"Um, he didn't come back to the house last night. He probably stayed over at Kramnik House."

It sent a brief current of tension down Althea's spine.

"Well, when he gets back, would you give him a message for me?"

"Sure, Aunt Al. What's the message?"

"Tell him that I love him and miss him already."

"Okay. I'm sure he misses you just as much."

Althea swallowed. "So am I. You take good care of him for me, Em. And get really good with Uncle Bart's ledgers and spreadsheets, so he can have a day off once in a while."

"I will. Bye, Aunt Al. See you in three years!"

"Bye, Em."

Althea powered down the radio and headed at once for the tunnel that led to the hatch where Liberty's Torch was docked.

The fusion plant ignited without incident. Althea watched the gauges unblinking as she nudged the power output toward the propulsion threshold, depressurized the docking seals and released the clamps, and opened the baffles to the reaction mass reservoirs.

Liberty's Torch accelerated smoothly away from the planetoid. Althea kept its exhaust plume of superheated plasma pointed well away from the Relic as the separation grew. When she was thirty kilometers away from her dock, she pulsed the ship's attitude thrusters to turn its heading toward the Eridanus cluster, and examined all her gauges and telltales closely.

Everything is green. Not even a tremor in any of the systems. I'm out of excuses.

Here I go, Grandpere.

She opened the reaction-mass baffles wide, powered the fusion unit up to full, and Liberty's Torch surged toward interstellar space.

It was twelve days' sublight travel before the densitometers indicated that Liberty's Torch's had reached a hard enough vacuum for the superluminal drive. Afflicted by uncertainty for the first time since she'd concluded her permittivity experiments aboard the Relic, Althea checked and rechecked her work. She strained to find anything, whether in her calculations or in her experimental results, that would suggest danger from going to maximum power. No flaw revealed itself in the mathematics; the experimental results and the graphs she'd drawn from them said nothing more.

Here I am. About to become the first human to leave the system. Let's hope I'm the first one to return.

She closed the baffles to the reaction-mass supply, damped the fusion unit to minimum, reached for the toggle that would activate the permittivity-field generator, and stopped.

What else do I hope for?

Maybe an explorer isn't supposed to hope for anything in particular. Maybe he's just supposed to look, and listen, and record what he's seen and heard. Like a scientist.

I'm one of each.

She dropped to her knees and bowed her head.

"God?" she whispered. "If you're real, and if you care at all about the stuff humans do, I hope you'll bless this journey. Please forgive me my doubts, help me to stay safe and sane, and keep my husband safe and sound until I return. Maybe that's too much for an unconvinced type like me to ask of you. But one way or another, here I go."

She rose, switched on the field generator, and ramped the fusion engine smoothly up to maximum.

"Amen."

Chapter 31.

Time was a millstone hung about Althea's neck. She ceased to keep track of the date as men reckoned it on Hope. In the interstellar wastes, it was meaningless.

She'd stocked Liberty's Torch as completely as she could manage. The ship's stores of entertainments and diversions were as copious and varied as its seven thousand cubic yards of physical space and two hundred fifty-six terabytes of digital storage could accommodate. She could read continuously for a century or more without running out of material. She could joust with the ship's computer over an uncounted number of simulated battlefields. When those pastimes palled on her, there was always exercise on any of the ingenious, multiply configurable resistance devices arrayed in the hold.

She used it all to the limit. She read more non-financial, non-scientific material in the year and more she spent between suns than in all her previous life. She played more computer games than she imagined could exist. She worked her body in every way the exercise gallery could provide, plus a few more courtesy of the bag of toys Martin had given her as substitutes for his affection.

Her ferocious need for distraction from the maddeningly slow passage through space started her playing with food, straining to concoct new flavors and textures from the ingredients onboard. It occasioned a fair amount of waste. She learned the hard way that some flavors and textures simply don't belong together, though in some cases her experiments might have turned out better had the components available been fresh rather than vacuum-packed.

Now and then, mindful of her promise to Martin, she tried to pray. It challenged her in a way no other undertaking ever had. She tried to imagine a conversational partner endlessly eager to hear her pleas, but indisposed to reply in any fashion she could interpret. She tried to see a face, to imbue it with the benevolence Martin had assured her God felt toward all who approached him. All her attempts fell short. They did not bring her the sense for which she'd hoped...the sense of communion with a being of infinite understanding, compassion, and love.

When all else palled upon her, she would stand at the viewscreen and stare into space. The stars were plentiful in that direction; the view was grander than any she'd seen from the Relic, much less through the atmosphere of Hope. But the tableau was too static to hold her attention for very long.

Yet the prolonged isolation taught her much about herself. They were lessons her years surrounded by her kin had not managed to impress upon her.

For fifteen months Liberty's Torch plodded onward at slightly over Michelson seven. The power from its fusion engine was insufficient to force swifter passage.

She was near the limit of her endurance when the ship at last entered the cometary zone around her target star. She disengaged the permittivity drive, engaged the reaction drive, and activated the lidar scanners and broad-spectrum receivers.

The receivers immediately caught a spread of multiply modulated signals in the microwave and higher frequencies. The lidar returns hinted at an artificial structure in orbit around the third planet of the system.

Hope's first interstellar explorer had reached her intended destination. It appeared to be inhabited by a race as advanced as Man on Hope, if not more so. And she had no clear idea how to proceed.

When Liberty's Torch reached the outer margins of the K-class star's system of planets, Althea slowed to 50 miles per second. The signals and lidar returns she had interpreted as evidence of habitation by intelligent life while in the cometary zone had grown far stronger. A large spherical mass with a visible-light reflectance of nearly 100% orbited the third planet from the primary. She corrected course minutely, slowed still further, and observed closely.

The object was without detectable external features. Its orbit was coplanar with that of the third planet from the system's primary. It appeared not to rotate around any axis. Its smoothness and spherical perfection spoke of high power sources and extreme craftsmanship flawlessly executed in zero gravity. It was all too obviously a space station.

The station was emitting electromagnetic radiation in regularly spaced pulses, at a wavelength of 1215 angstroms. Liberty's Torch's receivers classified it as a probable attempt to communicate. Althea braked still further and activated the recorders, but made no immediate attempt to interpret the signal stream.

Should I reciprocate? It might be no more intelligible to them.

She activated the communications laser, set the modulation to unencrypted analog, and spliced in the voice output.

"To the entity or entities aboard the space station," she intoned, "This is Althea Morelon, mistress of interstellar vessel Liberty's Torch. My people call our world Hope. Our system is about..." She paused for thought. "About as far from here as light will travel in eleven of your revolutions around your primary star. My intentions are peaceful. I wish to make contact, but I'm uncertain how to proceed. If you can interpret this message, please respond in kind with your rules for a visit to your system and for docking with your station. Liberty's Torch will loiter here until I hear from you." She disconnected the voice output and waited.

Martin's exhortation to avoid what risks she could rose to her thoughts.

If they can tight-beam Lyman-alpha radiation that I can detect from the cometary belt, they have to have one helluva power source aboard that station. I'd better play very, very nice.

The answer arrived at once, in a musical alto voice.

"Welcome to Loioc system, Mistress Morelon. We have awaited your arrival with much pleasure. Please brake to approximately 1/5 of your current velocity while we analyze your vessel's hull and compose docking instructions."

Althea put a tight rein on her rising excitement and complied.

The Loioc were bipedal and humanoid. Unless the pair that awaited Althea in the station's docking bay were non-representative, they stood somewhat shorter than Earth-derived Man. The more closely she focused on either one, the more apparent were the subtle deviations that marked their departures from Terrestrial humanity. Their proportions were slightly different, possibly owing to having adapted to a stronger or weaker gravity. The resting angles of their limbs diverged slightly as well. Their faces were exquisitely beautiful, as human as anyone could wish, with smiles as welcoming as any she had ever seen.

She doffed her helmet and took her first breath of their air. It was rich with oxygen, and carried a subtle hint of sweetness.

"Yes," the one on the left said, "our respiratory needs are a good match for yours as well. Welcome to our home, Mistress Morelon. How may we make you comfortable?"

"Well," Althea said, "for starters, you could tell me how to address you." And maybe fill me in about how you learned to speak English.

The one on the left nodded. "I am called Efthis. My husband," she said, turning to her left, "is named Vellis." She took his hand, and he gazed at her in evident affection. "No doubt you are curious about my mastery of the English language."

Althea chuckled. "Well, yes."

"These past thirteen hundred years," Efthis said, "Hope has emitted radio signals of sufficient variety for us to deduce virtually the whole of your tongue. Indeed, we have watched your race from well before your ancestors' flight from Earth. We have long looked forward to meeting you."

"Is yours a spacefaring race," Althea said, "apart from this station?"

"It was once," Efthis replied. "No longer. In fact, this is the only offworld presence our race maintains."

Althea frowned. "Why?"

Efthis's gentle smile acquired a hint of world-weariness. "Let us say we saw all that we wished to see, and somewhat more." She glanced at her husband and nodded toward the interior, and he nodded in response. "Come, let us refresh ourselves together, and I shall tell you whatever you might wish to know."

They turned as one, and Althea followed them into the depths of the station.

"I don't believe it," Althea said.

Efthis cocked a hair-thin eyebrow. "Surely your people enjoy a warm bath after a day of exertion?" She swiftly divested herself of her coverall. Vellis followed suit, and the two climbed into what was plainly a large hot tub.

"Well...yes."

But in company with a couple of aliens? All right, they seem to be very nice aliens...so far, anyway.

Oh, what the hell.

She unzipped her vacuum suit, stepped out of it, groped for her gunbelt and realized, to her displeasure, that in the excitement of first contact she'd forgotten to arm herself.

Probably wouldn't matter anyway. A race that could build this station and give it nearly a gee of gravity without spinning it would laugh at a Wolzman needler.

She removed her coverall, tossed it aside, climbed carefully over the side of the tub, and took a seat facing her hosts.

Vellis's eyes immediately fixed upon her, wide in undisguised fascination. He looked pleadingly at his wife. She studied him for a moment, then turned to Althea with a faintly mysterious expression.

"Vellis would like to touch you," she said. "Would you permit it?"

"Uh..." Oh, why not? They're probably puzzled that I'm not just as curious about their bodies. "Sure, okay."

Efthis nodded to Vellis, who flowed across the water between him and Althea so swiftly that he was upon her before she realized it.

"Upon her," indeed. The Loioc male wrapped himself around Althea, arms and legs both. He squirmed against her in a powerfully erotic fashion. His erection probed for her vagina with no pretense to the contrary. The surprise of it paralyzed her.

"Efthis," she croaked, counter-squirming to keep Vellis's phallus from finding the orifice it sought, "just what is Vellis doing?"

Efthis frowned. "He's trying to merge with you. I would have thought that was obvious. Are you offended?"

"Uh, no, but..." Are you? "Why?" And why hasn't he said a word since I arrived here?

"You're very beautiful," Efthis said. "Wouldn't a male of Hope want to merge with you? Or is it not permitted for some reason?"

"Well, uh, yes, it's...permitted," Althea said. You think I'm beautiful? Vellis's squirming was becoming frenzied. He had begun to whimper. "But this is...a bit sudden."

Efthis shrugged. "It's up to you. Enjoy him as you wish, and for as long as you wish." She smiled. "If you'd like to test whether he can impregnate you, I have no objection to it."

"Uh, not just now, but thanks for the...hospitality. Maybe later." She forced her arms between her and the squirming Loioc male and thrust him forcibly away. Vellis shrieked at the separation. He wriggled frantically, lashing the water into little waves of anguish, in an attempt to re-establish the embrace. Althea held him at arm's length with only modest effort.

I've got to ask.

"Efthis," she said in a carefully controlled tone, "Vellis is mute, isn't he?"

Efthis frowned again. "Of course. Isn't it obvious?"

There's too much obvious stuff going on here. I shouldn't have relaxed.

Althea nodded, holding the agitated male firmly away from her. "Is it by accident, or was he born that way?"

The Loioc's frown deepened further. "Born that way, of course." She emitted a whistle of elaborate modulation. Vellis immediately ceased to struggle against Althea's restraint. She relaxed her grip, and he returned to Efthis's side reluctantly and with a look of frustration.

"Well," Althea said, "you must love him very much."

"Love?" Efthis said. "How does one love a nonsentient?"

"What?"

"Vellis is incapable of rational thought. He's been conditioned to be loyal to me. He knows nothing of love, no more than an animal of the field."

"But..." Althea groped for words. "Your husband?"