“It’s ready!” called out Sabbath George. He and the others brought huge serving bowls to a large table that was situated in the middle of the room, adjacent to the kitchen. Places had been previously set. Tired as the men were, it took them only seconds to assemble at the table. George said a few words of thanks and passed the first bowl to his right where Joe was seated. Joe grasped the large serving spoon. The bowl was steaming with the mixture and wisps rose lazily from the ladle as it made several trips from serving bowl to Joe’s plate. After he had dished out at least two pounds of stew, he shoved the bowl on to the man at his right and took two biscuits from the central supply. “Only two biscuits, Joe?” prodded Mark. “Has hunger made you too weak to eat?” “I’ll show you whether I’m too weak to eat. Watch this!” He shoveled a heaping spoonful of stew into his mouth. His chin lifted a notch, his eyes closed, and a satisfied moan escaped his closed lips. He slowly lowered the spoon to the table and lifted both hands as if he were about to embrace someone. “Taste good?” asked Zip, reaching for the aromatic bowl as it came his way. Joe chewed and swallowed. “Someone back at the Academy told me once that there was no such thing as a dumb question. He was wrong. That was one.” Joe turned to George. “George, this is delicious! I’ve never tasted anything better!” George glanced over at the food cans that had been in storage for several years. “A hungry man will enjoy anything. A _very_ hungry man will consider even canned goods to be ambrosia.” But by that time the serving bowl had gotten around to George, and he stopped to fill his own plate. 16: A Dark Spirit TO STARMAN David Foster, it was a soft, rainy morning. He had just awakened after a night on the SE supply asteroid O344, and the only sound was the faint hum of the operating system. He wrapped himself a little more snugly into his blanket and kept his eyes shut. His imagination easily turned the murmur into the soft sound of rain sifting through the leaves of the tree outside his bedroom window on his uncle’s farm in West Virginia. With slightly more effort he could imagine a drizzle drumming lightly on the wooden shingles above and drifting out onto the empty fields in the early autumn days shortly after harvest. His Uncle Francis and Aunt Clare were dear to David. Although he had been raised on the Moon, close to his father’s work, he had been born in Clark’s Bridge Crossing, the village near their farm. From the time he was old enough to show any notice of the world around him, David had loved the stars. Even now, he loved interplanetary travel, exploration, and adventure better than anything, but in his heart was an emotionally-intense place where he kept his memories of the West Virginia farm where he had spent so much of his childhood.