2062 Houston, Texas

Robin Tagore missed quiet. She found none in sleep.

A swarm of worries, with a blinding sun in the sky behind them, did strafing runs at herds of counted sheep. The sun was a bubbling cauldron of light, and the sky lit up in odd colors.

Salvation came when exhaustion blotted out the sun.

That's when she heard a steady knock on her door.

Robin surrendered, if only to stop the noise, and got up to let in a young woman who carried a notebook and a tray of brew.

"Hello, hello... good morning, Wally." "Good morning, Robin. I have notes to go over for today."

Robin let in her aide, grabbed a cup from the tray and headed to the bathroom. Wally sat in the living room and read aloud memos.

"While the CME took many secondary systems offline for months, such as streams and holos, and it will take time to restore."

"That's why you're here in person but you bring my favorite brew each time, so maybe a step backward is a step up."

"Thanks to shielding and backups, most core systems are dormant and we are restarting them. We have connections through long-haul lines between operation locations. We have legacy systems."

Legacy is more than inheritance, obligation, and tradition. Legacy is memory.

"How... how is Heavyville?" Robin was thinking about friends and family at one of the Space Cooperative's top launch facilities. Her promotion and transfer from Heavyville to Houston was recent. A hurricane had devastated the Gulf coast.

"Recovery operations have been declared over. There will be a memorial held by local officials. You're invited. I can have a speech ready if you decide to go."

Robin walked in, dressed in a mix of old Cooperative clothes, with her half-finished brew. "I'll go. I have to."

Wally paused, and kept reading from an endless list of "ASAPs".

"What is the top thing on the list?" asked Robin. Back in Heavyville, she focused on bottlenecks, everything else marked "ASAP" was demoted and sent back in line.

"Finance." said Wally. "Finance?" Robin looked confused.

Robin joined the Cooperative as a "Launcher", a "Rocketman". Money was a treated as a given in the background, it flowed in the background like a river. Everyone's job was about space.

"Okay. Walk me through what's going on."

They walked outside and entered the morning flow of the Space Cooperative campus. Everyone was walking or cycling to work.