We’re expecting guests today. We’re nervous. Relationships have settled, and now — new people. Don’t let them shake us up; it’s hard enough as it is. We’ve gotten used to each other, worked ourselves in, and now it’s like starting over.

All day preparing for the rendezvous. We built a gravity-gradient stabilization attitude, with the transfer chamber’s docking port facing the Earth. This is necessary to create the best conditions for the Soyuz T-6’s “Igla” radio-technical system to acquire and track our station.

We stashed all extra items behind the panels. A vicious headache hit. At 19:50 we activated program 4 — the rendezvous mode began. The station started maneuvering; yaw rate up to two degrees, and immediately braking kicked in. The “36-10 km” indicator started lighting, but velocity lock wasn’t forming. The velocity indicator needle fluctuated between 0 and 6 m/s, slowly rising and falling.

No comm with the Soyuz T-6 crew, the “Pamirs,” at all. I watch the angular rate indicator — our angular rate is decreasing, meaning the ship has fired its engine to kill lateral drift, and the station, automatically tracking the ship, responded by reducing its own angular rate. On the science instruments control panel, the “10-3 km” indicator lit — the ship is already on approach within 10 km. Then the “3-1 km” indicator lit, and a moment later everything on the panel went dark unexpectedly.

We can only see on the combined electronic display a glowing dot — the ship’s television image, somewhere around a kilometer away. It sits on the screen grid three squares up and one to the right, while a minute ago it was only one square from center. So the ship has lateral velocity. That’s good. If the approach is off-nominal, safety is ensured — they’ll fly past us. In this situation the instructions say to follow the visiting crew’s lead, since they have the active role, or the ground’s. No ground contact — we’re outside our stations’ line of sight. We call the “Pamirs” but can’t hear them (later, in the comm zone, the ground told us someone at a ground station had left a transmit button depressed).

The ship moves out of the TV cameras’ field of view. Tolya flew to the intermediate compartment, where the “Pamirs” are docking, to look through the window for the ship. Then he flies back and says: “Val, it’s hovering right nearby.” I go there. I look — the ship is hanging about 200 meters away. Everything’s fine; the crew can see us and has control. We enter the comm zone.

They told us to put the station in stabilization mode.

On the screen the ship reappeared — the “Pamirs” had done a manual flyaround and began final approach. A bump. Docking confirmed! Time: 20:46:22. Good that it ended well. Although the situation wasn’t fully clear to us, we monitored it through individual instrument readings and on the TV display — we could see the ship drifting sideways. So we understood the key thing: the process was safe. And of course, we trusted the transport ship crew completely.

After docking we checked the docking port seal, helped the crew equalize pressure between the ship and station. At exactly midnight we opened the transfer hatches and met, embracing. The crew entered the station with a light box containing blooming orchids from the Kiev Botanical Garden. They were sent from the biotechnology institute where my Lyusya works. She tried hard, my dear. We immediately moved to station post one. The commander reported to the General Secretary about the start of the international crew’s work aboard the station. Then, per the program, until 3 AM — actually until 4 AM — we had dinner, treated the guests, and had our special tea to celebrate the reunion. Sasha and Volodya felt fine. Their mood was excellent — they’d docked manually. Well done. Jean wasn’t feeling great; floating around the station, he was afraid to turn his head. But otherwise everything was normal. When everyone had gone to bed, I took the thick envelope of mail and went to the transfer compartment to read. It was so wonderful. My son’s letters from camp cheered me up.

Letter 1

Dear Mommy. Hello. How are things? I got here fine, my mood is great. Mommy, write me a letter and tell me when you’ll come to take me to Pitsunda.

I miss you so much; please, I’m begging, come get me.

Right now as I write this letter I’m crying. I miss you so much, I just can’t stand it. Please come get me, I’m begging. I’ve only been here one day and they’ve already drilled us with meetings and stuff — there’s no free time.

Just give me your honest word that you’ll come. Mommy, as soon as you get to Pitsunda, come straight to my camp to pick me up. Mom, I just can’t stand it, I want to go home and be with you so much. Oh, and when you write me a letter, don’t forget — I’m in squad nine, brigade “Stremitelnaya.”

Vitalik

Goodbye, Mommy. A million kisses. Be sure to come get me.

See you soon.

Letter 2

Dear Mommy, hello. How are you? I’m fine. Just a little bored. Mom, I bought envelopes at the kiosk — “Airmail.” That way the letter gets there faster. I’ll send you an “Airmail” envelope in my letter. And when you write me, put your letter in this envelope. It’ll get here faster. Other than that, yesterday was the opening ceremony.

We swim in the sea. The hobby clubs will open soon. It’ll be fun. Right now our whole squad is preparing a play — “The Snow Queen” — and on the 31st we’re going to Novorossiysk. So those are the plans for now.

I’m in squad 9, brigade “Stremitelnaya.” Umik and I ended up in the same squad, so don’t worry. Just make sure you send a letter. In my next letter I’ll write to Papa in space.

Well, goodbye. A million kisses. Your son Vitalik. Signed.

Lyusya and Vitalik wrote many letters. Then I climbed into my sleeping bag and didn’t sleep all night — under the spell of the letters, the conversations from the reunion, and the big workload ahead with the guests. Got up at 11 AM. Volodya and Sasha were already fussing in the orbital module of their ship. I helped them deploy the air duct.