"How Beautiful With Banners"

Whereas James Blish's "Nor Iron Bars" is a direct, linear sequel to his "Common Time," his "How Beautiful With Banners" is a conceptual sequel to that same story because symbolism that had been unconscious, although later recognized as such, in "Common Time" was consciously written into "Banners."

In "Common Time," Garrard, alone in a Haertel overdrive spaceship, endures "psuedo-death," then communicates incomprehensibly with incomprehensible Centaurians:

Ransom en route to Mars experiences space as filled with a life-giving radiance whereas Haertel on the same journey knows that cosmic radiation is lethal. Later, Ransom experiences “trans-sensuous life” while approaching Venus in an angelically propelled coffin whereas Haertel’s successor, Garrard, endures psychophysical “psuedo-death” while enclosed in the rigid, monotonous environment of an interstellar spaceship.^{14, 15}
-copied from here.

In "Banners," Ulla Hillstrom is alone in her transparent film wrap on Titan when a Titanian "flying cloak" organism fuses with this artificial large protein molecule, then abandons Ulla to her inevitable death when it rises to join another flying cloak. Ulla has unknowingly introduced heterosexuality to Titan, thereby starting a sixty million year evolution the end of which no human being will see. Thus, this single story surpasses any of Blish's series in the length of time that it encompasses.