"Yep," Sven said with characteristic loquacity.

The sound that was not a sound, heralding the opening of a major gate, intensified. Beyond the imposing array of barriers, armed guards, ramps, fences, metal detectors, X-ray equipment, and dual medical stations stood a broad ramp which rose fifteen feet into the air, then simply ended. Light near the top dopplered through the entire visible spectrum. Then Shangri-La Station's main gate-and sole link with the rest of the uptime world-dilated open.

Uptimers streamed into the station, hauling baggage down that long ramp toward the Medical station barring the way. One by one, station medical personnel scanned and logged medical records. Malcolm waited in a cold sweat for the one slight figure in all that crowd he'd waited months to see-and dreaded meeting again. Then, before he was ready for it, she was there, hair back to its natural flaming red, all trace of brown dye banished until she was ready to take up time scouting as a professional.

Margo ...

Malcolm's belly did a rapid drawing in. How could he have forgotten what that little slip of a girl could do to a man's body chemistry, just by walking down an ordinary ramp? Margo was dressed-to Malcolm's astonishment in a chaste little floral-print dress that came nearly to her ankles. The swing of its long skirt and the way it clung to skin he vividly recalled the taste and touch of did bad things to Malcolms breath control. Her hair was longer, too, and-if possible sexier than ever as it curled around her ears. Oh, God, what if she says no? Please, Margo, don't walk down that ramp and tell new you've met some boy at school ....

She caught sight of him and her face lit up like Christmas on Picadilly. She shifted a heavy duffle bag to wave and blow a kiss right at him. His belly did another rapid drawing in that made breathing impossible. He waved back. His knees actually felt weak.

"Buck up, man," Kit muttered in his ear. "You're white as a sheet."

The ring in his pocket all but burned him through the cloth. He'd thought to give it to her here, but with all these well-intentioned onlookers ... Then, again before he was ready, she'd cleared station medical and dropped the duffle bag to run straight into his arms.

Margo Smith had not forgotten how to kiss.

By the time they disentangled, spontaneous applause had broken out even amongst tourists Malcolm had never laid eyes on. Margo flushed, grinned, then flung her arms around Kit.

"I missed you!"

"Humph!" Kit said, crushing her close despite the attempt at pretense. "The way you greeted Malcolm, I thought you'd forgotten your grandfather existed!"

Margo shocked them all by bursting into tears. "Forget you?" She hugged him more tightly than ever. "Don't you count on it!"

Malcolm cleared his throat while Kit shut his eyes and just held her. After the losses Kit had suffered, Margo's impromptu demonstration meant more than she could possibly know. And after the terrible fights they'd had, it was good to see that look on Kit's face.

Eventually she dried her eyes and sniffed sheepishly. "Sorry. I really did miss you. Sven! And Ann! You came to see me!"

Ann hugged her former pupil tightly. "Welcome home, Margo."

Sven Bailey, true to his nature, demonstrated his affection by launching a snap kick right at her midriff. Margo wasn't there when it should have connected. Despite the hampering cloth of her long dress, she danced aside and managed to land a stinging punch before grabbing Sven and hugging him tightly. He made a single sound of outrage, turned as red as Margo's hair, and extricated himself with slightly-less-than-excessive force.

"Huh. Good to see you remembered some of what I drilled into you, girl."

Margo grinned. "Just a little. Care to spar later? I've been practicing."

Sven Bailey's eyes lit up like an evil gnome's. "You're on!"

Then, shocking everyone, he picked up Margo's luggage and set out with it, calling over one shoulder, "Neo Edo? Kit's apartment? Or Malcolms place?"

Margo flushed bright pink, glanced guiltily at Kit, bit one lip, and said, "Uh, Malcolm's?"

Kit's face fell until Margo hugged him again and whispered, "Just for tonight, okay? I mean, well, you know."

Kit turned brighter red than Sven had.

Ann laughed aloud. "That's twenty you owe me, Kit."

Kit just produced the money and said repressively, "You had better be safe about it, Margo."

Margo put out a pink tongue. "I promised that before I went off to school. And I don't break my promises." At his look, she added, "Not anymore. I learned that lesson! But I want dinner with you at the Delight, so you'd better not have any dates lined up for tonight!"

Kit relaxed into smiles again. "Arley's already reserved our table."

"Good! College food sucks!"

"Watch your mouth," Kit said mildly.

"Well, it does." But she smiled as she said it.

Her gaze caught sight of the brave decorations strangling Commons and her mouth and eyes turned into little O's of wonder. "Oh, Malcolm, look! When did that happen?"

Kit laughed. "Another new 'eighty-sixer tradition you haven't been introduced to yet. Winter Holiday Decorations Contest. The vendors around each gate try to outdo one another. Last year, a three-story, arm-waving plastic Santa caught fire."

"Oooh, bet the stink of that took a while to clear."

Malcolm chuckled. "Yes. Whichever way you choose to interpret that."

Margo sighed. The gaudy spectacle was clearly, in her eyes, utterly enchanting. Then she shook herself and glanced at Kit. "Oh, uh, by the way? I've decided going back uptime to that school you got me into is a complete waste of time. Brian's got a much better library and, well, it's just awful!"

Before Kit could erupt into a violent temper, Margo held out one hand. "Just think about it. We'll, uh, talk more later. Okay?"

Kit hrumphed and said, "All right, my girl, but you're gonna have to talk pretty fast and damn convincingly to change my mind."

Margo laughed, a grown-up burble more than a childlike giggle. "Oh, I will. Don't you fret about that."

When she grabbed Malcolms hand, Malcolm felt like the air around his brain was fizzing and sparkling. He wondered if Margo could actually feel how hard his heart was thumping through the contact of her fingers against his.

"Any interesting prospects in that group?" Ann, who'd taken in the entire by-play with wide, fascinated eyes, asked. She nodded toward the other uptimers as they headed down the brightly lit, gloriously garish Commons.

"Hmm ... actually, yeah. There's this group of paleontologists headed downtime through the Wild West Gate. Couple of PhDs, three grad students. They're all set-they think," she chuckled, "to study the Bone Wars."

"Bone Wars?" Ann echoed, sounding astonished.

Margo glanced up at Kit, looking smug as a cat that's sneaked a choice morsel off someone's plate. "Yeah, the Bone Wars. There were these two paleontologists, see, Cope and Marsh, who got into a war with one another collecting fossils from the American West. It was kind of an undeclared wager to see who could name the most new specimens and mount them in museums back east. Heck of a wager, too, let me add. Their agents would actually sneak into one another's camps and smash up specimens, shoot at one another, real exciting stuff. But they brought out a king's ransom in dinosaur bones, between them, because of the competition. Named tons of new species and genera and stuff. So, anyway, these guys-well, one of the grad students is a woman-they want to study it firsthand. Said they've already got their own weapons, rifles and pistols, but they were all cased up for the trip through Primary. I made 'em promise to show me their rifles and stuff before they left and made 'em swear to God and all the angels they'd see you for lessons first. I think one of 'em would rather touch a live rattlesnake than the guns he brought along."