Am alone on the ship.

Instantly he wished he had not written that, but was not moved to cross the words out. It was true enough. He was alone. Would be alone nine more years.

Suppose something should happen to him? Who would land the ship? And what would happen to the sleepers?

He did not want to think about it. The medocenter would take care of everything. He didn't walk in his sleep. His duty was to get the hundred humans through to Ostarpa and then they all would become part of the colony there, except of course he'd be ten years older than the sleepers upon awakening. He looked at the day gauge on the wall. Just 3,332 days short of Ostarpa.

Three thousand three hundred and thirty-two days without Karen! An eternity of talking to himself and listening only to the sound of his own feet as he walked about the ship. A lifetime for remembrance, just as he remembered now how eager they both had been to make the trip, how she had shared the rigorous training. It had been a chance of a lifetime: ten years of being together! Time to meditate, to ponder the problems of life, of all humanity, of each other. They had thought soberly of it as an opportunity to make something of themselves—write a great play, solve a great problem. But they had never got around to that. The first year had been only the sheer delight of each other's company. He wondered if it would have ever changed. How fast it had gone!

And now it was over and the nine years ahead loomed like a dark tunnel, large and forbidding.

Clifton slammed the palms of his hands on the desk. Enough of that. He was captain of the ship and he had duties. He could not spend his time in the past. There were things to do. He must keep himself occupied. He must not think of her.

But he did.

Even though the days stretched into weeks he still found his steps faltering every time he walked past rooms where he had often looked for her. For one thing there was the stereo room where Karen loved to spend leisure hours. He never saw much in stereo, but she seemed to enjoy it. And there was the music taperoom, the massage parlor, the baths. She seemed to have a need of them. But all Clifton had ever needed was her.

He passed the jammed clothes locker, filled with enough apparel to last her ten years. He could not force himself to open it, though Karen seldom had opened it herself. She had made most of her own clothes, taking the material 

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