mean whether it contributed anything to Venus's spin rate?"
"Right. That's more his department."
"How come you haven't called him before?" Lorili asked.
"What for? If he needed anything, I'd have heard."
"How do you know he hasn't fallen off a mountain?"
"If he has, then there wouldn't be any point in calling him, would there?"
Lorili shook her head despairingly. "Guys!"
Kyal grinned, took his phone from an inside pocket of his parka, and flipped it open. "It should make you feel appreciated. You see, we need females around. The reason there are two sexes has nothing to do with producing children. The biological part's easy. It's to raise them. They need a bit of both of us. . . . Ah, it looks as if we're through. They've certainly got the net up and working here."
"Can I say hello to Yorim?" Lorili asked.
"Sure. I was hoping you would."
"Really? Why?"
"Oh. . . . Just to see his face, I guess."
"What do you mean?"
"I'm supposed to be so traditional. Remember?"
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
The group that Yorim was with had changed their plans at the last moment and gone westward from Rhombus instead of east. Wearing an open bush shirt with britches to just below the knee, and a floppy-brimmed hat that a site worker he'd stopped to talk to had given him, Yorim was sitting not far from Jenyn near the top of an immense weathered pyramid. Naseena and Mowrak were clambering about a short distance above, around the summit. The others, were below, exploring tunnels that had been discovered, going deep into structure.
The pyramid was the largest of three, standing between flat grasslands that disappeared to the horizon in one direction, and a broad river running south to north in the other. According to the geologists, the area had been a dry desert once. A strange effigy of an animal in repose with a human head stood near the pyramids, which along with other constructions in the surrounding area dated from a civilization far older than the Western technological one. Many great cultures had evidently arisen on Earth and been gone and practically forgotten by the time of whatever the final calamity had been that ended all of them. It brought home just how young Venus was in comparison.
"You know what this reminds me of?" Yorim said, still squinting out at the distance. "You remember the guy that I was with in Rhombus, who went his own way, Kyal? He's an electro-propulsion specialist. We went to some trials once, that they were conducting back home, of an experimental model of a high-power interplanetary drive they're talking about that would land you right down on the surface. But to do that, an incoming ship would need to lose its excess buildup of charge. The attractor they used was this kind of shape—a pointed artificial mountain. It focuses the field, like a lightning rod. You'd need something like that even more here on Earth. It's more active electrically than Venus. Doesn't have the same amount of cloud blanket to act as an intermediary distributor between space currents and the surface."
"Technical matters don't concern me," Jenyn answered. "My subject is languages."
Yorim hadn't formed an impression of him as the friendliest of people, but there was nobody else nearby to talk to just now. Jenyn seemed to be of the kind who never smiled, as if he preferred keeping others at a distance. Maybe he felt that setting expectations of amicability conferred an obligation to live up to them that put him at some kind of disadvantage. Yorim didn't particularly care why. "Is that what you were doing across in the Americas?" he asked.
"Yes. In the north they spoke mainly English, which is the principal language that we're studying."
"But England was over this side, right?"
"True. But more sources are turning up over there." Jenyn looked across at where Yorim was sitting. "It was a legacy from the times when the English were a nation of conquerors. They had a huge empire for a time." Yorim got the
"Right. That's more his department."
"How come you haven't called him before?" Lorili asked.
"What for? If he needed anything, I'd have heard."
"How do you know he hasn't fallen off a mountain?"
"If he has, then there wouldn't be any point in calling him, would there?"
Lorili shook her head despairingly. "Guys!"
Kyal grinned, took his phone from an inside pocket of his parka, and flipped it open. "It should make you feel appreciated. You see, we need females around. The reason there are two sexes has nothing to do with producing children. The biological part's easy. It's to raise them. They need a bit of both of us. . . . Ah, it looks as if we're through. They've certainly got the net up and working here."
"Can I say hello to Yorim?" Lorili asked.
"Sure. I was hoping you would."
"Really? Why?"
"Oh. . . . Just to see his face, I guess."
"What do you mean?"
"I'm supposed to be so traditional. Remember?"
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
The group that Yorim was with had changed their plans at the last moment and gone westward from Rhombus instead of east. Wearing an open bush shirt with britches to just below the knee, and a floppy-brimmed hat that a site worker he'd stopped to talk to had given him, Yorim was sitting not far from Jenyn near the top of an immense weathered pyramid. Naseena and Mowrak were clambering about a short distance above, around the summit. The others, were below, exploring tunnels that had been discovered, going deep into structure.
The pyramid was the largest of three, standing between flat grasslands that disappeared to the horizon in one direction, and a broad river running south to north in the other. According to the geologists, the area had been a dry desert once. A strange effigy of an animal in repose with a human head stood near the pyramids, which along with other constructions in the surrounding area dated from a civilization far older than the Western technological one. Many great cultures had evidently arisen on Earth and been gone and practically forgotten by the time of whatever the final calamity had been that ended all of them. It brought home just how young Venus was in comparison.
"You know what this reminds me of?" Yorim said, still squinting out at the distance. "You remember the guy that I was with in Rhombus, who went his own way, Kyal? He's an electro-propulsion specialist. We went to some trials once, that they were conducting back home, of an experimental model of a high-power interplanetary drive they're talking about that would land you right down on the surface. But to do that, an incoming ship would need to lose its excess buildup of charge. The attractor they used was this kind of shape—a pointed artificial mountain. It focuses the field, like a lightning rod. You'd need something like that even more here on Earth. It's more active electrically than Venus. Doesn't have the same amount of cloud blanket to act as an intermediary distributor between space currents and the surface."
"Technical matters don't concern me," Jenyn answered. "My subject is languages."
Yorim hadn't formed an impression of him as the friendliest of people, but there was nobody else nearby to talk to just now. Jenyn seemed to be of the kind who never smiled, as if he preferred keeping others at a distance. Maybe he felt that setting expectations of amicability conferred an obligation to live up to them that put him at some kind of disadvantage. Yorim didn't particularly care why. "Is that what you were doing across in the Americas?" he asked.
"Yes. In the north they spoke mainly English, which is the principal language that we're studying."
"But England was over this side, right?"
"True. But more sources are turning up over there." Jenyn looked across at where Yorim was sitting. "It was a legacy from the times when the English were a nation of conquerors. They had a huge empire for a time." Yorim got the
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