in his frozen brain a limited world stretched out of an archaic nature ; herb asher supposed himself to be back on the little planet of the cy3o-cy3ob system where he had maintained his dome in those crucial years ... crucial , in that he had met rybys rommey , migrated back to earth with her , after formally marrying her , and then getting himself interrogated by the terran authorities and , as if that were not enough , getting himself perfunctorily killed in an air collision that was in no way his fault .