He put his hands on his helmet, which was the lone piece of hard material the Flickinger suit allowed. Inside the force field, he was wearing fatigues and a Capital University pullover shirt. He looked as if he’d just arrived after a casual walk from the campus.

The statue was a self-portrait of one of the Monument Makers. It had been possible to make that determination from a set of footprints, which had matched the sculpture’s feet. Three lines of symbols, which had defied all efforts at translation, were carved into the base. In later years it had been discovered that the mysterious race had left sculptures, shrines, cones, and pillars all over the Orion Arm. But no other statues of the creatures themselves had been found. Hutch wondered whether the creature who’d arrived there had been a loner of some sort. There’d been only one set of prints. If that were true, it seemed likely she’d been trying to send a message. There was something familiar in that alien figure, something in the eyes, in the way it stood looking out at Saturn. Intelligent beings were few in a wide universe that didn’t give a damn for their welfare.

Maybe that was how the symbols translated.

“You know, Mom, you were right.” Charlie bore such a close resemblance to his father, to Tor, that it was almost painful. Dark eyes, chiseled features, charming smile.

“About what?”

“The virtual stuff. Sitting in the living room at home looking at this doesn’t work the same way.” He raised a fist. “You have to be here. I wish Dotty could have seen this.” Dotty was his current girlfriend. Hutch had offered to bring her along too, but her parents had declined. Too dangerous.

“Happy birthday, son.”

“You’ve made it unforgettable. Maybe it’s time I told you something.”

“Uh-oh.” She glanced around at the other tourists. There were eleven altogether. A couple were looking inside the ground module. The rest were standing on the viewing section in front of the statue, some pointing at the wings, others at the claws or trying to make something of the symbols. “Is there a problem?” She knew, of course, there wasn’t. But she and Charlie played games whenever they could.

“When I get through school—”

“Yes?”

“I’m going to follow your career. Become a pilot.”

That was news. He was majoring in art and seemed to have much of his dad’s talent in that area. “Glad to hear it, Charlie. You’ll be a good one. When did you decide that?”

“Well, actually, years ago.”

“You never said anything.”