Character guide

Ross

major

Also known as Mr. Ross, V Ross, Captain Ross

Ross is a trader's junior who stumbles onto the secret of a faster-than-light ship and the vanished colonies it could reach, making him the reluctant center of a mission to find out why the stars have gone quiet. His solid, fair-minded decency keeps colliding with worlds that answer curiosity with interrogation rods and gentle, smiling cruelty. He matters because his stubborn insistence on asking the right questions is what carries the search forward when everyone else has learned to stop.

Helena

major

Also known as Poor sweet Helena

Helena handles the ship with a swooping, timber-shivering recklessness that terrifies her crewmates even as it gets them where they need to go. She bristles at being called ugly by strangers and cries in a preoccupied way when frightened, but she never stops flying. Her willingness to take the controls—and her refusal to be cowed—makes her the crew's engine as much as its pilot, and her sharp instincts repeatedly save them from the traps waiting on each new world.

Marconi

supporting

Also known as Little Marconi, Trader Marconi, Mr. Marconi

Little Marconi stands four ranks above Ross in seniority, but the two juniors share lunch and confidences across the rival firms of Oldham and Haarland. He is rapturously, fatuously engaged to Lurline of the Old Landowners, waving a photo inscribed 'with crates of love' and reciting the child-bearing clauses of their contract as if they were poetry. Ross privately thinks him gaffed like a sugar perch, but Marconi's openness—and his willingness to listen—makes him the sounding board Ross needs before the mission begins.

Bernie

supporting

Also known as Bernie the Pullover, The Pullover, Bernard

Bernie punctuates crises with a long, mumbling catalogue of his own feeblemindedness—fatheaded, goggly-eyed, no-browed, slobber-lipped—while somehow staying in the thick of things. He is the one who spots the disguised gun-truck bearing down on them, and the one whose panic Ross has to silence before they can think. His jittery alertness and self-deprecating humor give the crew a human edge, reminding readers that these are not heroes but frightened people far from home.

Haarland

supporting

Also known as Mr. Haarland, old man Haarland, Mister Haarland, old Haarland

Haarland is the keeper of a terrible inheritance: the knowledge that the nucleophoretic effect behind the F.T.L. drive is also a weapon that can annihilate solar systems, which is why humanity's colonizers erased it from every record but one man per planet. He speaks of the danger not to the uncaring galaxy but to 'the sparse fester of life that called itself humanity,' and his face goes queerly gray when he admits there are things worse than war. His confession sets Ross on the mission and gives the story its moral weight.

Ben Jones

supporting

Also known as Ben, Jones, A different Jones, a Jones, A Jones

Doc Jones staggers into the control room loaded to the gills, bellowing a bawdy ballad about seven-sided doors and purple-colored curbing before remembering there are ladies present. Ross begs him to pull himself together before they meet the advanced people of Earth, but Jones goes pale and stumbles out again. His drunkenness is comic, yet his role as the outfit's scientist makes his collapse a real liability—and his absence forces Ross to speak for them all when they face the incomprehensible Earthfolk.

Sam Jones

supporting

Also known as Sam, Jones, the Jones, Dr. Sam Jones, Dr. Jones, By Jones

Jones is the starship's resident intellectual, the one Ross nominates to make first contact with the unnervingly advanced people of Earth. But he greets the moment of humanity's greatest need pickled in a backslide, bellowing a bawdy song about seven-sided doors and purple curbing before Helena's presence sobers him into mortified apology. His collapse forces Ross to improvise diplomacy with beings who have outgrown mathematics itself, making Jones's absence the hinge on which the crew's first contact — and their credibility — turns.

Charles Oldham IV

supporting

Also known as Oldham, Charles Oldham, Chuck

Oldham never appears onstage, yet his shadow governs Ross's choices: quitting him for a purser's berth feels ethical, quitting him for Haarland feels like betrayal. Haarland calls him 'that pompous young fool' and still phones him for a character reference, and the verdict — enough to hand Ross the assignment — arrives filtered through the old man's condescension. Oldham matters as the gravity Ross must escape: the respectable, dead-end orbit that Haarland's desperate mission yanks him out of.

Cavallo

supporting

Also known as the Cavallo, Miss Cavallo

Cavallo runs the biggest firm on Novj Grad's south side, and Ross's visit to her works ends with him muttering 'stupid old bat' in the street — a blasphemy Helena gently scolds. She embodies Azor's rigid, conservative order, the closed-mindedness Ross rails against when he names Haarland as the lone exception. Her refusal to entertain new ideas is what sends Ross and Helena walking Fifteen Street, where Helena's careless word 'women' detonates a mob and reveals just how alien this world's rules truly are.

Doc Jones

minor

Also known as A raucous Jones, Jones, Doc

Another Jones character, possibly a doctor or engineer.

The Judge

minor

Also known as judge

An authority figure who presides over a trial or judgment.

Ma

minor

A maternal figure, possibly a crew member's mother.

Dobermann

minor

Also known as Mr. Dobermann

A character with a German-sounding name, possibly a scientist.

Pilot Breuer

minor

Also known as Breuer

A pilot, likely of a spacecraft.

Doc Gibbons

minor

Also known as Doc

A doctor, possibly a minor medical figure.

Scholar Dobermann

minor

Also known as Dobermann

A scholarly character, possibly a scientist or academic.

Junior

minor

Also known as Junior Unit Twenty-Three, Junior Twenty-Three

A junior character, possibly a robot or young person.

Junior Dobermann

minor

Also known as Dobermann

A younger Dobermann, possibly a son or apprentice.

Marylyn

minor

A female character, possibly a narrator or focal point.

Flarney

minor

A minor character, possibly a crew member or local.

Whitker

minor

Also known as this Whitker, Mr. Whitker, old Whitker

An older male character, possibly a trader or elder.

Halsey

minor

A named character, possibly a pilot or officer.

Delafield

minor

Also known as Captain Delafield

A captain of a ship or vessel.

Joe Mulcahy

minor

Also known as Joe, Dr. Joseph Mulcahy

A doctor, possibly a minor medical officer.

Leverett

minor

Also known as Mr. Leverett

A minor character, possibly a crew member.

Mr. Oldham

minor

Also known as Oldham

An older male character, possibly related to Charles Oldham.

Minerva

minor

Also known as the Minerva

A female character, possibly a ship or personification.

Willie

minor

Also known as Virgin Willie

A minor character, possibly a young male.

Kent

minor

A minor character, possibly a crew member.

Masters

minor

A minor character, possibly an officer or narrator.

Sonny

minor

Also known as A Sonny

A young male character, possibly a child or junior.

Lurline

minor

A female character, possibly a mythical or local figure.

Peepeece

minor

Also known as the Peepeece

A minor character, possibly a nickname or alien.

Buster

minor

A minor character, possibly a nickname.

Hennery Matson

minor

Also known as Matson, Hennery

A minor character, possibly a crew member.

Smiley Smog

minor

Also known as Smiley, Uncle Smiley, Uncle Smiley Smog

A jovial character, possibly an uncle figure.

Angela

minor

A female character, possibly a love interest.

Sherrington

minor

A minor character, possibly a scientist or officer.

Azor

minor

A minor character, possibly an alien or local.

Fallon

minor

Also known as Mr. Fallon

A minor character, possibly a crew member.

Aalborg

minor

A minor character, possibly a place name used as a person.

Wesley

minor

A minor character, possibly a young male.

Appleby

minor

Also known as Senior Citizen Immanuel Appleby

An elderly character, possibly a senior citizen.