Starquake by Robert L. Forward

of both the exterior and interior of Dragon's Egg in that last HoloMem crystal I brought down." He swung down and stopped himself at the doorway to the lounge. "I had the computer reprogram the herder probes to move us into the path of the deorbiter mass. In about half a day we will be in proper position to be kicked out of this close orbit back up to St. George. Then we can be heading for home instead of looking at it." He looked up at the clock readout on the lounge wall. “Time to change HoloMem crystals again," he said. He crouched, then flashed a smile at them through his neat, dark brown beard. "Come on," he said. "There is a lot of work to do to get this ship ready. Amalita and I will finish off the last of the HoloMem crystals, but the rest of you had better start buttoning up the ship; the gravity fields from that deorbiter will turn anything loose into a deadly missile." He jumped upward to the central deck as the others swam through the lounge door and spread out through the ship. Pierre swung over to the communications console and looked at Sky-Teacher over Amalita's shoulder. The robot cheela was patiently explaining something. Pierre stared in fascination at the image. With the million-to-one time differential, it had not surprised Pierre that the cheela would make a slow-response, long-living robot that could take over the demanding task of talking to the slow-thinking humans. What amazed Pierre was that the robotic creature was so realistic that it had a person