Free Icehenge by Kim Stanley Robinson Page A

excellent mood, and talked at length about improvements made in the R and G of the starship. They were going to have to switch from acceleration to deceleration quite a few times, and now they would be able to do it using less fuel.
    â€œWhat’s with you?” he asked, when he noticed how much of the conversation he was supplying.
    â€œHow are you going to get out of the solar system?” I replied. “Without the Committee police seeing your exhaust?”
    â€œWe’re going to keep something between us and them the whole time our rockets are firing. At first we’ll have the sun between us and Mars, then we’ll shut down until we meet with Saturn. Orbit it for a while, then coast out to Pluto.” He looked at me oddly. “That’s only a few open bursts. But you’ll keep this all a secret?”
    â€œUnless they drag it out of me,” I said morosely. “Or drug it out of me. You’d probably better not tell me any more.”
    â€œWhat’s this?”
    â€œDuggins and Valenski plan to tell the Committee that I collaborted with you. I may end up on Amor, for all I know.”
    â€œOh my. Oh, Emma—you’ll have to deny their accusations. Most of the people returning will support you.”
    â€œMaybe. It’s going to be a mess.”
    â€œHere. I’m going to get a liter of wine.” They made a good white wine on Rust Eagle, with only a few vines. While he got it I tried to remember whether the starship would have any grapevines. No. Too much waste.
    I proceeded to drink most of the wine, without responding much to Swann’s conversation. After dinner we went down to our rooms. In front of my door Eric kissed me, and almost angrily I kissed back, hard. Drunk.… “Let’s go to my room,” he said, and I agreed, surprising myself. We went, and it never occurred to me, then, to wonder if this was exactly the man I had in mind to go to bed with.… In his room we turned off the lights and undressed as we floated about kissing. Making love was the usual clumsy, pleasant affair in the weightlessness—holding onto the bed, moving slowly at unfortunate moments, using the velcro straps. I lost myself in the sensations, marveling once again at how open lovers become to one another. I felt a surge of affection for this friend of mine, this cheerful and gentle man, this crazy exile fleeing from humanity. How to think of him? What was he fleeing, after all, but the turmoil and repression on Mars, the absolute madness of Earth, our home world, our home—fleeing all the hatred and war. If only they all understood, that everyone is as human as your lover is.… Maybe on the starship they would remember it, I thought disconsolately.
    â€œEmma,” he said, as we floated quietly in our embrace. “Emma?”
    â€œYes?”
    â€œPlease come with us.”
    â€œâ€¦ Oh, Eric.”
    â€œPlease, Emma. We need you. It’ll be a good life, one of the great human lives. And I want you along. It will make all the difference for me—”
    â€œEric,” I said.
    â€œYes?”
    â€œI want to live on Mars. That’s my home.”
    â€œBut—” He stopped, sighed.
    We floated, and for once the weightlessness felt like gravity, gravity pressing from every direction. Tears leaked out of my eyes.
    This was my chance to join humanity’s greatest voyage. I wished I hadn’t drunk so much. “I want to go back to my room,” I whispered. I switched on the desk lamp, retrieved my clothes from the air, avoided Eric’s sad gaze. I kissed him before I left.
    â€œThink about it?” he said.
    â€œOh I will,” I said. “I will.…”
    *   *   *
    In the last few days they gutted the Rust Eagle, leaving it just able to get home. Nadezhda and Marie-Anne looked haggard. One day I helped them get their belongings together, as they were moving to the starship.