"After anything," she said.

Martin opened his eyes completely and wiped them to clear his mottled vision. What he saw was still not sharp; Ariel leaned on her elbow a meter away, face blurred, eyes indistinct, mouth moving. He made an effort to listen.

"The Wendys will make their gowns. We'll marry a planet. Do you ever think about that?"

He shook his head.

"I do. I'd like to let it all down, relax, sit in a thick, fresh atmosphere with the sun in the sky… just not worry about anything. Do you think people on Earth ever did that?"

"I suppose."

"I wonder if I'd make a good mother. Having babies, I mean."

"Probably," he said.

"I've just started thinking about being a mother. My thoughts… I've been young for so long, it's hard to imagine actually being grown-up."

"Ariel, I'm not thinking too clearly right now. We should talk later."

"If you want. I don't mind if you don't answer. Do you mind listening?"

"I don't know if I mind anything right now."

"All right," she said. "I'll wait. But we're going to be so busy."

"That will be good," Martin said. "Not having time to think."

"Do you have a voice…" She trailed off. "It sounds so silly, like something Rosa might say. Do you have a voice that tells you what's going to happen?"

"No," Martin said.

"I think I do. We're going to survive, Martin."

"Good," Martin said.

"I'll be quiet." She lay back and folded her hands on her stomach. Martin looked down at her from his seat against the wall.

"She's not as pretty as Theresa," Theodore said, standing over them. "But she's honest. She's resourceful. You could do a lot worse."

"Shut up," Martin said.

Ariel opened her eyes languidly. "Didn't say anything."

"Not talking to you," Martin said, slumping until his legs bumped hers, then sidling up next to her. He reached out and hugged her. She tensed, then sighed and relaxed, turned her face toward his, looked him over from a few centimeters, eyebrows arched quizzically.

"I know I'm not as pretty as Theresa," she whispered. Her vulnerability pricked deep beneath his lassitude.

"Shh," he said.

"You two were good," she said.

He patted her shoulder. "Sleep," he said.

She snuggled closer, gripping his hand with her long fingers.

Trojan Horseended super deceleration at ten percent light-speed. Volumetric fields lifted. They would coast for five days, then begin a more leisurely deceleration to enter the system.

The first response to their signal came on tight-beam transmission from the fourth planet, content simple enough: a close match, with subtle and interesting variations, of Hakim's repetitive code. The first twelve prime numbers were counted out in binary.

Martin examined the message while still dazed from the constraints. Simple acknowledgement, without any commitment or welcome.

Salutary caution in a forest full of wolves. Or supreme confidence mixed with humility…

Hakim sent another message, this time with samples of human and Brother voices extending greetings, his own voice counting numbers, and a list of mathematical and physical constants.

Martin ate his lunch of soup in a squeeze bulb and a piece of cake as he looked over fresh pictures of the fourth planet. Huge and dark, touched with streamers of water vapor cloud, wide black oceans and lighter gray continents.

"When will the other ships finish super deceleration?"

" Shrikein fifty-four minutes, and Greyhoundin one hour, fifty-two minutes," Hakim said. "We can noach them now, if you wish, of course."

"No need," Martin said. "Let them recover first. We need time to work on our disguise. We need to rehearse."

"Sounds like the class play," Erin said, moving in for a closer look at the projected fourth planet.

"We'll follow the script closely," Martin said. He looked around the compartment, making sure the Brothers had recovered from deceleration. They took the process harder than humans and needed two hours disassembled to bring themselves out of funk.

Eye on Sky came forward, Paola at his side. He smelled of some exotic spice Martin couldn't identify: wine and cinnamon, hot resin.

"We are ready," Eye on Sky said.

The bridge of Double Seedtook shape, Brothers and humans orchestrating the final practical and decorative touches.

The crew compartment made sleeping nets for humans and ring beds for Brothers—a series of hoops within which a braid could disassemble and the cords could hang, one or two claws attached to each ring.

Silken Parts and Paola translated the proceedings for all the Brothers.

"We'll have four more days to rehearse," Martin said. "Hakim and Sharp Seeing will keep track of our interchanges with whoever's down there. We'll have an all-crew briefing every twelve hours. If you're not on duty, you're free to contribute to the background. Ariel and Paola will coordinate with Scoots Fast."

"Scoots Fast has requested a name change," Paola said. "He wants to be called Long Slither. It's more accurate. And more dignified."

"Fine by me," Martin said. He followed Hakim and Eye on Sky into the noach "inner sanctum," a small interior compartment screened against outside examination. There was barely room for the three of them.

Eye on Sky contacted Shrikefirst. At the extreme edge of noach range, text messages were most reliable, and Shrike'smessage was projected flat before them. Silken Parts translated the Brother text, a short row of closely spaced curved lines: "We we are safe and still joined in the giant braid. Swift work and firm sand."

The last contact with Greyhoundbefore entry was short and sweet as well: "In orbit and recovered," Giacomo transmitted. "Everybody impatient. Good luck! "

"Giacomo needs to work on his poetry," Erin said wryly. "We're being outclassed."

Hakim, Martin, Paola, and Eye on Sky gathered on the new-made bridge. Panels pulled back to show steady blackness, a close-packed haze of stars.

"This is very splendid," Hakim said, touching the new bulkheads, so different in style from the moms' usual architecture. "Like being on a ship that might have been made by humans, begging the Brothers' pardon!"

"We we also feel that if traveled to the stars, it might have been on such a ship," Eye on Sky said.

Hakim nodded pleasantly, "For the time being, we still use the moms' remotes on a wide baseline, advanced eyes and ears…"

An image of the fourteenth planet, nearest to the Trojan Horse, grew before them in a small star sphere. Martin leaned forward. Mottled, cold blue and green, a gas giant fifty thousand kilometers in diameter, the fourteenth planet was surrounded by twenty-one moons, and more besides. Its mushy upper atmosphere sprouted floating platforms hundreds of kilometers in diameter, needle-like proboscises extending down through the haze to high-pressure regions below. From the center of each platform, a crystal plume of white rose through a ring that glowed bright as fire in the upper, clear atmosphere. Hyperbolic lines of plasma shot from the ring, like threads from this distance, but hot as the filament in a light-bulb.

"Gas wells," Martin said. "Tens of thousands of them. Raising gas from the depths, packing it—somehow—accelerating it in those rings, retrieving it in orbit. Impressive."