He also spotted another bright star that didn’t belong where it was, and couldn’t for the life of him figure out from where it had been displaced. He finally gave up and pointed towards it. “What’s that one there, not far from Arcturus?”

Flynn didn’t need to ask which one he meant, and smiled a most peculiar smile. “Interesting you should wonder. I had to ask Walter Stone about that one myself.”

“Well, what is it?” Johnson said, a little irritably. Mickey Flynn’s smile got wider. Johnson’s annoyance grew with it. Then, all at once, that annoyance collapsed. He took another look at that unfamiliar yellow star. The hair stood up on his arms and the back of his neck. In a very small voice, he said, “Oh.”

“That’s right,” Flynn said. “That’s the Sun.”

“Lord.” Johnson sounded more reverent than he’d thought he could. “That’s… quite something, isn’t it?”

“You might say so,” the other pilot answered. “Yes, you just might say so.”

Tau Ceti, of course, remained in the same place in the sky as it had before. It was brighter now, but still seemed nothing special; it was an intrinsically dimmer star than the Sun. Before the Lizards came, no one had ever paid any attention to it or to Epsilon Eridani or to Epsilon Indi, the three stars whose inhabited planets the Race had ruled since men were still hunters and gatherers. Now everyone knew the first two; Epsilon Indi, deep in the southern sky and faintest of the three, remained obscure.

“When we wake up again…” Johnson said. “When we wake up again, we’ll be there.”

“Oh, yes.” Flynn nodded. “Pity we won’t be able to go down to Home.”

“Well, yeah. Too much time with no gravity,” Johnson said, and Mickey Flynn nodded again. Johnson pointed back toward the Sun. “But we saw this. ” At the moment, it seemed a fair trade.

Kassquit swam up toward consciousness from the black depths of a sleep that might as well have been death. When she looked around, she thought at first that her eyes weren’t working the way they should. She’d lived her whole life aboard starships. Metal walls and floors and ceilings seemed normal to her. She knew stone and wood and plaster could be used for the same purposes, but the knowledge was purely theoretical.

Focusing on the-technician? — tending her was easier. “I greet you,” Kassquit said faintly. Her voice didn’t want to obey her will.

Even her faint croak was enough to make the female of the Race jerk in surprise. “Oh! You do speak our language,” the technician said. “They told me you did, but I was not sure whether to believe them.”

“Of course I do. I am a citizen of the Empire.” Kassquit hoped she sounded indignant and not just terribly, terribly tired. “What do I look like?”

To her, it was a rhetorical question. To the technician, it was anything but. “One of those horrible Big Uglies from that far-off star,” she said. “How can you be a citizen of the Empire if you look like them?”

I must be on Home, Kassquit realized. Males and females on Tosev 3 know who and what I am. “Never mind how I can be. I am, that is all,” she said. She looked around again. The white-painted chamber was probably part of a hospital; it looked more like a ship’s infirmary than anything else. Home, she thought again, and awe filled her. “I made it,” she whispered.

“So you did.” The technician seemed none too pleased about admitting it. “How do you feel?”

“Worn,” Kassquit answered honestly. “Am I supposed to be this weary?”

“I do not know. I have no experience with Big Uglies.” The female of the Race never stopped to wonder if that name might bother Kassquit. She went on, “Males and females of the Race often show such symptoms upon revival, though.”

“That is some relief,” Kassquit said.

“Here.” The technician gave her a beaker filled with a warm, yellowish liquid. “I was told you were to drink this when you were awake enough to do so.”

“It shall be done,” Kassquit said obediently. The stuff was salty and a little greasy and tasted very good. “I thank you.” She returned the empty beaker. “Very nice. What was it?”

She’d succeeded in surprising the female again. “Do you not know? It must have been something from your world. It has nothing to do with ours. Wait.” She looked inside what had to be Kassquit’s medical chart. “It is something called chicknzup. Is that a word in the Big Ugly language?”

“I do not know,” Kassquit answered. “I speak only the language of the Race.”

“How very peculiar,” the technician said. “Well, instructions are that you are to rest. Will you rest?”

“I will try,” Kassquit said. The sleeping mat on which she lay was identical to the one she’d had in the starship. Why not? A sleeping mat was a sleeping mat. She closed her eyes and wiggled and fell asleep.

When she woke, it was dark. She lay quietly. The small sounds of this place were different from the ones she’d known all her life. Along with the noises of the starship’s ventilation and plumbing, there had been lots of tapes of random sounds of Home. But she knew all the noises on those by now. Here, her ears were hearing things they’d never met before.

Something buzzed at the window. When she looked that way, she saw a small black shape silhouetted against the lighter sky. It moved, and the buzzing noise moved with it. She realized it was alive. Awe washed through her again. Except for males and females of the Race and a few Big Uglies, it was the first living thing she’d ever seen in person.

She got to her feet. Slowly, carefully, she walked toward the window. Her legs were uncertain beneath her, but held her up. She peered at the creature. It sensed she was near and stopped buzzing; it clung quietly to the window glass. As she peered at it, she realized she knew what it was: some kind of ffissach. They had eight legs. Many of them-this one obviously included-had wings. Like most of them, it was smaller than the last joint of her middle finger. Home had millions of different species of them. They ate plants and one another. Bigger life-forms devoured them by the billions every day. Without them, the ecosystem would collapse.

Kassquit knew all about that from her reading. She hadn’t expected to find any ffissachi inside buildings. She especially hadn’t expected to find one inside a hospital. Didn’t the Race value hygiene and cleanliness? She knew it did. Her experience on the starships orbiting Tosev 3 had taught her as much. So what was this one doing here?

As she stood there watching it, it began to fly and buzz again. Its wings beat against the window glass. She didn’t suppose it understood about glass. Everything in front of it looked clear. Why couldn’t it just fly through? It kept trying and trying and trying…

Kassquit was so fascinated, she thought she could have watched the little creature all night. She thought so, anyhow, till her legs wobbled so badly she almost sat down, hard, on the floor. She also found herself yawning again. Whatever went into cold sleep, it hadn’t all worn off yet. She made her way back to the sleeping mat and lay down again. For a little while, the ffissach’s buzzing kept her from going back to sleep, but only for a little while.

When she woke again, it was light. Sunlight streamed in through the window. The ffissach was still there, but silent and motionless now. Before Kassquit could look at it in the better light, the technician came in. “I greet you,” she said. “How do you feel this morning?”

“I thank you-I am better.” Kassquit pointed to the window. “What is that ffissach doing there?”

The technician walked over, squashed it against the palm of her hand, and then cleaned herself with a moist wipe. “They are nuisances,” she said. “They do get in every once in a while, though.”

“You killed it!” Kassquit felt a pang of dismay at the little death, not least because it took her by surprise.

“Well, what did you expect me to do? Take it outside and let it go?” The technician sounded altogether indifferent to the ffissach’s fate. There was a stain on the inside of the window.

“I do not know what your custom is,” Kassquit answered unhappily.

“Do you know whether you want breakfast?” the technician asked, plainly doubting whether Kassquit could make up her mind about anything.

“Yes, please,” she answered.

“All right. Some of your foods came with you on the starship, and I also have a list of foods from Home you have proved you can safely eat. Which would you prefer?”

“Foods from Home are fine,” Kassquit said. “I am on Home, after all.”

“All right. Wait here. Do not go anywhere.” Yes, the technician was convinced Kassquit had no brains at all. “I will bring you food. Do not go away.” With a last warning hiss, the technician left.

She soon returned, carrying a tray like the ones in the starship refectory. It held the same sorts of food Kassquit had been eating there, too. She used her eating tongs as automatically and as well as a female of the Race would have. When she finished, the technician took away the tray.

“What do I do now?” Kassquit called after the female.

“Wait,” was the only answer she got.

Wait she did. She went to the window and looked out at the landscape spread out before her. She had never seen such a thing in person before, but the vista seemed familiar to her thanks to countless videos. Those were buildings and streets there, streets with cars and buses in them. The irregular projections off in the distance were mountains. And yes, the sky was supposed to be that odd shade of dusty greenish blue, not black.

Kassquit also looked down at herself. Her body paint was in sad disarray-hardly surprising, after so many years of cold sleep. As she’d thought she would, she found a little case of paints in the room and began touching herself up.

She’d almost finished when a male spoke from the doorway: “I greet you, ah, Researcher.”

Reading his body paint at a glance, she assumed the posture of respect. “And I greet you, Senior Researcher. What can I do for you, superior sir?”

“I am called Stinoff,” the male said. “You must understand, you are the first Tosevite I have met in person, though I have been studying your species through data relayed from Tosev 3. Fascinating! Astonishing!” His eye turrets traveled her from head to feet.

“What do you wish of me, superior sir?” Kassquit asked again.

“You must also understand, it is later than you think,” Senior Researcher Stinoff said. “When you came to Home, you were kept in cold sleep until it became evident the starship full of wild Tosevites would soon arrive. We did not wish to expend undue amounts of your lifespan without good reason. That starship is now nearly here, which accounts for your revival at this time.”