A human undergoes some sort of procedure to become a ship, where the human body remains as the ship's pilot, and the consciousness becomes the ship. As a passenger ship, the ship's only duty is to follow directions, protocol. She does this, except in the case of Li Sin, a young child stowaway onboard, who she befriends in her loneliness.

Over time, the ship begins to slowly find its humanity, and with it, the strength to divert from protocol. In the end, she makes the decision to break from its given route and save some refugees from a planet destined to be destroyed by the empire (the Principality). In opening up and choosing empathy, the ship finally finds family, in the stowaway and her crew.