Gording carefully retrieved Skatholtz's broken spear. He found the rock with the thread tied to it, found another rock and rebuilt his weapon. The tchiple's safety balloons had nearly deflated. Gording felt around inside until he had located the plastic disk.
The sun was a fiery flying saucer settling on clouds. They set out into the wet wheat, and Corbell began the tale of how the Girls had lost a moon.
Toward morning they found a stream.
Jupiter had lighted their way in horizontal orange beams that made the land look brighter than it was. Corbell walked into the water before he knew it was there. The stream was shallow and sluggish. Marsh grass was growing in it, possibly a mutant form of wheat or rice.
Corbell knelt to drink. He rubbed his calves to wash away dried blood. When he looked up Gording held a flopping fish in his hands.
"Gording, you're quick!"
"Dinner, such as it is-" He was scaling the fish.
"Do we dare build a fire?"
"No, we must not be seen. We're just the wrong number. We can't pass as Boys at any distance. We'll eat the fish raw."
"No, thanks."
"As you like."
The unwinking point of light had grown no brighter. Odd, that it could have come so fast. But Uranus had been nearing Jupiter in the random orbit the Girls had left it in, when Don Juan arrived in Sol system. He said as much to Gording.
Gording nodded his pale head. "I have not added the numbers, but I think the paths of Jupiter and Uranus must cross forever if it was left free after the Girls dropped Ganymede... But why would they let it free? They would have been trying to turn it, to correct their mistake."
"Maybe they heard there was a war. They took their ships home to bomb the Boys from orbit. They never came back."
Gording had eaten everything but the bones of the fish. He said, "It is unlikely that the Girls waited their revenge for your return. It is unlikely that Uranus, falling free, crosses the world's path just after your return. I think your explanation is right, Corbell. We must go to Four City and find the old dikt who has your pressure-suit helmet. Otherwise we will see the end of all life."
"I was afraid you'd say that. All right. There's a working tchiple in Sarash-Zillish. It took me there from Cape Horn. I wish I knew the code for getting back... but I don't."
"Dial at random?"
"Maybe. I'd like to check the subway system first. There are maps in the subway building." He stood. "Let's go."
Dawn came with a marrow-freezing roar. It whipped Corbell's head around. He faced a dwarf lion, twenty yards away on a rise of ground, roaring challenge.
Skatholtz's broken spear slapped against his palm. "Attack!" cried Gording, and he charged the Great-Dane-sized beast.
Corbell pelted after him. The lion seemed taken aback... but he decided. He charged Gording. Somehow Gording danced aside. The lion turned, broadside to Corbell. Corbell threw all his weight behind the spear, leaned into it as it punched into the lion behind the ribs. The lion screamed, turned and slashed, and missed, because one of its forelegs was unaccountably missing. Gording did his trick again and both the lion's forelegs were gone.
"Now run!" Gording cried.
They ran toward Sarash-Zillish. In the clear air they could see the bluish line where trees began. "Male lion... drives the prey .
toward the female," Gording panted.
Corbell looked back and saw something wheat-colored bounding through the tall wheat. A glance at the old man made him say, "You'll wear yourself... out. We'll have... to fight."
They stopped, blowing.
The female's caution gave them time to breathe. She stalked out of the wheat to find them facing her like statues of athletes, eight feet apart. She roared. They didn't flinch. She thought it over. She roared again. Corbell stood poised, confident, happy.
The female departed. Twice she looked back, thought it over, and kept going.
Corbell walked now with a silly smile plastered across his face. He couldn't help it. Everytime he let his face relax it came back. Any normal pair of men would have been bragging unmercifully; but Gording clearly considered the incident closed. He didn't even show relief at Corbel's competence... which was flattering, in a way.
Finally Corbell said, "Real lions would have torn us up. Why are there so many small versions of big animals?"
"Are there?"
"Yeah. Lions, elephants, buffalo. There must have been about ten thousand Jupiter years of famine here, before the soil turned fertile. The big animals must have starved faster. Or maybe they died of heat prostration: too much volume, not enough surface."
"I believe you. I look at you and I see a different kind of dikt. We have had time to adapt to reddened sunlight and long days and long nights. Animals and plants and dikta... and Boys adapted through the dikta. If Uranus widens the world's path now, it will all be lost."
"I know."
"Are you ready to face Mirelly-Lyra?"
"Yeah." Corbell shivered, though the morning was not especially cool. It would get cooler. Corbell tried to visualize six years of night- and saw Mirelly-Lyra stalking him in the dark. He said, "It'd be nice if we could find dikta immortality before we meet her. She'd do damn near anything for that."
"If we ever find it, my turn comes first."
Corbell laughed. "There's bound to be enough of it. Otherwise it would have been... guarded."
"Why did you pause?"
"Guarded. The hospital vault in Sarash-Zillish wasn't guarded. Were the Boys that sure a dilct couldn't get to it? It looked just like the other vault except for the guard systems, the vault door and the one-way prilatsil and the armored glass cubicles in the roof."
"What of it? What if one dikt or three found dikta immortality? The guarded chamber in Four City was protected from dikta by dikta who owned it, or so you assumed."
"I was wrong. Four City was old, but not like Parhalding. More like Sarash-Zillish. I think the Boys built Four City."
The trees were closer now. Fruit trees. Corbell was hungry. He shrugged that off. He had the tail end of something...
Ashes of a dying fire. Most of it comes out in the feces and urine but not all of that; urea can build up in the joints and cause gout. Cholesterol can build up in the veins and arteries. But even when all these are washed away... there are still the inert molecules that accumulate in the cell itself.
Picture the miracle that can remove those. Now tell me what it looks like.
"There was nothing to guard!"
"I don't under-"
"There was nothing to guard in Sarash-Zillish. I had it turned around. Heeeyaa! I've got it! Dikta immortality!"
Gording backed away a bit. "You had it once before. What fierce beast is to bite me this time?"
"I don't have to say. I made a fool of myself once. Not this time. Come on." The trees were close and Corbell was hungry.
IV
Corbell walked alone through the streets of Sarash-Zillish. His face itched. His scalp itched. His chest itched. He was trying to ignore an acid stomach.
How did loners walk? He'd seen only one loner close enough to tell. That one had been certain of welcome; his walk had been springy and confident, Boyish. Corbell tried to keep his walk springy and confident.
The windows of Sarash-Zillish were dark. The streets were empty and silent. This whole charade could turn out to be unnecessary, itches and all...