"Suit yourself. Still, you might try to see more of the ship, other than your quarters and this lab."

"I talk to Metz and Brookida all the time on screen. I don't need to wander around gawking at this Rube Goldberg contraption that can't even fly any more."

"And besides…" she prompted.

Charlie grinned. "And besides, I hate getting wet. I still think you humans should have worked on dogs second, after casting your spells on us Pan types. Dolphins are all right — some of my best friends are fins. But they were a funny bunch to try to make into a space-traveling race!"

He shook his head with an expression of sad wisdom. Obviously he thought the whole uplift process on Earth would have been better handled had his people been in charge.

"Well, they're superb space pilots, for one thing," Dennie suggested. "Look at how hot a star jockey Keepiru is."

"Yeah, and look at what a jerk-off that fin can be when he's not piloting. Honestly, Dennie, this trip has made me wonder if fins are really ready for spaceflight. Have you seen how some of 'em have been acting since we got into trouble? All the pressure is making some of 'em unravel, especially some of Metz's big Stenos."

"You're not being very charitable," Dennie chided. "Nobody ever expected this mission to be so stressful. I think most of the fen are doing marvelously. Look at how Creideiki slipped us away from that trap at Morgran."

Charlie shook his head. "I dunno. I still wish there were more men and chimps aboard."

One century, that's how much longer than dolphins chimps had been a recognized space-faring species. Dennie figured a million years from now they would still hold a patronizing attitude toward fins.

"Well, if you're not coming, I'm off," Dennie said. She took her notecase and touched the palm-plate by the door. "See you, Charlie."

The chimp called after her, before the door hissed shut behind her.

"Oh, by the way! If you run into Tkaat or Sah'ot, have em call me, eh? I'm thinking these subduction anomalies may be paleotechnic! An archaeologist may be interested!"

Dennie let the door close without answering. If she didn't acknowledge Charlie's request, she could feign ignorance later. There was no way she would go out of her way to speak to Sah'ot, whatever the significance of Charlie's find!

Avoiding that particular dolphin was already taking up too much of her time.

The dry sections of the starship Streaker were extensive, though they served only eight members of the crew. The one hundred and thirty dolphins — down by thirty-two since they had left Earth — could only visit the dry-wheel by riding a mechanical walker or "spider."

There were some rooms that should not be flooded with hyper-oxygenated water, nor be left to the gravity fluctuations of the central shaft when the ship was in space. There were stores that had to be kept dry, and machine shops that performed hot processing under gravity. And there were the living quarters for men and chimp.

Dennie stopped at an intersection. She looked down the hallway where most of the humans had their cabins and thought about knocking on the door two cabins down. If Tom Orley were in, this could be the time to ask his advice about a problem that was growing daily more irksome, the way to handle Sah'ot's unusual… "attentions."

There were few people better qualified to advise her on non-human behavior than Thomas Orley. His official title was Alien Technologies Consultant, but it was clear he was also out here as a psychologist, to help Dr. Metz and Dr. Baskin evaluate the performance of an integrated dolphin crew. He knew cetaceans, and might be able to tell her what Sah'ot wanted from her.

Tom would know what to do, but…

Her habitual indecision reasserted itself. There were plenty of reasons not to bother Tom right now, like the fact that he was spending every waking moment trying to find a way to save all of their lives. Of course, the same could be said of most of the crew, but experience and reputation suggested that Orley just might be able to come up with a way to get Streaker and her crew away from Kithrup before the ETs captured her.

Dennie sighed. Another reason to put it off was pure embarrassment. It wasn't easy for a young fem to ask personal advice of a mel as worldly as Thomas Orley. Particularly when the subject was how to cope with the advances of an amorous porpoise.

However kind Tom would be, he would also be forced to laugh — or obviously bite back laughter. The situation, Dennie admitted, would have to seem funny, to anyone but the object of the seduction.

Dennie quickened her pace up the gently curved corridor toward the lift. Why did I ever want to go into space, anyway? she asked herself. Sure, it was an opportunity to advance my career. And my personal life was in a shambles anyway, on Earth. But now where am I? My analysis of Kithrupan biology is getting nowhere. There are thousands of bug-eyed monsters circling over the planet slathering to come down and get me, and a horny dolphin's harassing me with suggestions that would make Catherine the Great blush.

It wasn't fair, of course, but when had life ever been fair?

Streaker had been built from a modified Snark hunterclass exploration vessel. Few Snarks were still in service. As Terrans became more comfortable with the refined technologies of the Library, they learned to combine the old and new — ancient Galactic designs and indigenous Terran technologies. This process had been in a particularly awkward phase when the Snarks were built.

The ship was a bulb-ended cylinder with jutting, crane-like reality flanges in five bands of five along her hull. In space the flanges anchored her to a protecting sphere of stasis. Now they served as landing legs as the wounded Streaker lay on her side in a muddy canyon, eighty meters below the surface of an alien sea.

Between the third and fourth rings of flanges, the hull bulged outward slightly for the dry-wheel. In free space the wheel rotated, providing a primitive form of artificial gravity. Humans and their clients had learned how to generate gravity fields, but almost every Earth ship still possessed a centrifugal wheel. Some saw it as a trademark, advertising what some friendly species had recommended Terrans keep quiet, that the three races of Sol were different from any others in space… the "orphans" of Earth.

Streaker's wheel held room for up to forty humans, though right now there were only seven and one chimpanzee. It also held recreation facilities for the dolphin crew, pools for leaping and splashing and sexual play during off-duty hours.

But on a planet's surface the wheel could not turn. Most of its rooms were tilted and inaccessible. And the great central bay of the ship was filled with water.

Dennie rode a lift up one of the spokes connecting the dry-wheel to the ship's rigid spine. The spine supported Streaker's open interior. Dennie stepped from the elevator into a hexagonal hallway with doors and access panels at all angles, until she reached the main bay lock, fifty meters forward of the wheel spokes.

In weightlessness she would have glided rather than walked down the long passage. Gravity made the corridor eerily unfamiliar.

In the bay-lock, a wall of transparent cabinets held spacesuits and diving gear. Dennie chose a bikini from her locker, and a facemask and flippers. Under "normal" circumstances she would have donned coveralls, a small jet belt, and possibly a pair of broad armwings. She could have leapt into the central bay and flown the humid air to any place she wanted, providing she was careful of the rotating spokes of the dry-wheel.

Now, of course, the spokes were still, and the central bay contained something more humid than air.