The Colors of Space

The Lhari spaceport didn't belong on Earth.

Bart Steele had thought that, a long time ago, when he first saw it. He

had been just a kid then; twelve years old, and all excited about seeing

Earth for the first time--Earth, the legendary home of mankind before

the Age of Space, the planet of Bart's far-back ancestors. And the first

thing he'd seen on Earth, when he got off the starship, was the Lhari

spaceport.

And he'd thought, right then, It doesn't belong on Earth.

He'd said so to his father, and his father's face had gone strange,

bitter and remote.

"A lot of people would agree with you, Son," Captain Rupert Steele had

said softly. "The trouble is, if the Lhari spaceport wasn't on Earth, we

wouldn't be on Earth either. Remember that."

Bart remembered it, five years later, as he got off the strip of moving

sidewalk. He turned to wait for Tommy Kendron, who was getting his

baggage off the center strip of the moving roadway. Bart Steele and

Tommy Kendron had graduated together, the day before, from the Space

Academy of Earth. Now Tommy, who had been born on the ninth planet of

the star Capella, was taking the Lhari starship to his faraway home, and

Bart's father was coming back to Earth, on the same starship, to meet

his son.

Five years, Bart thought. That's a long time. I wonder if Dad will

know me?

"Let me give you a hand with that stuff, Tommy."

"I can manage," Tommy chuckled, hefting the plastic cases. "They don't

allow you much baggage weight on the Lhari ships. Certainly not more

than I can handle."

The two lads stood in front of the spaceport gate for a minute. Over the

gate, which was high and pointed and made of some clear colorless

material like glass, was a jagged symbol resembling a flash of

lightning; the sign, in Lhari language, for the home world of the Lhari.

They walked through the pointed glass gate, and stood for a moment, by

mutual consent, looking down over the vast expanse of the Lhari

spaceport.

This had once been a great desert. Now it was all floored in with some

strange substance that was neither glass, metal nor concrete; it looked

like gleaming crystal--though it felt soft underfoot--and in the glare

of the noonday sun, it gave back the glare in a million rainbow flashes.

Tommy put his hands up to his eyes to shield them. "The Lhari must have

funny eyes, if they can stand all this glare!"