"Some suits I'll give to thee;

cruisers or liners. Shed logged five weeks of interstellar travel and must somehow endure another five before she reached the Optherian system. Could Trag have done a subtle job recruiting her because no other singer would consider the assignment? No, the fee was too good besides. Borella, Concera, and Gobbain had been trying for it. In the orbital position of a small moon, the Transfer Satellite inscribed a graceful forty-eight-hour path about the brilliant blue-and-green jewel of a planet. The satellite was a marvel of modern engineering, with docking and repair facilities capable of handling FSC cruisers and the compound ships of the Exploration and Evaluation Corps, felicitously sited at the intersection of nine major space routes. Fresh fruit and vegetables were grown in its extensive gardens, and high quality protein was manufactured in its catering division: sufficient in quantity and diversity to please the most exacting clients. Stores of the basic nutrients were available for five other star-roving species. Additional nodules accommodated small industries and a thriving medical research laboratory and hospital. In the transient quadrant, there were playing fields, free-ball and free-fall courts, spacious gardens, and a zoo housing a selection of the smaller life forms from nine nearby star systems. As Killashandra perused the directory in her room, she noted with considerable delight that a radiant fluid tank was one of the amenities in the gymnasium arc. Although she was certain that there had been some decrease of the resonance in her body, she ached for the total relief provided by an hour or so in the radiant fluid. She booked the room and, fed up with the reaction of ordinary people to her proximity, took the service route to it. She had also decided that she was not going to spend the five weeks on the cruise ship enhancing crystal singer myths. Just then her bruised and aching heart had no room for affection, much less passion. And crystal neutralized passing fancy or pure lust. If she could reduce the hair-standing phenomenon to a minimum, she intended to adopt a new personality: that of an aspiring young musician traveling to Optherias Summer Festival, and required by economics to travel off-season and on the cheaper freight lines. She had spent long hours preparing the right make-up for the part, affecting the demeanor of the very young, inexperienced adult and recalling the vocabulary and idiom of her student days. So much had transpired since that carefree time that it a95 camera cannon digital power shot was like studying for an historic role. In such rehearsals, Killashandra found that time passed quickly. Now if her wretched body would co-operate After nine hours of immersions over the course of three days, Killashandra achieved her goal. She acquired a suitable modest wardrobe. On the fifth day on the Bernards World Transfer Station, in wide-eyed and breathless obedience to the boarding call, she presented her ticket to the purser of the FSPS Liner Athena, and was assigned a seat on the second of the two shuttles leaving the station to catch the liner on its parabolic route through the star system. The shuttle trip was short and its single forward viewscreen was dominated by the massive orange hulk of the Athena. Most of the passengers were awed by the spectacle, babbling about their expectations of the voyage, the hardships they had endured to save for the experience, their hopes for their destinations, anxieties about home-bound relatives. Their chatter irritated Killashandra and she began to wish she had not posed as a student. As the respected member of a prestigious Guild, she would have been assigned to the star-class shuttle. However, shed made the choice and was stuck with it, so she grimly disembarked onto the economy level of the Athena and located her single cabin in the warren. This room was the same size as her Fuertan student apartment but, she told herself philosophically, she wouldnt be so likely to step out of character. Anyway, only the catering and lounge facilities differed with the price of the ticket: the leisure decks were unrestricted. The Athena, a new addition to the far-flung cruise line Galactica, Federated, was on the final leg of its first sweep round this portion of the Galaxy. Some of the ohs and ahs that Killashandra breathed were quite genuine as she and other economy class passengers were escorted on the grand tour of the liner. A self-study complex included not only the schoolroom for transient minors but small rehearsal rooms where a broad range of musical instruments could be rented with the notable exceptions of a portable Optherian organ a miniature theater, and several large workshops for handicrafters. To her astonishment, the gymnasium complex boasted three small radiant fluid tanks. Their guide explained that this amenity eased aching muscles, overcame space nausea, and was an economical substitute for a water bath since the fluid could be purified after every use.