He looked up again, this time in the opposite direction. The globular skylevator was rising, growing smaller and dearer each minute, looking now like a balloon. Soon he wouldn’t be able to see it at all. Proteus watched, thinking of the floating city complex to which it would return. He sighed, realizing how snugly he had been held within that plastic bauble. Now he almost yearned for the skylevator’s sheltering walls.

Already his skin prickled. The air was wild here, not controlled and even. Surprisingly soft, still it pushed against his face, thrust itself all around him, pushed him, though gently. It felt alive. But then so did the ground, which seemed to be a litter of sand granules and stones and small weeds. He was so surprised to be walking on an uneven surface that once he stopped dead still, almost afraid to go on. He wobbled when he walked. The stones hurt his feet, and he realized that in no time at all his shoes would be a complete loss. The sun fell a few notches in the sky.

How many other human beings were on the Earth? Suddenly he felt brave, heroic, caught up in a rush of exaltation. Once his mother had taken him on a business trip to the Moon with her, but the Moon was civilized and quite mundane in the domed areas. Earth was different. It was primitive, real. In a strange manner, he felt that he’d come home.

His aero-skis would save his shoes and feet until he got used to walking on the surface. He inflated them, and took off, whizzing just above the rocks and stones. But at once he was in trouble. Too late he realized that the skis had been developed for the comparatively even air currents inside the complexes. It was impossible to glide smoothly in this bumpy, undisciplined air.

Trying to navigate, he looked down beneath him. So this was Section 7! The entire Earth’s surface was designated by symbols now, though archeologists and historians could rattle off the old names with ease. Still, he wished he knew the name for his landing place. It seemed sad not to know.

He searched his mind, but all he could remember was the name Cyprus, which referred to an island, he thought, not a large body of land. Still a name was a name, and better than none. His skis wobbled in a sudden eddy of air, but already he could tell that he was beginning to handle himself in the new air currents. He glided almost easily over a good-sized air-hill, and yelled down at the land, “I name you Cyprus.”