Once again, when Mira called she found an image of Beth in her jumpsuit, seated in the cockpit of her mech. At the other woman’s query, she nodded. “You mean the space elevator? It’s remarkable—there are countless carbon nanotubes, each microscopically thin and yet it runs the entire length of the elevator. And the new robots they developed for the construction effort! Just think, if I’d gone into AI research like I’d intended in high school, I might have helped design and program those robots...” she said wistfully. “Though then we would have never met, so clearly there’s some profound drawbacks to that scenario,” she added playfully.<br/><br/>Beth was still maneuvering the mech as she spoke. “Anyway, I just finished another practice run, and I’m walking back to the hangar now. Other than that and seeing footage of the elevator, same old thing today. How’ve you been?”