Entry To Elsewhen - Lungfish

Lungfish

This story takes place aboard a multi-generational spaceship traveling from Earth to a planet orbiting Tau Ceti with the goal of establishing a colony. The story's action concerns the end of the journey. The trip has taken 37 years, and by now the crew is composed of two groups—the Earthborn, the surviving members of the original crew, and the Tripborn, descendants of the original crew, who have lived their entire lives aboard the ship.

On reaching the destination planet, the Tripborn refuse to leave the ship. Never having lived on a planet, they don't seem to see the appeal. Additionally the idea causes severe agoraphobia, as experienced by one Tripborn crew member who makes a landing on the planet and must be retrieved by remote control. The Earthborn crew members employ a variety of means to make the Tripborn less comfortable on the ship, such as Psychoactive Drug included in the food supply and subtle background sounds designed to cause unease. However this fails to move the Tripborn, even despite the fact that the ship will be unable to support the full crew's life for more than a few weeks more. The Tripborn also note that it's difficult to accept the Earthborn crew's rosy predictions for the future when the overall mission calls for the Earthborn to return home, leaving the Tripborn to establish the colony.

Since the ship's cargo includes the necessary tools to build a city suitable for 10,000 inhabitants on the destination planet, the Earthborn crew suggests that they instead be employed in the construction of a second spaceship. The reduced crew on the original ship could be supported by the ship's systems, and the Earthborn crew would no longer need the original ship for the return voyage.

The story ends before this plan has been carried out, leaving the reader to imagine whether the plan would be successful.

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