"Yeah. But it worked out pretty great for me." She sets her snack tray down and does a neat casual flip over the back of her arm chair. "Anytime I'm not in the shower I can do anything I have the muscle tone for, and in zero-g everybody else floats and I fly."

"That is pretty cool. Of course some people don't need zero-g to fly but zero-g sounds pretty damn cool anyway."

"Yes, well, if I were the kinda mutant with wings I couldn't go to Battle School in the first place, they have to trade off between polite disability accommodations and being in space."

"Oh, I was thinking more of telekinetics who can lift themselves and so on. My sister does magnetism and one of my other best friends does teekay and they can both fly."

"They don't love teekay or magnets in space either. I think they've made exceptions but they're not otherwise selecting for psychological health above a certain baseline and if a temper tantrum loses station pressure..."

"Ew. Okay, that makes a certain amount of sense. Not that either of my friends is likely to do anything like that, but yeah, lives on the line, I can appreciate that logic."

"I mean, they take Battle Schoolers who are kindergarten age, they have great psych tests but still."

"But still, yeah. ...So if you've been in space for the past whatever, you probably don't get trees and grass and stuff. Have you been outside?"

"There's an outside? I mean, besides the stars exploding outside, which, I didn't bring spacewalk gear."

"Yeah, Bar has a backyard with a lake and a forest and a mountain off in the distance."

"Neat. Can people swim in the lake?"

"Yeah. I've done it a couple of times."

"Anybody gonna care if I don't want to soak my uniform pants in so doing?"

"I don't, and Bar doesn't care what you are or are not wearing as long as it's not in the main area."

"Neat. Which way?" Aegis sways slightly with anticipation.

Edie opens the relevant door.

Aegis runs, rather gazelle-like, to the shore, hops out of her pants, and dives in. She is not an expert swimmer, but she stays afloat. "Brr!" she says delightedly.

"Don't get a lot of chance to go swimming in space?"

"Nope. Zero-g's better but this is new. For exercise it's all treadmills and weights and such."

"Yeah, novelty's cool. And swimming's fun, even if the water is pretty cold."

Aegis figures out how to float on her back. "So you know what I do all day, what about you?"

"Oh, I'm at college getting my teaching degree. Nothing near as interesting as space."

"What're you gonna teach?"

"Languages. I'm already something of a polygot, so it seemed like a good choice."

"Neat. Does your telepathy do languages? That's a nice polite application for it."