THE PREACHERS DAUGHTER

g that command flow appears to be working, and that the problem appears to be internal to the fusion unit." She paused for a moment in the super-frigid room as Basel spoke into his suit's au

y. Zaafir had her flying a jump jet to Cairo less than 24 hours after she accepted her assignment. There was a huge amount of paperwork to go through to have Eliana become a registered member of the Animal Conservation Guild, and it was done in a rushed manner. Eliana later found out from Basel that a number of the construction Guilds that had built the Ranger station were furious with the Cairo Guild. They said it was not in their design requirements that the station would be left inactive and unpowered for so long in such a super cold environment. They were threatening to void their warranties. Basel! Eliana wasn't sure what she had been expecting, but Basel certainly wasn't it. In general, men typically had an easy time socializing with women. Men could expect frequent offers for dating throughout their lives, sometimes from a single woman looking for a date, but more often from a pair of women who were interested in polygamy or often just a sexual tryst without any commitment at all. Eliana would sometimes laugh to herself as a child and wonder how ideal the men must think the setup was. But ten minutes after dropping in to introduce herself at Cairo, Eliana decided Basel was just as shy about socializing with the opposite sex as she was. And here they were now, six hours into their 180-day test and off to a very difficult start. They were on Level-2 of the four-level station, one level below ground in a ten-meter diameter circular area filled with the central controls of the station. The only light was from their arctic suits plus an extra battery light Basel had brought down from Level-4 storage around 2 AM. At midnight when the jump jet had lifted off, they had both been expecting to climb down the access ladder and simply turn the station on and sack out in toasty comfort a few hours later. Eliana stared at the back of her co