Free Venus by Ben Bova

her shoulder-length hair severely pulled back; the daughter’s flowed softly, and was considerably longer.
    “This is Mr. Van Humphries,” Duchamp said. Then, to me, “My daughter, Marguerite.”
    “Martin’s son,” she murmured, taking a step toward me. Out of the corner of my eye I saw her mother bristle.
    I extended my hand. “Pleased to meet you, Ms. Duchamp.”
    She touched my hand briefly. Her fingers felt warm, pulsing.
    “Marguerite has a doctorate in biology from Oxford,” Duchamp said, flatly, as if it were a challenge, not a trace of parental pride in her voice.
    Then she added, “I thought you two should meet.”
    “I’m happy to make your acquaintance,” I said to Marguerite. Glancing at her mother, I added, “although I’m afraid there won’t be much for you to do on this mission.”
    She did not smile back. Very seriously, she said, “Perhaps I can help with some of the other scientific observations, then.” Her voice was low, soft, resigned.
    The cabin seemed cold enough to start a glacier.
    “We’ll find something useful for you to do, don’t worry,” Captain Duchamp said.
    “Yes, Mother. I’m sure you will.”
    I decided it was time to get out of there. The bitterness between mother and daughter was thick enough to cut with a chain saw.
     
    Dr. Waller said I should exercise, so I started jogging through the warren of passageways and cargo bays of Truax. The old factory ship’s major cargo hold, which once
carried huge tonnages of asteroidal ores, was like a vast cave made of metal. Our expedition’s crated supplies hardly filled one corner of it. The outgoing crew had worked hard to clean up the holds for us; they had even opened the bays to the vacuum of space for several days on end. Still the metal bulkheads were dingy with dust. I could feel it crunching on the soles of my running shoes. When I ran a hand along a bulkhead the metal felt gritty; my fingers came away stained with dust.
    It made me grin, though. I was touching the dust of other worlds. Instead of sitting at home and staring at virtual reality simulations I was actually out here, touching other worlds, planetoids that had floated in the silent emptiness of space for billions of years, since the time when the solar system had been created.
    Then I discovered the bay that held the old smelter, silent and unused now. Yet I could sense the heat of the big nuclear-powered ovens as they melted down the ores in the first step of the refining process. Pulverized chunks of asteroidal rock were ruthlessly liquefied here, all their minor elements driven out to be collected by the mass separators, purified into the metals and minerals that were building the human race’s expanding civilization.
    For the first time I got an inkling of what my father’s corporations actually did. They were converting ancient leftovers from the creation of the solar system into habitats and factories and spacecraft for the men and women who were living and working in space, on the Moon and Mars, in the armored modules floating on the ice of Jupiter’s major moons.
    From the catwalk high above the smelter I drank in the heat that seemed to still hang in the air like a living presence. I could hear in my mind the growling roar of the rock crushers, the shuddering rumble of the conveyor belts that carried the pulverized ore into the white-hot fury of the smelter. When I closed my eyes I could see the glowing streams of man-made lava flowing into the separators in the next huge bay.

    All silent now, except for the soft echo of my running shoes padding against the metal grillwork of the catwalk. All stilled, unused, because I had decided in a reckless, angry moment to take up my father’s challenge.
    As he knew I would! That understanding came to me as I jogged along the catwalk, hit me so hard I stopped and gripped the handrail, feeling almost dizzy. He maneuvered me into this! He knew I’d take up his challenge. Or did he merely hope that I