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It was still as cold as ever, but for a change, there was no wind this evening. Taking advantage of the opportunity, Julia and Alonzo had slipped behind her tent instead of going straight in once they’d left the fire. The moons weren’t yet up, and the tent blocked most of the camp’s light, so it was dark enough to see the stars in G889’s night sky.
Alonzo’s arms were wrapped around her waist and his head rested on her shoulder. Leaning back against him, she followed his gaze skyward, looking at the bright points of light and mentally drawing lines between them to create constellations. In terms of stellar distances, they weren’t that far from Earth. But it was just enough that the stars were in slightly different places.
Plus, of course, there was one bright star that looked very different from here.
Behind her, Alonzo sighed. “I guess we’ll have to start thinking up new constellations.”
So their thoughts had been as closely aligned as their bodies. “I imagine so.”
“Let’s give them better names this time.”
She chuckled, but it was kind. “I’m sure the people who named Earth’s constellations thought the names were good at the time. They just got old.”
He blew a wisp of her hair away from his face. “So let’s pick names that last longer than a few thousand years.”
“Julia? Alonzo?”
They stepped apart to see Uly standing on the other side of the tent with them.
“What’s the matter?” she asked.
“What are you looking at?” His tone was curious.
“The stars,” she answered, hoping it would satisfy his curiosity enough to send him away. It wasn’t that she didn’t want to see him, and Uly was a sweet, intelligent child. It was just that privacy was nice sometimes.
“Oh.” Uly’s eyes flicked up. “Is there anything interesting?”
She closed her eyes briefly, pushing the annoyance to the back of her mind. To her surprise, when she opened them, she saw Alonzo crouched down next to Uly, pointing up. “Thousands of years ago on Earth, people looked at the sky and drew lines between them to make pictures.”
“Constellations,” said Uly. “I know. Like Orion and the Big Bear. But none of them look right here.”
“It’s a new world,” said Alonzo. “We’ll need new pictures.”
Deciding she was better off joining them instead of dwelling on the lost romantic moment, Julia knelt down on Uly’s other side. “We were just drawing some of them.”
“Did you figure out why the stars are all messed up?”
“All messed up?” Alonzo was frowning.
“Yeah. Look at them. They’re flickering. They’re not supposed to do that, and they didn’t when we looked at them using telescopes, back at the Stations.”
“Oh,” he answered. “That’s just the atmosphere. You’re seeing reflections from the air moving around up above us. The stars are the same.”
“Is that why the colors are different, too? The atmosphere?”
“Sure is. It’s something you have to adjust for, when you’re plotting a course from a planet. We use charts instead of our eyes, because the stars are actually a little different than they might look. You see that one?”
“Which one?”
Alonzo gently guided Uly’s head until it was pointed at that unique bright star, the one that was so different here on G889. “That one.”
Uly nodded. “That one’s way different. Why is that?”
“That’s the Earth’s sun.”
“Cool,” he breathed. Then he cocked his head to one side. “What’s its name?”
“Name?”
“Well, we can’t just call it ‘the sun’ anymore, can we?”
Alonzo started to explain in depth, and Julia sat back on her heels, watching in amazement. She’d never seen this side of him before. Of course, she’d never asked him questions with the childlike wonder that Uly was showing, and of all the topics that the pilot might be patient enough to explain, this would be among the more likely.
Still, it was delightful, and she found herself smiling.
Over the winter, she’d been noticing a gradual, quiet settling of his demeanor. She’d always thought he simply tolerated the children — he certainly had given that impression at first — but now, she realized, things were different. All of them had been changed by the events of the past several months. Why not him, too?
It’s a new world, Alonzo had said to Uly. We need new pictures.
Yes, she realized. They did need to consider new patterns. And not only just in the night sky.