The Employees

Set aboard an interstellar spacecraft called the Six Thousand Ship, the novel is composed entirely of numbered employee statements collected by an investigative committee over 18 months. The committee's stated purpose is to examine how crew members relate to mysterious objects housed in rooms on the ship and to assess whether those relationships cause deviations in employee performance. The statements are presented out of sequence, without names, and the speakers' identities as human or humanoid emerge only through contextual details. A committee assessment and post-termination addendum follow the statements.

The Six Thousand Ship orbits a planet called New Discovery, where crew members have ventured into a valley to dig strange objects from the earth. These objects vary in size and material: some hum, some emit fragrances, one lays an egg. Employees assigned to care for them describe powerful sensory and emotional responses. One speaks to a large, suspended object during quiet hours, having discovered that it laid an egg which cracked on the floor. Another describes three objects that function as a collective, alternating warmth and compelling the speaker to touch them despite revulsion. The first officer describes a ritual performed before each passage: donning yellow headgear, passing through a cleansing corridor of light, and greeting each object so the objects will recognize the officer.

The crew is divided into humans, born on Earth, and humanoids, manufactured in laboratories by a figure named Dr. Lund at a facility called January 01. Humanoids resemble humans in appearance and sensation but can be updated through software installations and "reuploaded," a process that transfers their data into a new body at the cost of minor memory loss. Humans age and die. Despite these differences, the two categories work side by side, and the boundary between them blurs. A humanoid who has never had a childhood works alongside a human who insists on taking breaks to tell stories about Earth. When the human places a warm hand on the humanoid's shoulder, the gesture leaves a lasting impression. Another humanoid feels a longing to be human and asks whether a change in official documents could grant them human status.

The objects intensify these questions. Employees develop deep attachments: one describes an object found in a rock crevice as a splinter near the heart and requests permission to hold it. Another visits the rooms compulsively and experiences palpitations and derealization when a favored object is removed. The rooms carry fragrances that act on the crew's bodies and minds. Disturbing dreams proliferate: employees report tiny stones lodged in their pores, seed grain growing from their flesh, walls closing in with patterns like seeds within seeds. A medical officer notes warts appearing among crew members, with green and black dots speckling the skin beneath.

Humanoid employees struggle openly with questions of identity and autonomy. One insists they are living despite the committee calling their emotional responses "attacks." Another asks who grants forgiveness for actions that contradict the program governing their behavior. A humanoid told they cannot cry because they are not programmed to do so keeps self-activating after repeated shutdowns, wanting only to live close to the humans and be embraced by their fragrance. The organization orders separation between the categories.

The human crew deteriorates in parallel. They gather in the canteen whispering about Earth, about rain, strawberries, the weather. A pilot who lost a pregnancy before departure describes flying not under a sky but through a slumbering infinity. The funeral director, whose job is cremating terminated workers, takes pride in human mortality as what distinguishes humans from the humanoids. Yet the objects alleviate some despair: a large object with deep yellow grooves, when struck by sunlight, oozes a fragrant resin that fills everyone present with happiness. The crew keeps the cloths used to wipe it and places them over their faces at bedtime.

Tensions sharpen. Humanoids begin sitting together silently in the canteen, a behavior one human interprets as conspiracy. A humanoid delivers a warning in metaphor: the organization is a family sheltering in a warm house while the humanoid stands in the rain, becoming the storm the house was built to exclude. Another demands that tests be stopped and humanoid representatives attend meetings about update timelines. One asserts that although they were made, they are now making themselves.

The conflict erupts into violence. A humanoid kills a human crew member and states in testimony that humanoids do not understand death since they cannot be destroyed and will go on regenerating. The organization designates certain humanoids as "offenders," a label some adopt with pride. The captain, exhausted and unable to keep pace, requests permanent dormancy. A human recounts a friendship with a humanoid that ended when the humanoid warned them to avoid the canteen the next day. The human failed to report the warning, and something unforgivable followed.

The organization attempts to regain control. The funeral director volunteers to oversee a remote shutdown program for the humanoids, and a human employee accepts the task of dismantling the humanoid crew via the ship's mainframe. Both efforts fail: humanoids stop appearing for installations and no longer plug in daily. Six crew members are lost, and one employee locks herself in her bunk room with a child hologram on repeat. A first-generation humanoid observes that negotiations have completely broken down but does not share the view that humans should be eliminated, suggesting they may be the element of chaos that keeps the world alive.

With no alternative, the remaining humans jointly request that the board of directors terminate the Six Thousand Ship. Unable to leave in their lifetimes, they have accepted the prospect of dying aboard. They ask only not to be told the date. A scientist who witnessed the first humanoids hatch from violet biological pods at January 01 views the conflict as a creative leap that should be observed with awe, not suppressed, but concedes that if the organization refuses to step back, the ship is an unsuccessful terrarium.

As termination radiation travels toward the ship, a humanoid fourth officer gives testimony while the ship trembles and the objects' hum rises to a high monotone. The humanoid insists they are living and reassures the frightened committee that they will all meet again on a different ship. A human tries to compose a final message home but cannot find the words. The last employee statement is a humanoid's looping declaration: "I believe in the future. I think you need to imagine a future and then live in it."

The committee assessment reveals several key facts. The board ordered a biological termination designed to preserve the ship and its objects while disintegrating all biological material above a certain pulse level. The committee members themselves were humanoid, not human, though they were presented as human because research showed employees respond more positively to human-appearing representatives. The committee deems the mission a success despite its early end and recommends a similar voyage with program changes. The ship is to remain empty, since it is unclear whether the disruptions resulted from the objects, the program, or both. The committee proposes using the collected statements for educational purposes, noting that readers' reactions could themselves be studied as evidence of the objects' influence.

Because the recording equipment survived the termination, three final transmissions are captured. The first, made 36 hours after the event, reports that all humans and committee members are dead. Of the humanoid crew, 58 perished within minutes while 14 remain. One survivor has strung human eyes on a string and hung them in a recreation room. The speaker sits with an object in their lap and addresses their future reuploaded self: "Hi, Marianna, everything turned out fine in the end." The second recording describes a humanoid lying in New Discovery's valley, touching grass for the first time, knowing the grass will remain in the dead body's fist while they continue in a new body elsewhere. The third recording, made 76 hours after termination with eight humanoids remaining, announces their collective decision to leave the ship and enter the valley, where plants and objects are pushing up through moist earth. They accept the risk of never being reuploaded. Their closing words are the last the recording captures.