'That's exactly what I used to call it. Intolerable.' Tayrey doesn't believe in fate, but it has to be some kind of probabilistic synchronicity that he used that word, that he sees it that way. 'And they shouldn't have. That caused so much of the damage, you know? One evil man capturing you and not caring about your rights is... it's horrible, but it's one man. Having almost all your fellow prisoners side against you is something else.'

She should leave it there. She should. But Ari's drunk and she trusts Gaeta so much, more than she ought to, and her emotions are all so close to the surface right now.

'I told you that I died back there, right? But not how. It was because of that distress beacon. Our captor had this... closest I can come is calling her an AI. Humanoid figure without a face, enforcing his rules. Constant surveillance, materialising as soon as anyone stepped out of line. We had to be real careful, working on that beacon out of her sight. We needed a way to launch it without her immediately stopping it. So I came up with... with overload. Get people breaking so many rules all over the place that her processor couldn't handle it. And it worked!'

She can't help but sound triumphant, even now. 'It worked. Only a friend of mine, turns out he was real fond of this artificial prison warden. We had a contract, he and I. He'd promised never to hurt me. But because of her? He transformed into a monstrous animal, and literally chased me down, clawed and bit and crushed me, planned on eating me, and made out it was my fault for not being satisfied with living in captivity and being tortured. Because he... he fucking liked it. So that's how I died. Not that day. Days and days later, after doing my best to fight for my life.'

Her tone has changed, and not to the flat impersonal approach she usually takes when talking about her unpleasant past, but genuine distress.