Coral's mechanical fingers moved across the control panel, adjusting the signal range for the hundredth time that morning. The pink brain inside the glass dome pulsed with concentration. Remote surgery—that was the dream. To reach patients stranded in places no doctor could travel to in time. Her tank hummed softly as she practiced the hand movements again, imagining someone hurt and alone on a distant station. The delay between her command and the robot arms' response dropped by point-three seconds. Not enough yet, but better than yesterday. She pressed a heart sticker onto her practice log and did a little figure-eight spin. One day, she'd save someone a thousand miles away. One day soon. The new pulley system arrived in three metal crates that afternoon. Coral's tank bobbed with excitement as she unpacked the sleek cables and guides. This was it—her big practice test. She'd use the pulleys to send medical supplies across the training course, guiding them through narrow passages like threading a needle from far away. Her fingers twitched over the controls. The first supply packet lurched forward, wobbled, then glided smoothly along the cable network. She hummed through her nanobots, watching the packet navigate each turn. When it reached the target zone without dropping, her tank lights danced like fireflies. The dream wasn't just in her head anymore. It was real, moving through space, reaching where she couldn't go. But supplies were only half the problem. Connection was everything. Coral rolled over to the tall beacon she'd ordered last week. The sleek device would test whether her signal could stay strong across long distances. She activated it and watched the readout climb. Green bars filled the screen as the beacon synced with her tank's network. Her mechanical hands trembled slightly. This was the missing piece—the link that would let her guide surgical tools from far away. She adjusted the frequency and felt the connection hold steady. A smile would have crossed her face if she still had one. Instead, she stuck a star sticker on the beacon's base. The dream was getting closer, one test at a time. The blueprints for the spaceport hospital spread across her display screen. Coral traced the layout with one metal finger, taking in every detail. The sleek building would be her base—the place where she'd sit in her tank and reach across impossible distances to save lives. Operating rooms designed for remote surgery filled the upper floors. Signal arrays lined the roof. She imagined herself there, guiding robot hands through delicate procedures while patients breathed on stations light-years away. Her tank did a slow figure-eight as she saved the blueprints to her files. Everything she'd practiced—the pulley system, the beacon tests, the hand movements—would come together in that building. The pieces were fitting like a puzzle, and soon she'd be ready to reach anyone, anywhere.