Island in a Sea of Stars by Kevin J. Anderson Page A

various ranks, engineers, metallurgists, geologists, shipping personnel, and just plain grunt workers who filled shifts aboard the smelter barges or control towers, surrounded by fires that could have inspired hell itself.
    That was the landscape Seth knew—not a domed greenhouse asteroid or the toroidal orbiting habitat of Newstation, which served as the Roamer center of government. Many Roamers lived in the open gas-giant skies on an ekti-harvesting skymine, reaping great profits by collecting stardrive fuel from the diffuse clouds.
    Instead, the boy’s daily view was a blaze of scarlet magma erupting in incandescent metal plumes in the smoke-filled sky; he’d grown up in a reinforced habitat mounted on pilings sunk down to solid rock.
    As the two closely orbiting halves of the planet adjusted their dance of celestial mechanics, Garrison had studied the melting points, annealing strengths, and the ceramic-lattice structure of the habitat and factory components. He had analyzed the binary planet’s pirouette, uncovering third-order resonances that would cause the fragments to dip fractionally closer to each other, increasing stresses and endangering the Iswander operations.
    Alarmed, Garrison had gone through all the right channels and presented his results to the industrialist, only to experience an even greater shock when he realized that neither Lee Iswander nor his deputy Elisa wanted to hear any such warnings. They simply and impatiently reassured him that the lava-processing outpost was safe enough and told him to go back to work. The material strength and heat tolerance of the structural elements was sufficient to withstand the environment of Sheol, they said … but Garrison knew there was very little margin for error.
    Adding unnecessary and expensive levels of redundant shielding and “paranoid” safety measures—Iswander said—was irresponsible to Iswander Industries, as well as to the employees, who participated in profit-sharing.
    Garrison had then made himself greatly unpopular by spreading his warnings among the Sheol employees, creating nervousness, which only upset his wife even more. She was furious with Garrison, sure that his whistle-blowing would cost her a promotion.
    Sadly, when he became convinced that there was no alternative, he had to take Seth away from Sheol before disaster happened. He hoped he was wrong. He knew he wasn’t.
    Elisa claimed that she loved their son, even insisted with great vehemence when Garrison had challenged her on it, but her words were only words. He knew her loyalty was to Iswander Industries. Elisa had hitched her star to the powerful man who came from a Roamer clan but acted like no Roamer.
    In his head, he heard his father’s gruff voice again. “You never should have married That Woman. You’re a Roamer, and you belong with other Roamers!”
    â€œLee Iswander’s a Roamer,” Garrison had responded, though the words sounded flat in his own ears.
    â€œThat man has forgotten who he is.” The bearded patriarch of clan Reeves had waved a finger in front of his son’s face. “And if you stay with him, you will forget who you are. So many Roamer clans have forgotten.”
    But Garrison had refused to listen, and he married Elisa Enturi anyway. He had given up so much for her … or had he done it just to act out against his father?
    â€œIf we find a place and settle down, will Mother come to live with us again?” Seth asked.
    Garrison didn’t want to lie to the boy. He stared out at the forest of stars ahead and the great emptiness in which they had lost themselves. “I think she wants to take her chances on Sheol.”
    Seth looked sad but stoic. “Maybe someday.”
    Garrison could not see any other answer but Maybe someday .
    In the stolen ship, they changed course several more times, flying where no one else would go. They crossed the expansive emptiness that