was not meant to take impacts like that, and radiation had weakened it. Organometal split asunder. Iron crushed circuits.
He cast the hammer from him and reeled out of the tomb. Stars blazed.
No, he must not cry, he must not huddle into grief, not yet. Kestrel and Aleka were, aloft. He switched his radio on. They could receive across the tens of thousands of kilometers between, and it mattered no longer that others heard. “Are you there?” he called. “Come in, come in.”
“Yes,” the dear voice responded. “Oh, darling, you’re hurt.”
“Record this.” He rattled off the figures. “Do you have them?”
“Yes—”
“On your way.”
“Aloha au id ‘oe,” he heard. “I love you.” He could not see, but he could imagine the spaceship surge forward.
He slumped down onto the regolith and waited for Venator’s men. The sun broke over the ringwall. 1 he Peace Authority vessel drove Earthward at half a gravity.
She was big, with space for some cabins. Kenmuir had been put in one by himself. The door was locked. His guards had told him that if he needed anything he could ask for it through the intercom, but thus far he had not. What he most wanted was to be alone.
Well, he would have liked a viewscreen, that he might look out upon the stars. Cramped and barren, the room crowded him together with his thoughts.
For the hundredth or the thousandth weary time he wondered how all this had come to pass, how he turned into a rebel and a killer. Why? He never intended or foresaw it. Events seemed to have acquired their own momentum, almost a will of their own. Was that the nature of human history? Chaos— strange attractors—how much did the Teramind itself understand? How much did God?
The door spread. It reclosed as a blue-clad figure stepped through. Kenmuir rose from the unfolded bunk. For a few seconds they stood motionless, two men tall and lean, one dark, one pale.
“Greeting, Captain Kenmuir,” the newcomer said in Anglo of the eastern hemisphere.
“You’re Pragmatic Venator, aren’t you?” the prisoner replied. “So we meet at last.”
The officer nodded. “I want to talk with you while we can be private.”
“Private? Your machines are watching and listening, I’m sure.”
“They’re your machines too.” Humanity’s.
“We’re both in error. They’re nobody’s.” Robots reporting to sophotects that ultimately were facets of the supreme intellect.
“No contradiction,” Venator said. “Your partner is yours, and you are hers, but neither is property.”
Something stirred in Kenmuir. He had felt emotionally emptied; but he found that he could again care. “What about Aleka? What can you tell me?” What will you?
Venator raised his brows. “Aleka? … Oh, yes. Alice Tarn. She’s alive and well.” A smile flickered. “Inconveniently much. That’s what I mainly have to discuss with you, if you’re able.”
Kenmuir shrugged. “I’m able, if not exactly willing. The constabulary on Luna were … not unkind. I’m medicated and rested.” In the body, at least. The mind, the soul—Anxiety died. He returned to the detachment that had possessed him of late, whether because he had been unknowingly tranquilized orbecause his spirit was exhausted; he stood apart from himself, a Cartesian consciousness observing its destiny unfold.
“Shall we sit?” Venator suggested.
“No need.” Nor wish.
“Do you care for refreshment? We’ve much to talk about.”
“No, I don’t want anything” that they aboard could give him.
“Pray rest assured you’re in no danger,” Venator said “You’re in civilized keeping.” The features Weakened, the tone flattened. “Perhaps more civilized than you deserve.”
“We can argue rights and wrongs later, can’t we?”
Venator went back to mildness. “I believe we’ll do more than argue, Captain. But, true, we’d best get the empirical out of the way first. Would you tell me why, m-m, Aleka didn’t take you along when she escaped?”
“Isn’t that obvious? I’d have had to retreat to a safe distance, then run to the ship, after which she’d have had to lift. It could have cost us as much as an hour. We didn’t have that long.”
“Obvious, yes. An hour at two gravities means an extra seven kilometers per second. I was probing the degree of your determination. I don’t suppose you’ll tell me where she’s bound?”