landscape

[isthisart]

Linya avoids haring off to do things much while Miles's arms are unusable. Once he can feed himself comfortably enough to prefer to do so, though, she makes plans with Ekaterin to go with her and little Nikki on a hike in some nice woods of mixed-origin fauna. She packs a picnic and takes the lightflyer and flies out to pick up the relevant subset of Vorsoissons.

Comments

[isthisart]

"So they're figuring out how to make it at home, out of the fake air, with algae and stuff like that."

[first_loyalty]

"What's an algae?" he asks next.

[isthisart]

"It's a little plant that lives in large groups. Some of it looks like green, wet hair."

[first_loyalty]

"That sounds weird," says Nikki.

[isthisart]

"It's kind of weird. But it's good at making oxygen for the air."

[first_loyalty]

"So people can breathe it?" he asks, in the interests of clarification.

[isthisart]

"Yup. Algae is helpful like that. All plants are, but algae grows quick and it's less picky about some things than some other plants are."

[first_loyalty]

"What are plants picky about?"

"Lots of things," says Ekaterin.

"Yeah but what?"

[isthisart]

"For one thing, Komarr doesn't get very much sunshine, and plants love sunshine," supplies Linya.

[first_loyalty]

"Oh. Why doesn't Komarr get sunshine?" asks Nikki.

[isthisart]

"Its sun is far away. It has a mirror to help it get more sun, but that only helps a little."

[first_loyalty]

"A mirror?" he asks.

[isthisart]

"Yep! A big space mirror to reflect the sun at the planet."

[first_loyalty]

"Wow. It must be so big!" he says, impressed.

[isthisart]

"It's huge! There's actually seven mirrors, all stuck together."

[first_loyalty]

"Wow," he repeats.

[isthisart]

"On Earth, they have a huge moon, even bigger than the mirror Komarr has. And no one had to build it, it's just there, and it reflects light too. It looks like a pearl in the sky at night when it's full."

[first_loyalty]

"Wow! I wanna see a picture," he says.

[isthisart]

So she waves away the nexus map and calls up a picture of Earth's sky at night, complete with a full moon.

[first_loyalty]

Nikki gazes at it in utter amazement.

[isthisart]

"I went with a tour group to the middle of the ocean, where there aren't any buildings that light up, and I sat there in the dark and my eyes adjusted and there were so many stars," she says. "You could do that here too, but there wouldn't be the moon, just the stars." She woggles her pen to check its chrono, and then gets up. "And I think I'm supposed to drop you off at home pretty soon so we'd better start walking back to the lightflyer."

[first_loyalty]

"Okay," says Nikki. He eyes the path doubtfully.

"Do you want me to carry you again?" asks Ekaterin.

He nods. She picks him up.

[isthisart]

Linya folds up the blanket and puts it and the discards from lunch into the basket and goes with them along the path.

[first_loyalty]

Along they go.

Ekaterin gets tired after a few minutes, and puts Nikki down. He clings grumpily to her leg, impeding her progress down the path.

[isthisart]

Linya scoops him up. He's not heavy at all. "Do you want to be carried or sit on my shoulders?" she asks.