So that was that.
Trase and Irinia talked it over; that is, as much as they could with their throats kind of choked up, and they decided the only thing they could do was to forget each other. Irinia could never be happy living in gravity. So she went off to space again, and Trase just sat back at his great carved oaken desk, looked out his lucite port, and pondered.
Oh, that Trase was a thinker, and his thinking got faster and faster as the days went by, and sometimes again he began to be seen on an earth-time afternoon down on the flight line, watching the ships come in and out. It was a place he hadn't frequented in years.
By the time Irinia got back on her trip from Deimos, his face was hard—hard as the thought that was in his mind. He called Irinia to come to his office. She didn't want to, because they had vowed never to speak again, but somehow, from the tone of the note, she had to come.
"O.K., veepee," she cracked, a frozen, bitter, mask of a smile on her lips, "What've I done now?"
Trase said, "I'm going to space."
Irinia's face went white for a minute, but she knew her Trase—and she knew argument was no good.
"Where?" she whispered.
"Saturn," Trase replied.