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38. A discreet note: despite the ‘rum, sodomy and the lash’ line that gets thrown around about life in the Stormwracks, it’s worth pointing out that only the rum is compulsory, and even then alcohol-free options are available. If the other two do happen to be your thing, you should know that Keelhaulyer has a well-regulated, heavily unionised sex industry, which its participants take great pride in. Rest assured, there are plenty of opportunities to get Jolly – and ethically – Rogered in these parts.
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39. Please, please remember to make sure you sign up under a temporary contract.
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40. Some anatomical diagrams can’t be unseen.
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41. Piratical dive technology is not recommended, being essentially a wooden barrel on the end of an air hose.
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42. Mostly the latter.
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CHAPTER FOUR: CHUGHOLME
1. You’ve already rinsed 120 of them, mind. And on what I have to say is the most atrociously pompous paragraph I’ve yet to see you produce. Well done, I guess? – ES
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2. Sorry, Eliza – is it ‘a eulogy’ or ‘an eulogy’?
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3. Figure it out yourself. I’m not going to edit a word of this chapter. I’m just going to bin it on press day, so write what you like. – ES
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4. Pronounced ‘Chalmondesleydale’.
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5. They were mostly boarding-school kids enjoying a break from their studies.
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6. I met her once, by the way.
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7. Their gripe was something about independence, or the means of production – I can’t remember, to be honest.
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8. Although I was devastated to forfeit my reserved table at the Botherstone.
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CHAPTER FIVE: SPACE
1. They may think they’re clever, but really – when it comes down to it, what are astrophysicists but overqualified geographers?
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2. Floyd, isn’t this both a) alarmingly colonial, and also b) entirely against the ground rules we agreed for your travels? Those flags are meant for sports games, not fucking conquest. And don’t you dare tell me it ‘doesn’t count because they’re only plastic’. – ES
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3. Wow. There’s just so much to unpack in that last statement. It’s a work of art. I don’t know where to start, so I reckon I’ll just let you continue. – ES
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4. Yuck. I don’t ever want to hear that sequence of words from you ever again. – ES
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5. Neither things are as bad as they sound. The SPACE Pirates are largely recent immigrants from Spume and are thus way too polite to be much genuine trouble, while the Xenads haven’t been proven to lay their eggs in anyone’s mouth.
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6. I really can’t cope with the capital letters every time I read this, so this is henceforth the style when referring to them and them alone. – ES
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7. Who can fathom the Missions of the Space Men?
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8. My favourite is Captain Karl Bludgeon, by a mile.
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9. But the guns can be put on a setting that just makes people sleepy, so it’s not a military force, OK?
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10. It’s called “terrorforming”.
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11. As far as I can tell, the designation is largely about bragging rights. This way, people can boast about being the best pilot in the Galaxy, or making the finest soup in the Galaxy – or whatever – and it’s harder for people to disagree.
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12. ‘Who would win out of the Syndicate and the Galaxy’ is always a cracking debate. And for the record, if all the best Syndicate Captains teamed up, they could totally defeat the whole Galaxy in an afternoon. It’s just beneath the Syndicate, is all. They’re classier than that.
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13. Floyd, you have to at least try. – ES
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14. They’re really not OK, the poor bastards.
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15. About that: if you run into any disgruntled diplomats on Outpost Bravo grumbling conspiratorially about a supposed ‘land grab’ by me on Earth’s behalf, just ignore them. They don’t know what they’re talking about. And Eliza (since I know you’re reading this), don’t pay any heed to talk of me bribing Syndicate Captains to look the other way on all the flag-planting. Aliens talk a lot of shit, you know?
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16. Hmm. Right. – ES
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17. Has anyone tried talking to them? I don’t want to point out the obvious,but they look exactly like the Scolopendrakin on Mittelvelde, who were also exterminated on sight as vile monsters, until they turned out to be thoroughly decent people (and they definitely don’t lay eggs in anyone’s mouths, for the record). – ES
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18. Even so, to this day it’s illegal to turn a telescope towards any of the systems once blighted by the Multibears, just in case they’re still there.
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19. They reproduce by budding, just like yeast. It’s extremely odd. The newly budded Space Men aren’t even babies, just sort of … crunched-up, muscly little men born with the minds of their progenitors, who slowly expand over the course of a few weeks. They’re prolific budders too, so it’s lucky they’ve such a titanic mortality rate, or they would overcome the whole sector.
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20. The Space Men are very anxious about *everything*, given the sheer amount of amphetamine rations they feel compelled to chew their way through.
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21. I have no idea how they got from Spume to SPACE, of course. Certainly, the suggestion that I accepted bribes from Spume to allow certain individuals to relocate is simply bunkum, and fodder for the credulous mind.
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22. It’s literally only you who calls them that. – ES
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23. They’re not balls, you fool! They’re external kidneys! – ES
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24. Ugh, seriously, they’re astonishingly boring. All they talk about is maths.
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25. Their bloody lawyers are always pulling contracts
