Starquake.pdf

millimeters away it fades into the background variations of a few gauss. There were a few plants near the
corner so we just moved the containers to another part of the room."
Zero-Gauss turned to Fuzzy-Crust.
"I have a replacement for Peter," she said, pulling the tiny ball of fuzz and eyes from her pouch.
"Poofsie, meet Fuzzy-Crust. He will be taking good care of you from now on," said the professor,
forming a little nest on the floor with the edge of her tread and dropping the animal into it. The Slink tried
to climb over the edge, but Zero-Gauss kept it in place by rippling her skin underneath the tiny tread. The
Slink stopped and looked up at Fuzzy-Crust with all twelve of its dark red eyes. The student brought an
eye down to look at it.
"So now it will be Flopsie, Mopsie, Cottonball, and Poofsie," said Fuzzy-Crust. "You found an excellent
replacement. It looks just like Peter."
'These genetically pure strains of laboratory Slinks all look the same," said Zero-Gauss. "I just chose the
one that looked the smartest."
"You should have chosen the dumbest one," said Careful-
Mover. "Peter was smart and look what happened to him. He figured out how to open his cage and died
of overeating. Set my zero-gauss horticulture thesis back half a great."
"I'll make sure the cage is locked this time," Zero-Gauss promised. "Do you have anything else for me to
take down?"
"A batch of seedlings," said Careful-Mover. "They are waiting in the storage pen next to the elevator."
Zero-Gauss checked the video monitors that showed every corner of the underground nursery and
animal pens, made a mental note to check a few plants that looked like they needed attention, then made
her way to the elevator in the facilities compound.
Next to the elevator was a dressing subcompound with high walls. She stripped off her six metal
professor badges, took off her jewelry, wiped off all her body paint, and emptied out all her pouches,
even her heritage pouch containing her clan totem. The totem was made of clay fired in the ancient
manner and had a baked-in magnetic field. She rolled the totem in a wiper and put it into a drawer with a
combination lock. Now, as naked as the day she was hatched, she opened the door to the dressing room
and looked out. Electron-Pusher, the facilities operator, was waiting discreetly at the operations console
around the corner.
She moved softly to the holding pens and loaded up her pouches. Poofsie went into a small pouch and
the plastic pots containing the seedlings sprouting in non-magnetic soil went into her carry-all pouch.
Now quite bulky, she faced the open door of the elevator. The elevator did not have a cooled ceiling,
and it took all her nerve to make her tread move her body under the heavy metal roof. Once inside, she
forced her eyes to look at the floor and calmed down. She activated the audio channel of the video link.
"You may shut the door, Electron-Pusher," she said.
"Door shutting, Professor," said Electron-Pusher. "What is the biggest diameter you're carrying?"