planted it. Or maybe I'm wrong and Arachne's wrong and it isn't-'
'It is.'
Now that Kolya had it, he had no idea what to do with it. He peeled off a shred of the leaf, put it in his mouth, and chewed. The green tobacco released the worst taste he had ever experienced, sour, bitter, potent.
Saliva spurted froin every salivary gland, as if he were about to vomit. His mouth filled with revolting liquid. He gagged. He pushed past Griffith, hurried out onto his porch, and spat violently over the rail. The green blob of chewed tobacco plopped in the dirt.
He hung over the porch rail, panting and sweating. His mouth tasted vile. 'God, I'm sorry,' Griffith said.
'Don't be,' Kolya said.
It astonished him, how much better he felt, and how quickly, as if the nicotine had diffused straight into his brain. He fingered the leathery leaf, and pulled off another shred of tobacco.
Victoria entered the physics building gratefully, glad of the cool constant underground temperature. She wiped the sweat off her face with her soaked sleeve. She felt dirty and sticky. Her shoes were muddy from the garden; so were her pants, from the knees down. She flung herself gratefully into the deep, soft chair.
The maintenance work on Starfarer was important, of course, but she had to get some of her own work done. If she could spend some concentrated time on the algorithm, she knew she could speed it up. Starfarer was less than a day away from transition, and she still could not tell where they were going.
I keep reassuring people about it, she thought, but I'm nervous, too.
What if Europa suspected we might follow, what if she led us somewhere she can survive, but we can't? Would she do that? Are we such a threat that she'd be willing to wipe us out?
Starfarer ought to be more resistant than Europa's ship to difficult conditions. Starfarer enclosed its ecosystem. But Victoria had no way of knowing what hidden abilities Europa's strange ship might have, and Infinity had brought home to her the essential fragility of Starfarer.
No, she thought. Fragility's the wrong word. But resilience has limits.
She gave herself a moment to appreciate the tightknit, symmetrical form of the three-dimensional representation of her multi-dimensional algorithm. It hovered, complex and colorful, forming itself in the corner of her office.
It stopped.
Victoria jumped up, her sore shoulders and sweaty clothes forgotten. She queried Arachne, expecting to be told No, be patient, it just looks finished, it's still working, inside where you can't see.
Arachne presented her with the algorithm's solutions.
Starfarer was about to set out for 61 Cygni.
Victoria whistled softly. 61 Cygni was a long, long way away: completely on the other side of Earth from Tau Ceti. And yet the transition duration had a lower maximum than the range from Tau Ceti to Sirius.
'Curiouser and curiouser,' she said softly.
She checked the spectral signature. 61 Cygni A was a K5 star on the main sequence, not too different from the sun. She hoped that would reassure Infinity; she hoped the change toward terrestrial conditions would stabilize Starfarer's environment. She put a message into Arachne for everyone to see.
She hurried next door to JDA office and found her colleague curled up in the deep fabric-sculpture chair, writing in her notebook. The holographic image of Nerno's chamber hovered over her desk.
'J.D.! The algorithm's done!'
'It is? Victoria, that's wonderful!'
J.D. tried to jump up out of the chair, but it was so low and so soft that it made her struggle. She made a sound of disgust. J.D. hated her office furnishings. They were left over from her predecessor in the alien contact department, and she had had no opportunity to replace them. Victoria hugged J.D., joyful. J.D. embraced her gently, and let her go with regret.
Arachne presented a star map, and a copy of the algorithm.
'It's beautiful,' J.D. said. 'Beautiful results. It's different from the others.'
'They're all different,' Victoria said. 'But . . . you're right. The other solutions had some visual similarities. This one's completely changed.'
'61 Cygni,' J.D. said softly. 'Will we find our neighbors?'
'Could be.'
They knew they had neighbors: Europa had referred to them. Unfortunately, she had not been willing to reveal anything about them, including where they lived or how to make contact with them.
J.D. sat on the edge of her desk and stared at the solution, the star chart, the time range.
'What is it?' Victoria asked.
'Nemo.'
Victoria sat beside her. 'There's still time. We don't hit transition till tomorrow afternoon. Nemo knows what we're doing. If he-she-T'
'I don't think our pronouns fit Nemo,' J.D. said.
'One wouldn't have started metamorphosis and invited you back if one knew there wasn't going to be time.'
'I hope not. Only what if Nemo didn't have any choice about when it began? We pretend we know all about our own physiology. But we still can't predict exactly when somebody will be born . . . or die.'
'Nerno will follow us through transition. We can meet on the other side.' 'If Nerno's still alive.' J.D. gestured to the time range. 'Using Civilization's algorithm, the trip will take a lot longer.'
Victoria hesitated. 'Do you want me to give
'I . . .' J.D. leaned back, gripping the edge of the desk. 'You have to make that decision.'
They sat together in silence. The algorithm was an example of natural beauty, like a waterfall, a mountain view.
Victoria laid her hand over J.D.'s.
'Yesterday was fun,' she said softly.
Yes.
J.D. brought Victoria's hand to her lips. She kissed her palm, her fingertips.
'Come stay overnight with me and Zev,' she said. 'Would you?'
'I'd like that,' Victoria said. 'Satoshi and Stephen Thomas and I have some things to work out, first. But soon.'
'Is everything okay?'
Victoria shrugged, and smiled as well as she could manage. 'Changing into a diver is more disorienting than Stephen Thomas expected. Not just for him.'
Stephen Thomas started dinner. He was a lousy cook, but he needed to pretend everything was normal. He boiled water and stirred in the rice.
At that point, both his imagination and the household's supplies failed him.
He could go over to the central cafeteria and get bento boxes . . . except if he did, he would have to face Florrie Brown.
Outside, Victoria and Satoshi crossed the garden, laughing. Stephen Thomas opened the door.
'Stephen Thomas! The algorithm's finished!'
Victoria fairly glowed with the success of her work. She showed off the algorithm's new pattern.
Stephen Thomas was glad to see her happy, after so much stress and despair, after this morning's fiasco in the ocean. Satoshi acted more content, too, though Stephen Thomas felt an inexplicable distance separating him from his partner.
Inexplicable? he thought. How would you like it, if Satoshi's skin started peeling off?
He could not answer the question. He wanted to think he would take the changes in stride, if they were happening to Satoshi, or if something comparable were happening to Victoria. But he distressed himself, with his battered toes, his raw penis, the swollen flesh redesigning itself to hold his genitals within his body. At the moment he did not want anyone to look at him, much
less touch him. How could he be sure he would accept it any better if it were happening to one of his partners?
Victoria came up behind him, slid her hands around his waist, and leaned her cheek against his shoulder. His
