A frustrated smell emerged from Photuris’s suit. The helmets were off, and Sarah had to imagine it would’ve been much worse otherwise. “The ancients did not consider that acceptable. Many of their number were concerned with the continuity of consciousness. They considered any existence that could not grant that as a guarantee to be unacceptably cruel. That was why Harmony was so forceful with us—the handful of deaths it observed were unacceptable and could not be repeated.”