“My name’s Priscilla,” she said. “You guys can have it. You need any help?”
“No, we’re good. You should probably go inside. They’re waiting for you.”
She took her bag, went into the access tube, and was met at the other end by a young woman and a short, stocky man with thick gray hair. “Hello,” he said, offering a hand. “I’m Joe Chappell. And this is Wilma Barrister. We’re happy to see you, umm—”
“Priscilla Hutchins,” she said.
Wilma’s eyes sparkled. “Welcome aboard, Priscilla.” She was the comm operator.
They were in a lounge with a door in every bulkhead. A dozen chairs were scattered about, and a couple of small tables. A pennant reading PROJECT RAINBOW was fixed over the entrance. “How was the flight, Priscilla?” Chappell asked.
“Long,” she said.
“Yeah, we know about that. If there’s anything we can do to make you comfortable while you’re here, don’t hesitate to ask. Wilma will show you to your quarters and provide anything you need.”
“Thank you,” said Priscilla.
“It’s no trouble. We’re always glad to have a visitor. Especially one so charming.” The comment sounded automatic. Chappell started for one of the doors, but stopped. “Oh, you’re aware that you’ll be taking Monika Wolf back with you?”
“Yes, Joe. I know about that.”
“Very good. She’ll be ready to go in the morning. I expect about nine. Now, if you’ll excuse me, I’m in the middle of something.” He tried another smile, gave up, turned, and left.
“Problem?” asked Priscilla.
“No. Joe always has something important to do. He’s a good guy at heart.” She led the way out. “He’s our director, but I guess you know that.” It had been hard to miss.
“I thought that,” she said. “Wilma, what’s Project Rainbow?”
“That’s the terraforming operation.”
“How’s it coming?”
“All right, I guess.” She led the way through a door and down a corridor. “Be careful,” she said. “We have some spin but not much.” It was effectively zero gee. But they couldn’t have produced anything stronger without getting everyone dizzy. Wilma took a side corridor, stopped at a door, and opened it. “This one’s yours.”
The cabin was a bit compact, smaller even than the quarters on the Venture. But it wasn’t going to matter. She expected to be out of there within ten hours.
“Thanks, Wilma.”
“You’re welcome. And I wasn’t kidding about the party. Take whatever time you need. When you’re ready, come back to the lounge and meet everybody.”
* * *
IT WASN’T EXACTLY a party. The two cargo handlers, Rick and Tonya, were there. They were obviously lovers. A guy who seemed to be Wilma’s boyfriend showed up, and three or four others. “What are you drinking?” asked the boyfriend, whose name was Ben. “Here’s the wine list.” It was all nonalcoholic.
“Joe,” said Wilma, “doesn’t believe in alcohol on space stations.”
“I can understand that,” said Priscilla. “Drunks in orbit. Probably not a good idea.”
“You were alone in the ship?” asked Rick.
“Yes,” she said.
He made a face. “I don’t know why they do that.” Rick wore a shirt with a rainbow and the project name. “I don’t know how you guys manage it. I’d go nuts if they sealed me alone in one of those things for a week.”
“You get used to it,” she said, speaking like a veteran pilot and immediately regretting it. Somebody here might know this was her first mission. So she grinned. “At least, that’s what they tell me.”
“You new?” asked Wilma.
“Just a couple of weeks.”
Wilma introduced her to two physicists, Hal and Agnes. Hal was middle-aged, balding, and looked generally bored. He made it immediately clear that he’d been out there a long time. “We don’t get many visitors like you.”
Priscilla’s alarms went off. “I guess not, Hal. So you guys change the weather patterns, right?”
“We do more than that. Basically, what we do is climate adjustment.”
“In what way?”
He passed it over to Agnes, whose age and reactions signaled she could easily have been Hal’s mother. “We’ve had to modify the mix of gases in the atmosphere,” she said. “This place has good potential for human habitation. It’s one of maybe three worlds we’ve seen where people could actually live comfortably. But it needs some modification. Usually, if we get a decent climate, the gravity level’s too much. Or too little. Cilia II, for example, would be a great place to live. Standard gravity and an ideal atmosphere. But it’s unstable.”
“How do you mean?”
“There’s a ton of junk floating around in the system.” She laughed. “It gets whacked regularly by asteroids. In a billion years or so, the problem will go away on its own.”
Priscilla poured herself an apple juice. “What kind of adjustment do you need here?”
“A higher level of oxygen.”
“And you do it with superalgae?”
“Very good,” said Hal, trying to look impressed. “You’ve done your homework.”
She nodded. Looked back at Agnes. “How long have you been at it?”
“I don’t think anybody, except Hal, has been here longer than a year,” she said. “Project Rainbow, though, is about six years old.”
“How’s it been going?”
“Okay,” said Hal. “Oxygen content has gone from 15 to almost 16 percent. For better or worse. Or were you talking about the social life?”
Wilma’s eyes moved from Hal to Priscilla. She pursed her lips, as if Hal had told an inappropriate story. He shrugged. Smiled. Drank whatever was in his cup.
“Something wrong?” asked Priscilla.
“Well,” said Wilma. “Nothing critical. The nitrogen-oxygen balance seems to be having an adverse effect on some of the lower-level life-forms. No big deal.”
* * *
WILMA CONTINUED INTRODUCING her around, and one of the women made a play for her. As did one of the young males. Social reality in a place like Amity, she realized, was going to be a completely different ball game from anything she’d experienced before. Maybe that was why Monika Wolf was heading home. Priscilla actually felt guilty declining the offers. She almost felt as if she had an obligation to provide a break from the vapid existence. Amity. It brought a sad smile to her lips.
Toward the end of the evening, she heard raised voices somewhere in the station. One belonged to Chappell, the other to a woman. Priscilla couldn’t make out what it was about. The disruption lasted only a minute or so. But the lounge grew quiet. And when it was over, everyone behaved as if it had not happened.
* * *
SHORTLY AFTER SHE’D retired, Hal showed up at her cabin and asked whether she needed anything. She thanked him and assured him she was fine. He let her see his disappointment.
Priscilla was up early, packed her bag, and stowed it on the Venture. Then she joined a couple of the techs for breakfast in a conference room that also served as the dining area. She was finishing a plate of pork roll and eggs when she heard the same two raised voices that had interrupted the party the previous evening. “—No choice,” Chappell was saying. “I really wish you’d rethink things, Monika.” The director walked in, accompanied by a tall, intense woman with black hair and angry eyes. She wore a white blouse and green slacks, in contrast to the gray work uniforms everyone else had.
“Maybe,” said the woman, “you should think about the potential consequences of all this.”
“Try to be rational,” he said. “The chances of its happening are remote.”