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vision ports as they slowly approached it. The women were managing to pilot the bubble where it needed to go. The conviction grew that they were going to make it.
    But that allowed Spirit to think about other things. Hope and Helse were now an open couple, and they looked wonderful together. That griped Spirit; she had been closest to her brother before. She tried to control herself, knowing that her attitude was unworthy, but couldn't.
    One day she burst in on the two of them in their chamber, hoping to catch them in the middle of sex.
    “There you go again!” she cried. “Father's gone, Faith's gone, Mother's alone--and you're busy fooling with her!”
    Actually she could see that they weren't doing it at the moment; they were naked, but they had been sleeping. Still, they were doing it at other times, and certainly Helse was monopolizing Hope's attention.
    “I do not take your brother from you, Spirit,” Helse said. “I can never do that. You are of his blood and I am not. I do not love him as you do.”
    Spirit faced her defiantly. “That's space-crock! You love him more than I do!”
    Helse looked as if she had been stabbed. “Oh!” she cried in pain, and fled the chamber, naked.
    Spirit stared after her, astonished. “I vanquished her!”
    “But you misspoke yourself,” Hope protested. “You said she loves me more than you do. You know she doesn't love me; she can't love any man.”
    “Oh, I shouldn't have said that! I blabbed her secret!”
    “What secret?”
    “I'd better go try to apologize. I lost my stupid head.” She started to leave.
    He held her back. “She doesn't love me, though I love her. I understand her situation. My talent--”
    “Oh, you don't know half what you think you do!” Spirit snapped. “When your emotion is tied in, your talent cuts out!”
    He looked stricken, and she realized that she shouldn't have said that either, though it too was true. She was thoughtlessly laying about her with a verbal knife, and cutting up those who meant most to her. “But she said--” he said haltingly.
    Once again she spoke before she thought, and then just had to continue, because half the truth would be worse for him that all of it. “She had to deny it, dummy! She thinks men don't love women who love them back. She's always been used by men who only wanted her body, no matter what they said at the time, and when her body changed they didn't want her anymore. So she knew if she really liked someone, she shouldn't ever, ever let on, because--” She wrenched, trying to break free of his hold on her. “Let me go, Hope! I could kill myself! Helse's an awfully nice girl, and I've got to tell her--I don't know what, but I've got to!”
    Now she scrambled out of the chamber, and searched for Helse. She wasn't hard to find; evidently becoming aware of her extreme dishabille, she had ducked into another unoccupied chamber. She was huddled there, alone, sobbing.
    Spirit dropped in beside her. “Helse, I'm sorry! I--I--when Hope gets in trouble, he expands his understanding and somehow makes it come out all right. With me, I just start fighting worse. I--” But what could she possibly say to make it right? Suddenly her tears were flowing, making it worse yet. “Oh, damn, damn, damn!”
    “I didn't mean to hurt you, Spirit,” Helse said. “I thought it was all right with you.”
    Even through her tears, Spirit managed a form of laugh. “I'm supposed to be apologizing to you! You're a really nice person. I just got so crazy jealous--damn! I'm a stupid child. I never should have--what can I do to make it right?”
    “You spoke the truth.”
    “Sure! And we're eating our fathers. Should I speak that truth too?”
    “I think I see it now,” Helse said. “I've been taking up so much of Hope's attention, you're getting excluded. I shouldn't have been so selfish. I'll try to change--”
    “No! That would only hurt him. He loves you.”
    “And it seems that I love him. That means--”
    “No it