Adventure stories; Science fiction; Sex role -- Fiction
"Tere are no astronomical tables aboard ship," pointed out Urushkidan,
"and I certainly don't clutter my brain wit mere numerical data."
"Vich star is Rigel?" asked Dyann.
"Why--uh--well--that one--no, it might be that one over there--or
perhaps--how should I know?" growled Ray.
"We will simply habe to go back te way we came, as nearly as we can
judge it," said Urushkidan.
"Maybe ve can find somevun who knows," suggested Dyann.
Ray thought of landing on a planet and asking a winged, three-headed
monster, "Pardon me, do you know which way Sol is?" To which the
monster would doubtless reply, "Sorry, I'm a stranger here myself." He
chuckled wryly. They'd encountered a difficulty which all the brave
futuristic stories about exploring the Galaxy seemed to have overlooked.
They had headed out in the ecliptic plane, very nearly on a line
joining the momentary positions of Jupiter and Neptune. That didn't
help much, though, in a boat never meant for interplanetary flight and
thus carrying only the ephemerides of the Jovian System. Presumably
they had gone in a straight line, so that one of the zodiacal
constellations was at their back and should still be recognizable,
but the high-velocity distortions of the outside view had precluded
anyone's noticing which stars had been where.
Ray floated over to the port and looked out at the eerie magnificence
of unknown space. "If I'd been a Boy Scout," he lamented, "I might
know the constellations. The thing to do is to head back toward any
one which looks halfway familiar, since that must be the one which was
at our stern. But I only know Orion and the Big Dipper." He looked at
Urushkidan with accusing eyes. "You're the great astrophysicist. Can't
you tell one star from another?"
"Certainly not," said the Martian huffily. "No astrophysicist eber
looks at de stars if he can help it."
"Oh, you want a con--con--star-picture?" asked Dyann innocently.
Ray said, "I mean one we know, as we see the stars from Sol, or from
Centauri. You're nice to look at, honey, but right now I can't help
wishing you Varannians were a little more intellectual."
"Oh, I know the stars," said Dyann. "Every noble learns them.
Let me see--" She floated around the chamber, from port to port,
staring out and muttering to herself. "Oh, yes. There is Kunatha the
Hunter-threatened-by-woman-devourin-monster. Not changed much."
"Huh?" Ray and Urushkidan pushed themselves over beside her. "By gosh,"
said the Earthling, "it does look like Virgo, I think, or one of 'em.
Dyann, I love you to pieces."
"Let's get home qvick, then," she beamed. "I vant to be on a planet."
During the outward flight she had been somewhat discomforted by
discovering the erotic importance of gravity.
"_You_ steer us home?" screeched Urushkidan. "How in Nebukadashatbu do
you know te stars?"
"I had to learn them," she said. "Every noble on Varann has to
know--vat you call it?--astroloyee. How else could ve plan our battles
visely?"
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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