An Lowe opened her eyes and looked toward the red sphere that seemed to float at the center of the tangent-orbital reference viewer. She recognized Earth.
She felt no emotion. Returning to her world after six thousand years could not stir her. Nothing, absolutely nothing, could move her.
She sensed G’wer, the "Orion," speaking to her through their shared sensory link:
—In three hours, we will be there, "Eldem."
G’wer must have been watching her from his steel tower, the antenna reaching eighty thousand meters, the beacon of the Galaxy. He was not human. He lived within a glass receptacle, among metallic spores, circuits, and ultraphotocells. A curious "robot" with a mind more complex than any human's.
Peter Kapra was a prolific writer of science fiction, westerns, war, and crime stories from 1960 to 1982. His works, originally written in Spanish, had only been translated into Portuguese until now—and only a few of them. This is the first time his work is being presented to the English-speaking audience.