The pilot spoke again to confirm this conclusion.
“Well, I guess I’m having one of my lucky days. We made it.” The slow Southern drawl was a godsend. “Some of you people have probably noticed the gravity. Don’t ask me how they do it but it sure ain’t centrifugal. The outer hatch has closed and we’re reading a pressure buildup outside, so it looks like they’re turning on the air or whatever they use. I’ll tell you if you need helmets or
not when we’ve done some tests. Won’t take more’n a minute. We still have contact with 15 here. Guess our friends are picking up our transmissions and relaying them on. 15 says the emergency status has been relaxed ‘and communications have been resumed with other locations. Message from 14 reads: Tell ’em we waved as they went past.”
The air was breathable-almost normal. Hunt had expected as much; the ship’s atmosphere would probably resemble that of Minerva, and terrestrial life had flourished there. The figures in the cabin stayed outwardly calm, but here and there fidgeting and last-minute fiddling with pieces of equipment betrayed the rising air of impatience and expectancy.
The honor of placing the first human foot on an alien spacecraft was to be Storrel’s. He rose from his seat near the rear of the cabin and waited for the inner door of the lock to swing aside; then he moved through into the chamber and peered through the transparent port of the outer door.
After a short wait he reported his findings to the rest of the party. “A door is opening in the wall at the edge of the platform we’re on. There are guys standing inside it-the big guys. They’re coming out. . . one, two, three. . . five of them. Now they’re coming across . . .” Heads in the cabin turned instinctively toward the wall screen, but it was showing another part of the structure.
“Can’t get a scanner on them,” the pilot said, as if reading their thoughts. “It’s a blind spot. You’re in command now, sir.” Storrel continued looking out of the port but said nothing further for a while. Then he turned back to face the cabin and took a deep breath.
“Okay, this is it. No change from plan; play it as briefed. Open her up, pilot.”
The outer door of the bus slid into its recess and a short metal stairway unfolded onto the platform. Storrel moved forward to stand framed in the entrance for a second, then disappeared slowly outside. The UNSA officer who was to be second, already waiting at the inner door, followed him while, farther back in the cabin, Hunt took his place in the slowly shuffling line.
Hunt’s impression as he emerged was one of a vastness of space that had not been apparent from inside the bus; it was like walking suddenly out of a side chapel and into the nave of a cathedral.
Not that he found himself surrounded by a large unused area-this was, after all, a spacecraft-but beyond the tail assembly of the Shapieron’s daughter ship, now seen as a sweeping, metaffic, geometrical sculpture above their heads, the perspective lines of the docking bay’s interior converged in the distance to add true proportion to the astronautic wonder in which they were now standing.
But these were just sensations that flitted across the background of Hunt’s perceptions. Before him, history was being made: the first face-to-face meeting between Man and an intelligent, alien species was taking place. Storrel and the two officers were standing slightly in front of the rest of the party, who had formed into a single rank; just a few feet away, facing Storrel, stood what appeared to be the leader of the Ganymean reception committee and, behind him, his four companions.
Their skins were light gray and appeared somewhat coarse compared to that of humans. All five displayed dense hair covering their heads and hanging to their shoulders though there was no hint of any facial growth. On three of them, including the leader, the hair was jet black; one of the others had gray, almost white, hair while the fifth’s was a very dark coppery hue, enhancing the subtle reddish tint of his complexion.