by Roger Bourke White Jr., copyright 2010
When real interstellar space commerce happens, the trips will take a long time, and the ships will be city-sized. And the cargo moved from star system to star system must be very valuable—no one is going to find it profitable to move iron ore from Alpha Centauri to Sol.
One of the valuable cargos will be highly trainable, highly adaptable humans.
This is the story of a starship getting ready to add some cargo, but there is a twist.