Satoshi drifted to a stop. Stephen Thomas, who hated zero-g, waited uneasily with one hand clamped around a grip. He managed to smile when he saw Satoshi. Satoshi floated to his
side and put one arm around him. Stephen Thomas hugged him with his free arm, then massaged the junction of Sato-
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shi's neck and shoulder. Satoshi groaned as the tight muscles started to loosen.
"Thanks. That feels great."
A hologram created itself in the center of the waiting room. As the image of the transport approached the image of the cylinder, all the people within the volume of the hologram drifted out of it and surrounded it, watching. The bulky, asymmetrical transport touched the docking port. The faint vibration of its attachment quivered around them.
Victoria had been away for less than two weeks. It felt like months.
Stephen Thomas patted Satoshi's shoulder. "I'll give you a proper massage when we get home."
"It's better already." He let himself drift in the quiet air. Stephen Thomas did his best to appear nonchalant about the lack of gravity.
"When are you going to let me take you out for a spacewalk?" Satoshi said.
Stephen Thomas pushed back his hair with his free hand.
As usual, he had come into zero-g with his hair flying loose.
"Probably never."
"You'd like it."
"Probably get sick in my spacesuit," Stephen Thomas said.
Satoshi let the subject drop. He was convinced that Stephen Thomas would leam to like zero-g if he experienced the complete freedom of an untethered spacewalk, but Stephen Thomas grew sullen if he was pushed to do something he preferred to avoid. Gentle encouragement worked better.
The docking port opened and the transport passengers entered Starfarer. The more experienced travelers came first. A couple of helpers went in to assist the novices.
Satoshi and Stephen Thomas greeted their friends and acquaintances. The people who had traveled all the way to earth stood out from those who had just visited one of the O'NeilI colonies; all the veterans returning from earth wore bright new clothes.
Victoria appeared, wearing a gold scarf around her hair, a matching vest, and a swiriy black split skirt. She soared toward him, hand in hand with a plain, heavyset woman who must be J.D. Sauvage, though Sauvage was supposed to be a novice in space. This woman moved with the assurance of a
72 vonda N. Mclntyre
veteran. Behind her she towed a young red-headed man whom
Satoshi could not place.
Victoria let go ofJ.D.'s hand and floated toward Satoshi.
They clasped wrists, tumbled one around the other, and drew close enough to embrace. Victoria kissed him.
"Oh, I missed you."
"Me, too," Satoshi said.
Victoria fended off the wall with her foot, and, in doing so, damped most of their spin and changed their direction back toward Stephen Thomas. A second touch stopped them in front of him. He embraced Victoria with his free arm, but kept hold of the grip with his other hand.
"Welcome home."
"Thanks," she whispered, not trusting her voice any louder. After a moment holding them both, she opened the circle to include the two newcomers. "J.D.," she said,
"these are my partners, Satoshi Lono and Stephen Thomas Gregory. Guys, J.D. Sauvage, our alien contact specialist.
And this is Feral Korzybski, the journalist. He's come to do a story on the expedition."
"Welcome to Starfarer."
Stephen Thomas glanced at J.D. quizzically.
"Are you all right?"
"Yes, of course." She stared at Stephen Thomas. "Why do you ask?"
Satoshi hoped Stephen Thomas would leave auras out of the introductions. Sauvage apparently had some reservations about joining the team and the expedition. The last thing they needed was to have her decide Stephen Thomas was too strange to work with, and go straight back to earth on the same transport that had brought her. Never mind talking about auras in front of a reporter.
"Oh—no reason," Stephen Thomas said. "You looked worried, that's all."
"Have you been up here before?" Satoshi said.
"What?" She looked away from Stephen Thomas. "No, never."
"You look like an old hand in zero-g- But everybody knows everybody out here, and I know I've never met you."
"It must be because of diving, though there are a lot of differences. You move a lot faster than underwater." She took
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them all in with her glance. "Thank you for inviting me into the team. I know I'm going to like it. This feels . . . natural."
"Not to me," Stephen Thomas said plaintively. "Can we get back to solid ground?''
J.D. followed her new teammates from the transport waiting room, anxious for her first view of Starfarer.
Stephen Thomas disappeared over the lip of the tunnel entrance, hurrying toward the floor of the cylinder and Star-farer's normal seven-tenths gravity.
J.D. stopped short at the outlet of the tunnel, amazed by Starfarer. She sank toward the floor in the low false gravity, at the last moment remembering to get her feet under her.
The sun tubes, reflecting and dispersing sunlight from the solar mirrors, stretched along the axis of the cylinder, from above her to the distant far end. Their heat warmed J.D.'s face and shoulders and their light dazzled her.
Victoria glanced at her from a few meters down the hill.
"J.D., don't stare at the tubes'"
J.D. looked down fast. An abrupt wave of dizziness overtook her as the cylinder rolled back and forth around her. Victoria bounded to her side and grabbed her arm before she lost her balance.
"Stay still. It'll stop in a minute."
"I'm sorry." J.D. felt foolish. "I know better—about looking at the tubes am/about nodding or shaking my head."
Victoria smiled and patted her shoulder. "It's all right. Everybody 'knows' when they get up here that the light is direct from the sun, and that the inner ear reacts to the spin of the station. But the sun tubes look like great big fluorescent lights, and the acceleration feels just like gravity, so it takes a while to develop the new habits. Have you stopped spinning yet?"
"I think so." The dizziness had begun to disperse- It was a very strange sensation, one that would change depending on whether she nodded or shook or tilted her head, and depending on her relative orientation to Starfarer's spin. For the moment she had no wish to experiment with it.
Victoria let go of her elbow. "The light's filtered, so it's safer than looking at the sun, but it can damage your eyes.
Vonda N. Mdntyre
You have to be more careful in the wild cylinder, if you cross over fora visit. The light's even less filtered there."
"I'll remember." J.D. looked around, her gaze oblique to the sun tubes. "I know Starfarer is big—I knew exactly how big it is before I came up here. But I didn't realize how big it would feel.''
At the foot of the hill, the ground curved upward to her left and to her right. Far overhead, hazed by distance, the sides of the cylinder curved toward each other. The sun tubes obscured the side of the cylinder directly opposite, but the
rest lay spread above and around her like a map.
"Almost everybody has that reaction, their first time here."
"Come on, you guys'" Stephen Thomas shouted from halfway down the cylinder's end-hill. Below, the interior of the starship stretched out into the distance. Feral and Satoshi waited, ten meters down the slope. J.D. and Victoria joined them.
Feral squinted past the sun tubes toward the cylinder's far side. "Amazing how the people up there can keep their balance, walking upside down and all."