the manifest a full range of beasts of burden as well as milk, wool, egg, and meat beasts. Are they Earth-natural, or have they been genetically altered to digest the local vegetation?"
"Your methods were very promising at the time we left, but did not prove out until we were well under way. So all the animals and plants we brought with us are Earth-natural. They're all in stasis, and can be maintained in that condition on the surface for some time, even after the ship leaves. So there'll be time to make the alterations on the next generation."
"Ix Tolo has ongoing projects of his own, but I believe he'll be able to train your new xenos in the techniques."
"Ix Tolo will remain the head xenobiologist, in your absence," said Wiggin. "I've seen his work in recent weeks - years, to you. You've trained him to an exacting standard, and the xenos on this ship intend to learn from him. Though they're hoping you'll return soon. They want to meet you. You're something of a hero to them. This is the only world that has non-formiform flora and fauna. The other colonies have been working with the same genetic groups - this is the only world that posed unique challenges, so you had to do, alone, what all the other colonies were able to do cooperatively."
"Me and Darwin."
"Darwin had more help than you," said Wiggin. "I hope you'll keep your radio dormant instead of off. Because I want to be able to ask for your counsel, if I need it."
"You won't. I'm going back to bed now. I have a lot of walking to do tomorrow."
"I can send a skimmer after you. So you don't have to carry your supplies. It would increase your range."
"But then the old settlers will expect me to come back soon. They'll be waiting for me instead of relying on you."
"I can't pretend that we're not able to track you and find you."
"But you can tell them that you're showing me the respect of not trying. At my request."
"Yes," said Ender. "I'll do that."
There was little more to say. They signed off and Sel went back to bed. He slept easily. And, as usual, woke just when he wanted to - an hour before dawn.
Po was waiting for him.
"I already said good-bye to Mom and Dad," he said.
"Good," said Sel.
"Thanks for letting me come."
"Could I have stopped you?"
"Yes," said Po. "I won't disobey you, Uncle Sel." All the grandchildren generation called him that.
Sel nodded. "Good. Have you eaten?"
"Yes."
"Then let's go. I won't need to eat till noon."
You take a step, then another. That's the journey. But to take a step with your eyes open is not a journey at all, it's a remaking of your own mind. You see things that you never saw before. Things never seen by the eyes of human beings. And you see with your particular eyes, which were trained to see not just a plant, but this plant, filling this ecological niche, but with this and that difference.
And when your eyes have been trained for forty years to be familiar with the patterns of a new world, then you are Antonie van Leeuwenhoek, who first saw the world of animalcules through a microscope; you are Carl Linnaeus, first sorting creatures into families, genera, species; you are Darwin, sorting lines of evolutionary passage from one species to another.
So it was not a rapid journey. Sel had to force himself to move with any kind of haste.
"Don't let me linger so long over every new thing I see," he told Po. "It would be too humiliating for my great expedition to take me only ten kilometers south of the colony. I must cross the first range of mountains, at least."
"And how will I keep you from lingering, when you have me photographing and sampling and storing and recording notes?"
"Refuse to do it. Tell me to get my bony knees up off the ground and start walking."
"All my life I'm taught to obey my elders and watch and learn. I'm your assistant. Your apprentice."
"You're just hoping we don't travel very far so when I die you don't have so long to carry the corpse."
"I thought my father told you - if you actually die, I'm supposed to call for help and observe your decomposition process."
"That's right. You only carry me if I'm breathing."
"Or do you want me to start now? Hoist you onto my shoulders so