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platform below us slowly fell away. In a few seconds, you could see the big energy farm. I strained at the seatbelt, but couldn't get close enough to the “window” to see the laser and the mirror—dumb of me. It wasn't really a window; if the camera wasn't pointed at the laser, I wouldn't see it.
    The noise stopped and there was another bump. “Switching over,” Dr. Porter said over the intercom. A woman of few words.
    The main motors were much smoother. There was a slight press of acceleration and a low hum, and in a couple of minutes we were up to our cruising speed, about 250 miles per hour.
    After a couple minutes more of going straight up, we were higher than most airplanes, and you could easily see the curvature of the Earth as the Galapagos came into sight. My ears started to pop and crackle with the air pressure dropping. Upstairs, a couple of the younger kids were crying. Ears or fears?
    It wasn't really anything new; we'd sat through a twelve-hour test of it at the Denver orientation, thin air with beefed-up oxygen, and everybody managed to live with it. We'll be breathing something like this for the next five years. (The high oxygen content was why we couldn't bring regular clothes—everything has to be absolutely nonflammable. And smokers have to quit.)
    Little numbers in the corner of the window showed how high we were and what the gravity was. At seven or eight miles, the edge of South America was coming into view. The sky was getting darker and darker blue, and by twenty-five miles it was almost black. You could see a few stars, at least on this side. I craned my neck to see the windows behind me; the ones facing the afternoon sun were dimmed.
    Soon the sky was inky black, and I shivered involuntarily. For all practical purposes, we were in outer space. Outside the elevator, you wouldn't live a minute.
    That would be true in an airplane, too. I told myself not to panic. I considered taking one of the pills, but instead just closed my eyes and took a few deep breaths.
    When I opened my eyes, the gravity had fallen to 0.99. I'd lost a pound already, on the Space Elevator Diet. (Money back guarantee—in one week, your weight problem will be gone!)
    That was one advantage we had over the old astronauts. They went straight from one gee to nothing, and about half of them got sick. We had a week to get used to it gradually. But we did have barf bags, too.
    That made me glance down to the pocket on the side of the chair. I did not count the number of bags in the stack, but rather pulled out the magazines.
    We didn't get paper magazines at home. These felt funny, kind of heavy and slippery. I guess that was like the clothes, nonflammable paper.
    One was the Space Elevator News, with a sticker on it that said “take this copy home with you.” Not to Mars, I think. The others were the weekend edition of the International Herald Tribune, which I'd read back at the hotel (for the comics), Time,International Photography, and Seventeen .
    "God, you're reading a magazine?” Card said. “Look, South America!"
    "I saw it miles ago,” I said. But Earth really was starting to look like a planet, and we were only thirty miles up. I'd thought it would take a lot longer than that.
    "You're free to unbelt now and walk around the carrier,” Dr. Porter said. “Sometime before six o'clock, check off your dinner preference, and I'll call for you when it's ready.” Doctor, chef, and waitress all in one, impressive. Though I suspected there wouldn't be much chefing involved, and I was right.
    Once you got over the novelty of seeing the Earth out there, it was kind of like watching grass grow. I mean, it wasn't like low Earth orbit, where the real estate rolls along underneath you, constantly changing. I figured I could check it out once an hour, and tried the keyboard.
    It worked pretty much like the console at home. Bigger picture and more detail. Out of curiosity I typed in a request for porn, and got an alphabetical menu