He walked toward the open port. It was a peculiar process. First he cut off the left magnet, lifted his left foot, then.... * * * * * He was inside. Inside the space port of the pilot ship. The outer door swung closed. Darkness. Then they switched on a light. After what seemed a long time, there was enough air around him that he could hear it hiss from the vent through his built in outer pick-up. The inner door opened. He stepped into the ship proper. There was a group of friendly Earth-faces waiting for him. They were smiling. His muscles were knotted with tension. He fumbled with his helmet. He couldn't hold his hands still. They slipped. He twisted at the helmet, futilely. One of the Earthmen stepped forward to help. Then. It was off. And with that, he knew that he was Home. He felt the tension flow away to be replaced by a singing excitement, an excitement so intense as to be almost unbearable. Something had to give. ... Suddenly he thought of how he must have looked, crossing to the pilot ship--how awkward he must have seemed to the trained spacemen around him. He started to laugh, explosively. At himself. Twisting awkwardly in space. It was funny. He laughed, and he didn't care what the Earthmen thought, seeing him laugh. Even if they thought he had gone crazy, he didn't care. That was the first thing he did. Laugh. After that.... At first he could not understand what was wrong. The laughter died; it sputtered and died in a strangled gasp. Then he thought he had eaten fire, and his throat and lungs were raw. Johnny Nine swayed on his feet. The magnetized soles kept him erect. The Earth-faces spun dizzily around him. He reached for his helmet, instinctively, reached and missed, reached again. He clawed frantically at his helmet, and everything around him turned black. The helmet fell in place with a loud clang of steel on steel. * * * * * He was unconscious only five minutes, but, as consciousness flowed back, he felt his head hammer with sharp pains, and lights danced before his eyes. He was afraid he was going to be sick inside the space suit. It was fifteen minutes before he was recovered enough to listen to what they had to tell him. An Earth doctor, the pilot ship's surgeon, made it very plain. "... Twenty-one generations is a long time," the doctor had told him, "for an animal that can adapt itself as easily as man...." Johnny Nine could complete the rest of it: Sometime, long ago, perhaps as early as the Second Generation, perhaps at the time of the Great Sickness, the terrarium had been thrown out of balance. And, as the balance continued to shift, man continued to adapt. Until-- He could hear them, around him, talking quietly. "We haven't told yur Ship, yet. We thought you'd better do that." "Yes," Johnny Nine choked. The Earthmen fell silent, ringing him in.