Man, according to them, when subjected to long periods of unrelieved solitude, is apt to lose control over his own mind and emotions, can be lulled imperceptibly into a dreamless, wakeful sleep from which he is not always able to waken in time. Some have been known to fall victim to hallucinations of obscure origin, to fits of anxiety or severe emotional outbursts, and the ability to control one’s own physiognomy is thought to be an excellent corrective, though, to be sure, it was no fun having to stare at one’s own face for hours on end and dutifully record its every expression. And no one can appreciate this better than the pilots of patrolships. It may begin innocently enough: you make a face, you frown or grin at your own reflection, and that unleashes a torrent of grimaces, one more contorted than the next. That’s what can happen when a situation so contrary to nature goes beyond normal human endurance.

Fortunately, Pirx was not so infatuated with his own image as others were with theirs. Though difficult to verify, stories were told of those who, overcome by a debilitating boredom, were given to such embarrassing acts as spitting at their own reflection, and how, overwhelmed with shame, and in violation of all the rules, they would unfasten their straps, get up, and proceed to walk—or rather to swim—through the cabin’s zero-gravity atmosphere to the mirror, to somehow clean it before landing. There were some who stubbornly maintained that Wuertz had drilled his ship thirty-three meters into the concrete landing strip because he had put off cleaning his mirror until the moment of reentry.

Pilot Pirx had never experienced such symptoms, much less felt the temptation to spit at his own reflection—the struggle to resist often led to severe psychological damage that could have been amusing only to those who have never flown a lonely patrol. In the end, even during his worst spells, Pirx had always found something to distract him, some dependable spool around which to wind his jumbled thoughts and emotions, like a long and tangled thread.