More and more of the night hemisphere was coming into view, and proved, while much darker than the daylit part, to be much brighter than geometry would have suggested.

“Lightning,” remarked the navigator without taking her attention from her work.

“Shouldn’t it be sort of flickering?” asked Mike.

“When we’re closer and can see separate storms.”

“When can we communicate? You haven’t tried to use radio yet.”

“We can’t. The lightning hashes up everything electromagnetic up to near infrared; radio, even FM, is nothing but noise out to half a million kilometers. The permanent haze is charged enough to take care of most shorter waves. Only Muamoku maintains a reasonably high-powered set of laser beams aimed almost vertically, but we have to find those ourselves. I hope the place hasn’t drifted too far north or south. Guiding people like us in to where they are is not their highest priority, and if storms knock them off latitude they don’t always hurry back. The city isn’t very maneuverable, after all, and there aren’t many scheduled arrivals from outside. We’re lucky having even one city that’s willing to do it at all. They—look! RS-455 on the screen! There they are!”

It must have been a battery of lasers, not just one; the luminous spot below was changing color as the ship moved. At first the signal was brilliant blue; then it was green, then yellow. Then it shifted back to green, and the navigator altered course and speed slightly. The yellow returned and became orange, started toward shorter wavelengths again, but was finally brought to deep red by more control work.

“Now we let straight down, but try to see the city before we land on it,” was the remark.

“What do we land on?” Mike asked naturally.

“Ocean. Don’t worry, we’ll float.” “Is there tube connection, or do we moor securely enough for that?”

“We don’t. You’ll need a suit.”