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Pop Gillette has flown the spacelanes for forty years, his hands knowing every lever and dial of his ship like muscle memory. Now the galaxy runs on automation, and the young pilots laugh at his old-fashioned ways. When the electronic brains that run everything suddenly fail on a routine flight, Pop becomes the only thing standing between his crew and the void. William Shedenhelm's 1950s short story is a quiet, aching meditation on what it means to grow obsolete in a world that doesn't need you anymore, and the strange grace of being needed one last time.