The meeting would later be known as the Council of the Seven Eves. For, though eight women were present, one of them—Luisa—had already gone through menopause. Ivy opened with a report on their general situation. From a certain point of view, this was surprisingly good. They had grown so inured to terrible news that she had to emphasize this more than once. Few places in the solar system were as safe as the one where they had come to rest. No cosmic radiation could touch them here. From coronal mass ejections they were equally immune. Sunlight for energy and agriculture could be had a short distance above them, high on the walls of the crevasse, where the sun shone almost all the time.