Page 24 (1/2)

Seeot to anything, the worse it looked Take the most beautiful person in the solar systenification and they were an apocalyptic cratered landscape crawling with horrors That’s what the Earth was A shining jewel from space, up close a blasted landscape covered with

“One ticket to New York,” he said to the automated kiosk

The drop to Earth was short enough that no one tried to run an extortion racket on hiht itself was bu about space: itradiation-filled vacuu attention, but at least it never had turbulence There weren’t any s on the shuttle, but the front of the cabin had a big viewscreen showing the descent through the forward external cae to a visible cityscape The spaceport on the artificial land e sta rails surrounded by the Atlantic Ocean just past the entrance to Lower New York Bay Tiny toy ships of suitable size for bobbing in a child’s bath grew into the vast solar-powered cargo ships that crawled back and forth across the oceans Everything visible on the descent was clean and technologically sleek

That was a lie too

By the tie of the city if only to see so that was honest about itself When he stood up in the full gravity of Earth to walk off the shuttle, he wanted it to feel wrong, oppressive after all his years away But the truth was that soenetic level, rejoiced His ancestors had spent a few billion years building all their internal structures around the constant of one g doard pull, and his organishtness of it

“Thank you for flying with us,” a pleasantly nondescript face said from the video screen next to the exit The voice was carefully crafted to have no specific regional dialect or obvious gender ain soon”

“Go fuck yourself,” Amos said to the screen with a smile

“Thank you, sir,” the face replied, actually see to look him in the eye “TransWorld Interplanetary takes your coestions seriously”

A short tube ride fro pad to the spaceport visitors center later and he was in the customs line to enter New York City and officially walk on Earth soil for the first time in twenty-some years The visitor center stank of too ether But under it there was a faint, not-unpleasant odor of rotting seaweed and salt The ocean, just outside, seeped into everything An olfactory reh the Ellis Island of the space age that Earth was absolutely unique to the hu in everyone’s veins first pulled fro The seas had been around longer than humans, had helped create them, and then when they were all dead, it’d take their water back without a thought

That, at least, wasn’t a lie

“Citizenship, guild, or union docs,” the bored-looking man at the customs kiosk said It appeared to be the only job left in the building not done by a robot Co but sense when soood A hi his heart rate, his skin s could be faked with drugs or training The hu to see if he just see

Amos smiled at him “Sure,” he said, then pulled up his UN citizenship records on his hand terrabbed them and compared them to the database The officer read his screen, his face betraying nothing Amos hadn’t been home in almost three decades He waited to be directed off to the additional security line for a er up his ass

“Okay,” the custoood one”

“You do the same,” Amos replied, not able to fully keep the surprise off his face The custo hi behind him in line cleared their throat loudly

Aed and move