of merchandiser, entered the parameters of the least studied sector on the map and started his way as an independent entrepreneur by chance. When he dove out of hyperspace Valerian checked his ship’s position first of all. He found himself in the vicinity of a big planet Gorgia. The mankind has already known about this pristine world for approximately two hundred years, but the Gorginians were taking such strong efforts in preventing interplanetary relations that an applicant could visit their sector only with the special permission. Valerian had no idea how to get the one, so he heaved aback and prepared himself for a long waiting. And it was absolutely easy for him to do nothing because, after all, in his forty-five he felt lost and castaway, and had no plans for future.

She appeared from nowhere; at least Valerian got such a strange opinion about the red-haired woman watching him through the viewing port. Wait a minute, how is it possible? He is half sitting in the chair inside a spaceship, and she is floating without any helmet or spacesuit in the empty space off-board?!

– It’s a vision, an illusion or a dream. – Valerian murmured these words without any purpose, just to awake himself if necessary.

Drafting for a couple of days made him lazy, the gravity unit was off at uselessness, so he unfastened himself from the chair and swam to the window to check his experiences. There was nothing outside but the darkness of cosmos. Valerian reached the control board and switched the artificial gravity on. Then he took a tour to the engineering compartment, electronics chamber and the kitchen block, and returned to the captain’s bridge with the container of food and drinks. This type of modern ships is totally automated and a single pilot may operate a machine of a Big Apple size just by checking the controls and computer's reports. Valerian got cozy in the low and soft armchair, put the tray on the small table and opened the lid of the catering container. Under the lid there was a pressed plastic plate with two warm toasts in forms covered with layers of butter, slices of ham, lettuce and cheese. Hot coffee in a closed thermo-cup, cherry tomatoes held by plastic ribbons and some orange candies for dessert gave the impression of almost home comfort.

– I know that it will be possible only on a firm ground but I would like to have some beer and a shrimp cocktail. – Valerian said thoughtfully with addressing to no one.

The next moment a high glass full of cool yellow drink was lying in his hand and an ice-cream glass with pink shrimps in creamy sauce was staying on the table. Valerian got stuck of amazement. The first thought in his head that appeared at that moment was as absurd as the biblical story of the world creation. When he was a boy and laughed at “Santa Claus fairy-tales”, his father insisted that once upon a time there lived such a person. Maybe the name of Santa Claus was not correct and invented by people, maybe the period of Santa’s existence was different from the fable one, but according to his father the phenomenon was real many centuries ago. The bush telegraph says that an old man was hiding himself in the North Pole all year round, catching the thoughts of children all over the world and collecting the materialized things in his premises, and then leaving his shelter after the day of winter solstice with the purpose to deliver all the gifts to certain addresses and to make the dreams of clear minds come true. And he travelled by some strange means of transport that most of public considered being a flying sledge drawn by a harnessed deer. The fable says that Santa became weaker and weaker and disappeared one day because the children of the Earth stopped believing in him. But Valerian’s father made a supposition that the man called Santa Claus had just become too old and died of natural reasons.

All right, nice story, nice hypothesis and nice explanation of the materialized wish, but what really have lain under them? The next moment something or somebody knocked in Valerian’s head and asked the permission to come in. He nodded and saw the red-haired woman again.

– Don’t be afraid, – she said voicelessly. – I am not an illusion; I am quite a material creature of the material world. I live on the Gorgia planet, and my nature is rather different from yours. But you have already noticed it. My race got in touch with humans thousands of years ago when we were as curious as your people are at the moment. The epoch of space travelling gave us great experiences and also vast disappointments. By the Planet Council’s Degree the Distant Space Research Program was closed, and we reduced or interrupted contacts to the less developed worlds. You have appeared at the traverse of Gorgia by chance, but don’t forget that any eventuality is a particular case of regularity.

– How can I get permission for visiting your planet? – It seemed that Valerian could handle himself and started to generate reasonable synopses.

– I think that you don’t need any permission as well as visiting the surface. – The woman became firmer than before, – It is so dangerous for the type of consciousness that you have. Human brain is fragile; you may even die down here. And for sure you will lose your mind and join those few desperate creatures who ignored the warning and landed a century or two ago. You consider them lost in mission.

– You may say that I’m a loser, but I’m not the only one. – He smiled because he found his joke to be funny. – You are so beautiful, what is your name, girly? – A male woke up in Valerian and changed the priority of desires.

– My name is Tartara. It’s the closest variant to the pronunciation in human language. I belong to