The Engines Of God

1 Quraqua. 28th Year of Mission, 211th Day. Thursday, April 29, 2202; 0630 hours local time

Almost overnight, every civilization on this globe had died. It had happened twice: somewhere around 9000 B.C., and again eight thousand years later. On a world filled with curiosities, this fact particularly disturbed Henry's sleep.

He lay awake, thinking how they were running out of time, thinking how the Quraquat had known after all about the anomaly on their moon. They were unaware of the two discontinuities, had lost sight of them toward the end, and remembered them only in myth. But they knew about Oz. Art had found a coin which left no doubt, whose obverse revealed a tiny square on a crescent, at the latitude of the Western Mare. Precisely where Oz was located.

He wondered whether Linda's surmise that the Lower Temple era had possessed optical instruments would prove correct. Or whether the natives had simply had good eyes.

What had they made of the thing? Henry buried his head in his pillow. If the Quraquat had looked at their moon through a telescope, they would have seen a city occupying the center of a vast plain. They would have seen long airless avenues and rows of buildings and broad squares. And a massive defensive wall.

He turned over. Eventually Oz would surface in Quraquat mythology and literature. When we've collected enough of it. And mastered the languages.

His stomach tightened. There would not be time.

The anomaly was only rock, cunningly hewn to create the illusion of the city. There was the real puzzle. And the explanation for Oz lay somehow with the race that had inhabited this world. This was a race that had built complex cultures and developed philosophical systems that had endured for tens of thousands of years. But its genius did not extend to technology, which had never risen much beyond a nineteenth-century level.

The door chimed. "Henry?" The voice in the speaker was tense with excitement. "Are you asleep?"

"No." He opened the door. "Did we get in?"

"Yes—"

Henry threw back his sheet. "Give me two minutes. I didn't think it would be this quick."

Frank Carson stood in the corridor. "You have a good crew down there." In the half-light, he looked pleased. "We think it's intact."

"Good. That's goddam good." He turned on his table lamp. Beyond the window, sunlight filtered down from the surface. "Did you see it?"

"Just a peek. We're saving it for you."

"Yeah. Thanks." The traditional lie amused Henry. He knew they had all stuck their heads in. And now they would pretend that the boss would make the grand entrance.

If there was anyone with the Academy's archeological teams homelier than Henry Jacobi, he would have been a sorry sight. In Linda Thomas' memorable phrase, he always looked as if a load of scrap metal had fallen on him. His face was rumpled and creased, and his anatomy sagged everywhere. He had slate-colored hair, and a permanent squint which might have derived from trying to make out too many ideographs. Nevertheless, he was a master of social graces: everyone liked him, women married him (he had four ex-wives), and people who knew him well would have followed him into combat.

He was a consummate professional. Much like those paleontologists who could assemble a complete brontosaur from a knee bone, Henry seemed able to construct an entire society from an urn.

He followed Carson through the empty community room, and down the stairway into Operations. Janet Allegri, manning the main console, gave them an encouraging thumbs-up.

Creepers and stingfish moved past the wraparound view-panel. Beyond, the sea bottom was crisscrossed by trail marker lamps. The sunlight was fading from the water, and the Temple was lost in the general gloom. They passed into the sea chamber, and put on Flickinger harnesses and jetpacks. Henry rubbed his hands together in pure pleasure.

Carson straightened his shoulders in his best military bearing. He was a big man with a square jaw and intense eyes that saw the world in sharp colors. That he was a retired colonel in the army of the North American Union would surprise no one. "This is just the beginning, Henry. I still say we should hang on here. What are they going to do if we refuse to leave?"

Henry sighed. Carson didn't understand politics. "They would put a lot of heat on the Academy, Frank. And when you and I went home, we would find ourselves back in classrooms. And possibly defending ourselves in court."

"You have to be willing to take risks for what you believe, Henry."

He had actually considered it. Beyond Earth, they knew of three worlds that had given birth to civilizations. One of the civilizations, the Noks on Inakademeri, still survived. The inhabitants of Pinnacle had been dead three-quarters of a million years.

And Quraqua.

Quraqua, of course, was the gold mine. Pinnacle was too far gone, and since the Noks were still in the neighborhood, the opportunities for investigation were limited. Nonetheless, there was hardly a graduate student who hadn't found a buried city, uncovered the key to a mass migration, tracked down a previously unknown civilization. It was the golden age of archeology. Henry Jacobi understood the importance of saving this world. But he had no inclination to risk anyone's life in the effort. He was too old for that sort of thing.

"Does Maggie know we're in?"

"They're getting her now. The poor woman never gets any rest, Henry."

"She can rest when we're out of here." Maggie was his chief philologist. Code-breaker, really. Reader of Impossible Inscriptions. The lamp on his left wrist flashed green. He activated the energy field.

Carson punched the go pad, and the lock cycled open. Water sloshed in over the deck.

Outside, visibility was poor. They were too close inshore: the marker lights always blurred, the water was always full of sand, and one could seldom see the entire Temple.

The Temple of the Winds.

A bitter joke, that. It had been submerged since an earthquake somewhere around Thomas Jefferson's time created a new shoreline. The Temple was a one-time military post, home for various deities, place of worship for travelers long before humans had laid bricks at Ur or Nineveh.

Sic transit.

Fish darted before him, accompanied him. Off to his left, something big moved through the water. Carson turned a lamp in its direction, and the light passed through it. It was a jelly. Quite harmless. It rippled, blossomed, and swam leisurely on its way.

A broad colonnade masked the front of the Temple. They settled onto the stone floor, beside a circular column. It was one of ten still standing. Of an original twelve. Not bad, for a place that had been through an earthquake.

"Frank." Linda's voice broke in on his earphones. She sounded pleased. And with good reason; she had planned this aspect of the excavation. She'd taken a couple of chances, guessed right, and they'd broken in well ahead of schedule. Under the circumstances, the time gained was critical.

"Henry's with me," said Carson. "We're on our way."

"Henry," she said. "We're open as far back as we can see."

"Good show, Linda. Congratulations."

The Temple entrance gaped wide. They swam into the nave. Lines of colored lights trailed off through the dark. It always seemed to Henry that the lamps exaggerated the size of the place.

"Blue," said Carson.

"I know." They followed the blue lamps toward the rear. Only vestiges of the Temple roof remained. The gray light from the surface was oily and thick against the cheerful glow of the markers.

Henry was in poor condition. Swimming tired him, but he had declared jets too dangerous to use inside the excavation. He had to live by his own rules.

The glowing blue track angled abruptly off to the left, and plunged through a hole in the floor.

He could hear Linda and Art Gibbs and some of the others on the common channel. They were laughing and cheering him on and congratulating one another on the find.

He swam down the labyrinthine approach tunnel. Carson stayed to his rear, advising him to take his time, until Henry finally lost patience and asked him to be quiet. He rounded the last bend and saw lights ahead.

They stood aside for him. Trifon Pavlaevich, a husky Russian with a giant white mustache, bowed slightly; Karl Pickens beamed; and Art Gibbs floated proudly beside Linda.

Linda Thomas was a redheaded dynamo who knew what she was doing and didn't mind sharing credit with her colleagues. As a result, they loved her. She stood over a shaft, waving him forward. When he reached her, she shook his hand, and their fields glimmered. "All right," he said briskly. "Let's see what we've got." Someone pressed a lamp into his hand. He lowered it into the darkness, saw engravings and bas-reliefs, and descended into a chamber whose dimensions reached beyond the limits of the light. The walls were busy, filled with shelves and carvings. There were objects on the shelves. Hard to see precisely what. Maybe local sea life, accumulated before the room was sealed. Maybe artifacts.

His team followed. Trifon warned them not to touch any thin. "Got to make a chart before anything gets moved." We know, Tri.

Lights played across the wall-carvings. He could make out animals, but no likenesses of the Quraquat. Sculptures of the intelligent species were rare, except in holy places. In any age. And among most of their cultures. There seemed to be an imperative that prohibited capturing their own image in stone. There would be a reason, of course, but they had not yet found it.

The floor was covered with a half-meter of silt. Other chambers opened beyond. And voices echoed happily in his phones:

"This used to be a table." "The symbols are Casumel series. Right?" "Art, look at this." "I think there's more in back." "Here. Over here."

And Linda, in the room on the north side, held a lamp up to a relief which depicted three Quraquat figures. Trifon delicately touched the face of one of the images, trailing his fingers across its jaw, along the thrust of its mouth. The Quraquat had been warm-blooded, bipedal, furred creatures with a vaguely reptilian cast. Alligators with faces rather than long jaws and mindless grins. These were robed. A four-legged beast stood with them.

"Henry?" She motioned him over.

The figures were majestic. They radiated power and dignity. "Are they gods?" he asked.

"What else?" said Tri.

"Not strictly," said Linda. "This is Telmon, the Creator." She indicated the central figure, which was dominant. "She is the Great Mother. And these are her two aspects: Reason and Passion."

"The Great Mother?" Henry sounded surprised. The Quraquat at the time of their demise had worshipped a supreme male deity.

"Matriarchal societies have been common here," she said. Tri was taking pictures, and Linda posed beside the figure. For perspective, more or less. "If we ever get a decent analysis on the Lower Temple," she said, "we'll discover that was a matriarchy. I'll bet on it. Moreover, we'll probably find Telmon in that era as well."

Carson's voice came in on Jacobi's personal channel. "Henry, there's something here you'll want to see."

It was in the largest of the chambers, where Carson waited before another bas-relief. He waved Henry nearer, and raised his lamp. More Quraquat figures. These seemed to be set in individual tableaus. "There are twelve of them," he said in a significant voice. "Like the Christian stations."

"Mystical number."

Henry moved quietly around the room. The figures were exquisitely wrought. Pieces had broken away, others were eroded by time. But they were still there, frame after frame of the Quraquat in that same godlike dignity. They carried rakes and spears and scrolls. And, near the end, a fearsome creature with partially hooded features appeared.

"Death" said Linda.

Always the same, thought Henry. Here or Babylon or New York. Everybody has the same image.

"What is this? Do you know?"

Linda was glowing. "It's the story of Tull, the Deliverer. Here—" She pointed at the first tableau. "Tull accepts the wine of mortality from Telmon. And here he is behind a plow."

Quraquat mythology wasn't Henry's specialty. But he knew Tull. "Christ figure," he said. "Osiris. Prometheus."

"Yes. Look, here's the visit to the armorer." She drifted along the friezes, pausing before each. "And the battle sequences."

"There's a problem here somewhere," said Carson. "The myth is later than this period, isn't it?"

"We're not sure of very much yet, Frank," said Linda. "And maybe this place isn't as old as we think. But that doesn't matter as much as the fact that we have a complete set of tableaus."

"Marvelous," said Henry. "They'll put these in the West Wing and hang our name on them."

Someone asked what they represented.

"Here," said Linda. "It begins here. Tull is an infant, and he's looking down at the world."

"It's a globe," said Art. "They knew the world was round."

"That knowledge was lost and recovered several times during their history. Anyway, Tull envied the people on the world."

"The Quraquat."

"Yes."

"Why?"

"It's not clear. The Quraquat apparently thought it was obvious why an immortal would behave this way, but they didn't explain it. At least not in any of the records we've been able to find.

"Over here, he's assumed a devotional attitude. He is requesting the gift of mortality from his mother. Look at the universal outstretched hands.

"And here" — she moved past Henry, pointing—"here, he is a teacher."

And here, caught up in war. Arm raised. Expression fierce. His right hand was broken off. "He would have been holding a weapon," she said. "He was at a disadvantage, because when they gave him mortality, they did not deprive him of all his divine attributes. He understood the suffering of his enemies. And he could see the future. He knew that death in battle awaited him. And he knew the manner of its coming."

The crocodilian image of the god-hero was not without its nobility. In one frieze, he contemplates mortality in the presence of dark-robed Death.

"Eventually," said Linda, "he asks that his godhood be restored. Here, look at the supplicating hands."

Henry nodded. "I assume it was restored?"

"Telmon left the decision to him. / will comply with your wish. But you have chosen by far the better part. Continue in your present course, and you will be loved so long as men walk in the world. She didn't say 'men, of course, but used the Quraquat equivalent." Linda illuminated the final tableau. Here, he has made his decision, and puts on his armor for the last time.

"After his death, his mother placed him among the stars." She turned toward Henry. "That's the point of the myth. Death is inevitable. Even the gods are ultimately subject to it. Like the Norse deities. To embrace it voluntarily, for others, is the true measure of divinity."

The dark, robed figure was disturbing. "Something familiar about it," said Henry.

Carson shook his head. "It just looks like your basic Grim Reaper to me."

"No." He had seen the thing before. Somewhere. "It isn't Quraquat, is it?"

Art pointed a lamp at it. "Say again?"

"It isn't Quraquat. Look at it."

"No, it isn't," said Linda. "Does it matter?"

"Maybe not," he said. "But take a close look. What does it remind you of?"

Carson took a deep breath. "The thing on lapetus," he said. "It's one of the Monuments."

Dear Phil,

We got a complete set of the Seasons of Tull today. I have attached details of the design, and tracings of eight wedges with inscriptions in Casumel Linear C. We are exceedingly fortunate: the place is in excellent condition, considering that it was close to sea water for most of its existence, and in the water for the last few centuries.

Time was, we would have had a major celebration. But we are getting close to the end here. We'll be turning everything over to the terraformers in a few weeks. In fact, we are the last team left on Quraqua. Everybody else has gone home. Henry, bless him, won't leave until they push the button.

Anyway, your wunderkind has struck gold. Henry thinks they'll name the new Academy library for me.

Linda

— Linda Thomas.

Letter to her mentor, Dr. Philip Berthold, University of Antioch. Dated the 211th day of the 28th year of the Quraqua Mission. Received in Yellow Springs, Ohio, May 28, 2202.

2 Princeton. Thursday, May 6, 2202; 1730 hours

Hutch killed the engine and the lights, and watched the first wave of office workers spread out through the storm. Most headed for the train station, an elevated platform lost in the hard rain. Some huddled in the shelter of the Tarpley Building, and a few—the more prosperous—dashed for their cars. The sky sagged into the parking lot, its underside illuminated by streetlights and traffic.

His lights were still on, but the blinds were down. It was a corner office on the top floor of a squat utilitarian building, a block of concrete and glass, housing law firms, insurance agents, and jobbers reps. Not the sort of place one would associate with romance. But for her, just being here again, just seeing it, set her internal tides rolling.

People were piling up at the main doors, pulling their collars tight, wrestling with umbrellas. Two or three energy fields blinked on. Cars swung into the approaches, headlamps blurred, wipers moving rhythmically.

Hutch sat unmoving, waiting for the lights to go out, waiting for Cal Hartlett to appear out on the street, wondering what she would do when he did. That she was here at all angered her. It was time to let go, but instead she was hanging around like a lovesick adolescent, hoping something would happen. Hoping he would change his mind when he saw her, as though everything they'd had would come rushing back. But if she didn't try, she would have to live with that knowledge, and she would always wonder.

She shrank down into the front seat, and drew the rain and the night around her.

He had first confessed his love to her in that office. She'd sat in as a systems technician for him one memorable evening, and they'd stayed until dawn.

How long ago all that seemed now. She had been between flights, and when it all ended everything had seemed possible. We'll find a way.

The glide train appeared in the distance, a string of bright lights against the general gloom. A few people hurrying across the lot broke into a run. It approached on a long slow curve, braked, and whispered into the station.

Cal was a financial analyst with the brokerage firm of Forman & Dyer. He enjoyed his work, loved to play with numbers, had been fascinated by her profession. My star pilot. He loved to listen to her descriptions of distant worlds, had extracted a promise that one day, somehow, she would take him along. At least, he'd smiled, to the Moon. He had gray eyes and brown hair and good laugh lines. And he loved her.

The lights in his office went out.

He lived eight blocks away. Cal was a fitness nut, and even in weather like this he would walk home.

The glide train pulled out, accelerated, and slipped into the storm.

The steady flow of people thinned to a handful. She watched the last of them, several waving down their rides, two breaking into a run toward the station.

And then he came through the door. Even at this distance, and in the blurred light, there could be no mistaking him.

She took a deep breath.

Cal pushed his hands deep into the pockets of his soft brown jacket and strode into the lot, away from her, with a quick step. She watched him cross the plastene, skirting puddles, plowing steadily ahead through the storm.

She hesitated, very deliberately shifted to low feed, and switched on the engine. The car moved silently across the pavement, and drew up beside him. Until the last moment, she was uncertain whether or not she would swerve away.

Then he saw her. Her window was down, rain pouring in. He looked startled, pleased, ecstatic, uncomfortable. The whole range of emotions played across his face. "Hutch." He stared at her. "What are you doing here?" She smiled, and was glad she'd come. "Want a ride?" The passenger's door lifted, but he stood watching her. "I didn’t't know you were home."

"I'm home. Listen, you're getting drenched."

"Yeah. Thanks." He came around the front of the car and got in. The after-shave was the same. "How are you doing?"

"Okay. How about you?"

"Fine." His voice was flat. "You look good."

"Thanks."

"But then you've always looked good."

She smiled again, warmer this time, leaned over, and carefully kissed his cheek. Cal had seemed fairly dull when she'd first met him. And his profession had done nothing to enhance that image. But he'd touched her in some primal way so that she knew, whatever happened tonight, she'd never be the same. His appearance, which had been so ordinary in the beginning, was now leading-man, drop-dead caliber. How and when had that happened? She had no idea.

"I wanted to say hello." Swallow. "See you again." Who were the couple who slept with a sword between them to ensure forbearance? She felt the presence of the sword, hard and dead.

He was silent, searching. "Hello."

Rain rattled on the roof. "I missed you."

He frowned. Looked uncomfortable. "Hutch, I have something to tell you."

Up front, she thought. That was his style. "You're getting married."

His eyes widened again. He grinned. It was the sheepish, friendly, disingenuous grin that had first attracted her two years before. Tonight, it reflected relief. The worst of this was already over. "How did you know?"

She shrugged. "People were telling me about it ten minutes after I landed."

"I'm sorry. I would have told you myself, but I didn't know you were back."

"It's not a problem. Who is she?" She negotiated a deep puddle at the exit, and turned onto Harrington Avenue.

"Her name's Teresa Pepperdil. She's like you: uses her last name. Everybody calls her 'Pep. She's a teacher."

"She's attractive, of course."

"Again, like you. I always restrict myself to beautiful women." He meant it as a compliment, but it was clumsy, and it hurt.

Hutch said nothing.

He looked past her, avoiding eye contact. "What can I tell you? She lives in South Jersey, and, as far as I know, she plans to stay here." He sounded defensive.

"Well, congratulations."

"Thanks."

She turned left onto 11th. Cal's apartment was just ahead, in a condo designed to look like a castle. The pennants hung limply. "Listen," she said, "why don't we stop and have a drink somewhere?" She almost added, for old time's sake.

"Can't," he said. "She'll be over in a little while. I need to get cleaned up."

She pulled in at the curb, short of the driveway. Cut the engine. She wanted to back off, let it go, not embarrass herself. "Cal," she said, "there's still time for us." She spoke so softly she wasn't sure he'd heard.

"No." His eyes turned away. She had expected anger, perhaps bitterness, sadness. But there was none of that. His voice sounded hollow. "There never was time for us. Not really."

She said nothing. A man approached with a dog. He glanced at them curiously, recognized Cal, mumbled a greeting, and passed on. "We could still make it work," she said. "If we really wanted to." She held her breath, and realized with numbing suddenness that she was afraid he would say yes.

"Hutch." He took her hand. "You're never here. I'm what you do between flights. A port of call."

"That's not what I intended."

"It's what happens. How many times have we had this conversation? I look at the sky at night, and I know you're out there somewhere. How the hell could you ever settle in to hang around Princeton the rest of your life? And rear kids? Go to PTA meetings?"

"I could do it." Another lie? She seemed to be flying on automatic now.

He shook his head. "Even when you're here, you're not here." His eyes met hers, finally. They were hard, holding her out. "When's your next flight?"

She squeezed his hand, got no response, and released it. "Next week. I'm going out to evacuate the Academy team on Quraqua."

"Nothing ever changes, does it?"

"I guess not."

"No—" He shook his head. "I've seen your eyes when you start talking about those places, Hutch. I know what you're like when you're ready to leave. Did you know you usually can't wait to get away? You could never settle for me." His voice trembled. "Hutch, I love you. Always have. Always will, though I won't mention it again. I would have given anything for you. But you're beyond reach. You would come to hate me."

"That would never happen."

"Sure it would. We both know that if I said, fine, let's go back and start again, you call up what's-his-name and tell him you're not going to Quraqua, wherever the hell that is, and you'd immediately start having second thoughts. Immediately. And I'll tell you something else: when I get out of the car, and you wave goodbye and drive away, you're going to be relieved." He looked at her, and smiled. "Hutch, Pep's a good woman. You'd like her. Be happy for me."

She nodded. Slowly.

"Gotta go. Give me a kiss for the old days."

She managed a smile. Saw its reflection in his face. "Make it count," she said, and drank deep.

Moments later, as she turned onto the Conover Expressway headed north, she decided he was wrong. For the moment, at least, she felt only regret.

Amity Island, Maine. Friday, May 7; 2000 hours.

Hurricanes had been Emily's kind of weather. She'd loved riding them out, sitting in front of the fireplace with a glass of Chianti, listening to the wind howl around the central dome, watching the trees bend. She'd loved them even though they were getting bigger every year, hungrier, wearing down the beach, gradually drowning the island.

Maybe that was why she loved them: they were part of the intricate mechanism of steadily rising seas and retreating forests and advancing deserts that had finally forced reluctant politicians, after three centuries of neglect, to act. Probably too late, she had believed. But she heard in the deep-throated roar of the big storms the voice of the planet.

Richard Wald was struck by her in their first encounter. That had come in the days when archeology was still earth-bound, and they'd been seated across a table in a Hittite statuary seminar. He'd lost track of the statuary, but pursued Emily across three continents and through some of the dingiest restaurants in the Middle East.

After her death, he had not married again. Not that he'd failed to recover emotionally from his loss, nor that he'd been unable to find anyone else. But the sense of what he'd had with her had never been duplicated, nor even approached. His passion for Emily had dwarfed even his love for ancient knowledge. He did not expect to find such a woman again.

It had been her idea to settle in Maine, well away from D.C. or New York. He'd written Babylonian Summer here, the book that made his reputation. They'd been here on Thanksgiving Day, watching a storm like this one, when the announcement came that FTL had been achieved. (At the time neither Richard nor Emily had understood what was so special about FTL, much less how it would change their profession.) That had been just two weeks before she'd died, enroute to visit her family before the holidays.

Rain blew hard against the windows. The big spruce trees in his front yard, and across the street at Jackson's, were heaving. There was no longer a hurricane season. They came at all times of the year. Counting from January 1, this was the seventh. They'd named it Gwen.

Richard had been reviewing his notes on the Great Monuments while preparing to write an article for the Archeological Review. It was a discussion of the current disappointment that we were no closer to finding the Monument-Makers after twenty years of effort. He argued that there was something to be said for not finding them: Without direct contact, they (the Monument-Makers) have become a considerable mythic force. We know now that it is possible to create an advanced culture, dedicated to those aspects of existence that make life worthwhile, and even noble. How else explain the motivation that erected memorials of such compelling beauty?

It might be best, he thought, if we never know them, other than through their art. The artist is always inferior to the creation. What after all are Paeonius, Cezanne, and Marimoto when contrasted with the "Nike," "Val d'Arc," and the "Red Moon"? Firsthand knowledge could hardly lead to anything other than disappointment. And yet—And yet, what would he not give to sit here on this night, with the storm hammering at the door, and Beethoven's Fifth in the air, talking with one of those creatures? What were you thinking atop that ridge? Hutch thinks she understands, but what was really going through your mind? Why did you come here? Did you know about us? Do you simply wander through the galaxy, seeking its wonders?

Were you alone?

The leading edge of Hurricane Gwen packed two hundred-kilometer winds. Black rain whipped across his lawn and shook the house. Thick gray clouds torn by livid welts fled past the rooftops. The metal sign atop Stafford's Pharmacy flapped and banged with steady rhythm. It would probably come loose again, but it was downwind of the town, and there was nothing the other side of it except sand pits and water.

Richard refilled his glass. He enjoyed sitting with a warm Burgundy near the shuttered bay window, while the wind drove his thoughts. One was more alone in heavy weather than on the surface of lapetus, and he loved isolation. In a way he did not understand, it was connected with the same passions that flowed when he walked the halls of long-dead civilizations. Or listened to the murmur of the ocean on the shores of time…

There was no purification ritual anywhere in the world to match that of a Force 4 hurricane: Penobscot Avenue gleamed, the streetlights glowed mistily in the twilight, dead branches sailed through town with deadly grace.

Keep down.

It was, however, a guilty pleasure. The big storms were gradually washing away Amity Island. Indeed, it was possible, when the ocean was clear, to ride out a quarter mile and look down into the water at old Route One.

He'd been invited to eat at the Plunketts that evening. They'd wanted him to stay over, because of the storm. He'd passed. The Plunketts were interesting people, and they'd have played some bridge (which was another of Richard's passions). But he wanted the storm, wanted to be alone with it. Working on a major project, he told them. Thanks, anyhow.

The major project would consist of curling up for the evening with Dickens. Richard was halfway through Bleak House. He loved the warm humanity of Dickens' books, and found in them (to the immense amusement of his colleagues) some parallels to the Monuments. Both espoused, it seemed to him, a sense of compassion and intelligence adrift in a hostile universe. Both were ultimately optimistic. Both were products of a lost world. And both used reflected light to achieve their sharpest effects.

How on earth can you say that, Wald?

Carton in A Tale of Two Cities. Sam Weller in Pickwick. In Dickens, the point always comes from an unexpected angle.

Richard Wald was somewhat thinner than he had been when he'd walked the ridge with Hutch five years before. He watched his weight more carefully now, jogged occasionally, and drank less. The only thing left for him seemed to be womanizing. And the Monuments.

The meaning of the Monuments had been debated endlessly by legions of theorists. Experts tended to complicate matters beyond recall. To Richard it all seemed painfully clear: they were memorials, letters sent across the ages in the only true universal script. Hail and farewell, fellow Traveler. In the words of the Arab poet, Menakhat, The great dark is too great, and the night too deep. We will never meet, you and I. Let me pause therefore, and raise a glass.

His face was long and thin, his chin square, and his nose tapered in the best aristocratic sense. He resembled the sort of character actor who specializes in playing well-to-do uncles, Presidents, and corporate thieves.

The storm shook the house.

Next door, Wally Jackson stood at his window, framed by his living-room lights. His hands were shoved into his belt, and he looked bored. There was a push on now to shore up me beach. Harry was behind that. They were losing ground because of the frequency of the storms. People were simply giving up. Real estate values on Amity had dropped twenty percent in the last three years. No one had any confidence in the island's future.

Directly across Penobscot, the McCutcheons and the Broad-streets were playing pinochle. The hurricane game had become something of a tradition now. When the big storms came, the McCutcheons and the Broadstreets played cards. When Frances hit the year before, a Force 5, they'd stayed on while everyone else cleared out. Water got a little high, McCutcheon had remarked, not entirely able to disguise his contempt for his fainthearted neighbors. But no real problem. Tradition, you know, and all that.

Eventually, the McCutcheons and the Broadstreets and their game would get blown into the Atlantic.

Darwin at work.

The commlink chimed.

He strolled across the room in his socks, paused to refill his glass. Something thumped on the roof.

Three-page message waiting in the tray. The cover sheet caught his interest: the transmission had originated on Quraqua.

From Henry.

Odd.

He snapped on a lamp and sat down at his desk.

Richard,

We found the attached in the Temple of the Winds. Est age 11,000 years. This is Plate seven of twelve. The Tull myth. Frank thinks it's connected with Oz. Date is right, but I can't believe it. Any thoughts?

Oz?

The next page contained a graphic from a bas-relief. An idealized Quraquat and a robed figure. Page 3 was a blow-up of the features of the latter.

Richard put down his glass and stared. It was the Ice-Creature!

No. No, it wasn't.

He cleared off his desk and rummaged for a magnifying glass. This was from where? Temple of the Winds. On Quraqua. Oz—The structure on Quraqua's moon was an anomaly, had nothing in common with the Great Monuments, other than that there was no explanation for it. Not even a conjecture.

And yet—He found the lens and held it over the image. Too close to be coincidence. This creature was more muscular. It had wider shoulders. Thicker proportions. Masculine, no doubt. Still, there was no mistaking the features within the folds of the hood.

But this thing is a Death-manifestation.

He slipped into an armchair.

Coincidence, first. Somebody had once shown him an image on the outside of an Indian temple that looked quite like the long-departed inhabitants of Pinnacle.

But something had visited Quraqua. We know that because

Oz exists. And the evidence is that the natives never approached the technology needed to leave their home world. Why the Death personification? That question chilled him.

He punched up an image of Quraqua's moon. It was barren, airless, half the size of Luna. One hundred sixty-four light-years away. A little less than a month's travel time. It was a nondescript worldlet of craters, plains, and rock dust. Not much to distinguish it from any other lunar surface. Except that there was an artificial structure. He homed in on the northern hemisphere, on the side that permanently faced the planet. And found Oz.

It looked like a vast square city. Heavy and gray and point-less,it was as unlike the works of the Monument-Makers as one could imagine.

Yet many argued no one else could have put it there, Richard had always dismissed the proposition as absurd. No one knew who else might be out there. But the Tull discovery was suggestive.

He called the Academy and got through to the commission-er. Ed Horner was a lifelong friend. He, Richard, and Henry were all that was left of the old guard, who remembered the-Pinnacle earthbound archeology. They'd gone through the great transition, had been mutually intrigued by million-year-old ruins. Horner and Wald had been among the first to get down on Pinnacle. Today, they still made it a point to get together for an occasional dinner. "I don't guess you'll be jogging tonight, Richard." That was reference to the storm. Ed was slightly the younger of the two. He was big, jovial, good-humored. He had thick black hair and brown eyes set too far apart, and heavy brows that bounced and rode when he got excited. Horner looked senticent and inoffensive, someone who could easily be cast aside. But that pleasant smile was the last thing some of his enemies remembered. "Not tonight," said Richard. "It's brisk out there." Ed grinned. "When will you be coming to D.C.? Mary would like to see you." "Thanks. Tell Mary I said hello." Richard raised his glass toward his old friend. "Nowhere I'd rather be. But probably not for a while. Listen, I just got a transmission from Henry."

"He sent it here, too. I haven't seen it. Something about a Grim Reaper?"

"Something about the Monument-Makers," Richard explained. Ed began to look uncomfortable.

"We've got a problem," he said. "You know we're getting ready to pull the plug on Quraqua."

Richard knew. Quraqua was first in line to be terraformed. It was to be the New Earth. (No other world offered hope of supporting a settlement, save Inakademeri. Nok. But that garden world was already home to a civilization.) Now, a wide group of powerful interests saw Quraqua as a laboratory, a place to establish a Utopia, a place to start over. "When?"

"Six weeks. A little less. Henry was supposed to be out of there by now. But you know how he is. Hell, Richard, once they start, we're finished. Forever."

Well, for a half-century anyhow. Might as well be forever. "You can't let it happen, Ed. The situation's changed."

"I can't see how. Nobody gives a damn about the Monument-Makers. Not really. You and me, maybe. Not the taxpayers. And certainly not the politicians. But a lot of people are excited about terraforming. There won't be any more delays."

"Have you spoken to Caseway?"

"No. And I don't intend to. That son of a bitch wouldn't give us the time of day. No." Homer's eyes flashed. Richard read his old friend's frustration. "Look, you know I would if I thought there was a chance. Why don't you try talking to him?"

"Me?"

"Yeah. He thinks you're the big hotshot with this outfit. He's read your books. Always speaks highly of you. Asked me why the rest of us couldn't be more like you. Wald wouldn't put his own interests first, he says. Thinks you have a sense of decency. Unlike me, apparently."

Richard grinned. "Can't argue with him there." The wind howled over the house. "Ed, can you get me transportation to Quraqua?"

"Why?"

"Because we're running out of time. I'd like to see the Temple. And Oz. Can you do it?"

"We have a flight going out to pick up Henry and his people."

"When?"

"When can you be ready?"

"Soon as the storm blows over. Thanks, Ed."

The comers of Homer's mouth rose. "I want you to do something for me."

"Name it."

"Two things, actually. I would like you to consider talking to Caseway. And, when you get to Quraqua, make sure Henry gets off with time to spare. Okay?"

NEWS DESK

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How You Going to Keep Them Off the Farm?

EUROPEAN URBAN POPULATION HITS NEW LOW 71 % Now Live in Rural or Suburban Areas

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Germany, Japan

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GROUND WATER DESTROYING EGYPTIAN

MONUMENTS

Ancient Heritage at Risk

Restoration Groups Mobilize

GUNMAN KILLS SEVEN IN LIBRARY

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POLL REVEALS AMERICANS TURNING OFF POLITICS Voters Cynical in Wake of Sex, Money Scandals

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Move Forced by Budgetary Constraints

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LIVABLE WORLDS EXTREMELY SCARCE

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Quraqua To Be Ready in Fifty Years "One New World Is Enough," Says Hofstadtler

PROTEST PLANNED BY NEW-EARTH SOCIETY "Don't Abandon the Hunt," Warns Narimata

3 Arlington. Saturday, May 8; 0915 hours

The chime brought her out of a warm, silky dream. She fumbled at the lamp stand and touched the commlink. "Yes?"

"Hutch?" Richard's voice. "They tell me you're the pilot for the Temple flight."

"Yes," she said sleepily.

"Good. I'll be going with you."

She came awake. That was a pleasant surprise. She had not been looking forward to a month alone rattling around in Wink. "I'm delighted to hear it," she said. But she wondered why he'd bother. This was strictly an evacuation run.

"I'd have asked for you in any case," he was explaining.

"And I'd have appreciated the business." Hutch was a contractor, not an employee of the Academy. "Why are you going?"

"I want to see Oz," he said.

Richard signed off. Below, a tour boat with a canvas awning circled Republic Island, leaning to port while its passengers crowded the rail. They carried umbrellas against a light rain that had been falling all morning. They munched sandwiches, and dragged windbreakers for which they had no need. A fat man in a misshapen gray sweater sat in back, feeding gulls.

A brisk wind disturbed the surface of the river. Richard watched from his air taxi. Brightly colored pennants fluttered along both beams. A young couple on the starboard side paid far more attention to each other than to the monument. On the island, a group of kids, shepherded by a harried woman with a cane, trailed blue and red balloons. The fleet of sailboats that usually filled the river had not appeared. The fat man crumpled a white bag and opened another. He looked at peace with the world.

Richard envied him. Feed the gulls, and enjoy the monuments.

The taxi banked west. Constitution Island lay to his right, with its cluster of public buildings. The old Capitol had all but vanished into the rising mist. The Lincoln, Jefferson, Roosevelt, and Brockman monuments stood serenely on their embankments. And the White House: nothing in D.C. quite stirred the emotions like the sight of the former executive mansion, defiant behind its dikes. Old Glory still flew, rippling above the green and white banner of the North American Union. This was the only site in the country where the national colors gave precedence to another flag. Lights burned in the towers along the Arlington shore. The air taxi swung in a wide arc toward the Virginia side Richard reluctantly turned his thoughts to the coming ordeal. He disliked confrontations. He was accustomed to deference, to people who listened politely and, if they disagreed, knew how to respond without being disagreeable. Norman Caseway, CEO of Kosmik, Inc., was the prime mover behind the Second Earth initiative. And he could be expected to show no such fastidiousness. Caseway was no respecter of per-sons. He was an alley fighter, a brawler who enjoyed leaving hoofmarks on opponents. He particularly relished assaulting academic types, as several of Richard's colleagues had discovered to their dismay.

Richard had never met Caseway. He'd seen his antics on NET. A few weeks ago, he'd watched him demolish poor old Kinsey Atworth, an economist whose tongue was not as quick as his brain. Caseway's strategy was to attack the motives of anyone who opposed him, to mock, to sneer, to enrage. And then to back off coolly while his opponent sputtered and self-destructed. The man enjoyed humiliating people. Always speaks highly of you, Ed had said. He's read your books.

He passed over Potomac Island and the Pentagon, and descended toward Goley Inlet. The taxi rolled in a wide, lazy spiral and landed atop the Crystal Twins. Richard's restraints snapped open, and the hatch slid back, He inserted his card into the reader. The taxi thanked him, wished him good day. He stepped out into warm, sluggish air, and the taxi lurched skyward, far more quickly than it would have with a passenger aboard. It turned south toward Alexandria and soared quickly over the hotels.

Norman Caseway lived with his wife and daughter in what the Towers was pleased to call its Observatory Suite, a lush penthouse that occupied parts of two floors. He was greeted at the door by an attractive middle-aged woman. "Dr. Wald? We're happy you could come." The smile was perfunctory. "I'm Ann Caseway."

"Pleased to meet you." She did not offer her hand, and Richard detected a stiffness which seemed alien to her appearance. Ann Caseway was, he judged, a woman both congenial and casual. Under normal circumstances.

"My husband's waiting for you in his office."

"Thank you." He followed her into a reception room, tastefully decorated with embroidered wall-hangings and Caribbean basket-chairs, and a curved springwood table.

Long windows overlooked the Potomac, and the ceiling was vaulted glass. The overall display of wealth and success was calculated to intimidate visitors. Richard smiled at the transparency of the tactic. Still, reluctantly, he recognized that it did affect him.

"This must be difficult for you," she said smoothly. "Norman hoped it might be possible to talk things out with someone at your level." There was the barest hint of regret, not unmixed with satisfaction, in her voice. Regret perhaps that Richard would be an unseemly victim to throw to her husband, satisfaction stemming from the end of the long argument with the Academy over Quraqua, with its threats of court battles and sequestration of funds. Nice to see the enemy at the door, hat in hand.

Damn the woman.

She led him through a conference room filled with Kosmik trophies and memorabilia, photos of Caseway with famous people, Caseway signing documents, Caseway cutting ribbons. Awards, certificates of appreciation from charities and public organizations, plaques from government agencies, were present in such profusion that they overflowed the walls and lay in piles. An antique dark-stained roll top desk dominated the room. It was shut, but a framed news bulletin, with a photo, stood prominently on its top. The bulletin, dated thirty years before, read: BRAINTREE MAN RESCUES BOY WHO FELL THROUGH ICE. The hero in the photo was a young Caseway.

"This way, please." She opened an inner door and sunlight blinded him. This wasn't the feeble mid-May sunlight of Virginia. Nor even of a summer day in New Mexico. This was off-Earth sunlight. Naked white sunlight. She handed him a pair of dark glasses.

"Welcome, Dr. Wald." The voice, rich, precise, confident, came from within the glare.

A sand dune half-blocked the doorway. A hologram, of course. Richard strolled directly through the dune (which was not playing the game), and stepped into a desert. The room was air-conditioned. Flat sand stretched to the horizon.

A few feet away, Norman Caseway sat in one of two wing chairs behind a coffee table. A bottle of Burgundy and two goblets were on the table. One was half-full.

He was well turned-out—red jacket, tie, neatly pressed dark blue trousers. Dark lenses hid his eyes. Behind him, rising out of the desert, was Holtzmyer's Rock.

Caseway filled Richard's glass. "I hope you don't mind that I started without you."

They were on Pinnacle. Holtzmyer's Rock looked like a gigantic washed-out red onion rooted in the sand. It stood more than thirty meters high, eight stories. The original was composed of individual pieces of stone, so cunningly fitted that the seams were not visible without close inspection. The object had been dated at almost a million years. Arnie Holtzmyer, who'd stumbled on it almost twenty-two years ago, had been the least competent professional Richard had known. Had the sand been a little higher, Arnie would never have seen it.

The intent of its builders was unknown. It was solid rock, with four inner chambers but no means of reaching them. The chambers were empty, and did not seem to have any geometric order.

"What did you feel when you came to this place?" Caseway's voice, breaking into his reverie, startled him.

"Its age," Richard said, after a moment's reflection. "It felt old."

"You didn't mention that. In your book."

"I didn't think it was important."

"You were writing for the general public. About a structure that seems to be unique on Pinnacle. Nobody knows what its purpose was. Or anything about it. What else was there to talk about except your feelings?"

The book was Midnight on Pinnacle. Richard had dwelt on brick texture, on the discoloration near the top that suggested a long delay during construction. He had made observations relating to the geometry of the object, and drew inferences from the fact that it stood alone. He had traced the geological history of the land on which it rested, pointing out that it had probably been a prairie at the time of construction. He had provided graphs showing how long it had been buried. And described recent wind action which had uncovered the object for Amie.

"I'd like to go out there myself some day." Caseway rose and offered a hand. "I'm pleased to meet you, Dr. Wald. Glad you could find time to come by."

Richard was thinking of the inadequacies of holograms. You can't sip wine out near Holtzmyer's Rock. On the other hand, when he had stood in a high wind years ago and pressed his fingertips against the blistered stone, he had been shielded from the heat by his Flickinger field. The sand had rattled against the energy envelope, and the wind had tried to blow him over. Like Caseway, he had never really been there.

"Yes. Well, I needed to talk to you." Richard was naturally gregarious. Despite the years that make cynics of most people, he believed everyone could be reasoned with. He took the proffered hand and squeezed it warmly.

Caseway was a small, heavy man in late middle age. He reminded Richard of a master chess player he had once known, a man of infinite deliberation. He observed all the courtesies, and his manner suggested that he had taken the moral high ground, and that they both knew it. His voice filled with passion, and Richard understood that he was dealing with no empty opportunist. Norman Caseway perceived himself as a benefactor of the species.

"Please, sit down." His host turned his chair to face him. "I assume you'd like to talk about Project Hope."

Right to the point. Richard tasted his Burgundy. "Apparently, Mr. Caseway, there's been some bitterness."

"My friends call me Norman. And that's something of an understatement, Richard."

Richard folded his hands across his waist. "I would have preferred it otherwise."

"Doubtless. So would I. You should know Horner went behind my back. Tried to pull political strings."

"Ed means well. Maybe it didn't occur to him to just ask."

"I think he needs new advisors." Caseway looked out across the desert. "Does he listen to you!"

"Sometimes."

"Tell him that if it had been possible to oblige him, I would have done so. If he had been willing to approach me directly. And talk to me."

"What you're saying is that it would have made no difference."

Caseway's lips tightened. "None," he said. "Under the circumstances, I really have no choice but to proceed."

"I see."

"If it's any consolation, I take no pleasure in this. I understand the archeological value of Quraqua. And I have a reasonable idea what we stand to lose. But you have had twenty-eight years on that world—"

"That's a long time in a man's life. Mr. Caseway. But it is very short when we are trying to reconstruct the history of an entire world."

"Of course." He smiled at Richard's persistence in using the formal address. But he refused to take offense. "Nevertheless, there are pressing considerations. We are not entirely free to choose our time frames." He sipped his drink. "What a marvelous place Pinnacle must be. I wonder what they were like."

"We'll know eventually. We are already able to make reasonable assumptions. We know they believed in survival beyond the grave. We know they valued mountaintops and seacoasts. We know they succeeded in eliminating war. We even know something about their music. Fortunately, we don't have to worry about a private corporation seizing the world."

"I understand." Caseway looked genuinely regretful. "I envy you. I don't know anyone who has a more interesting line of work. And I would oblige you in a moment, if I could."

"It would be to everyone's benefit." He wished they were somewhere else, away from the glare. He would have preferred being able to see Caseway's eyes. He took his own glasses off to emphasize the gravity of the moment. "The last of the natives on Quraqua died off probably about the middle of the seventeenth century. They were all that was left, scattered in dying cities around their world, of a prosperous and vital web of civilizations that spanned their globe only three thousand years ago. We don't know what happened to them. They collapsed, over a short period of time. Nobody knows why. They were technologically backward, by our standards. Which should have helped them survive, because they were still close to their roots, and not vulnerable to the kinds of problems we've experienced."

"It wasn't all that sudden," Caseway said. "It happened over centuries."

"No." Richard took the initiative. "Those are assumptions, put out by people who think it had to happen that way, because some of these civilizations were not connected, and should not all have gone down at the same time. But it's as if someone turned off a light."

Caseway thought it over. "Epidemic."

"Maybe. Whatever it was, the old order went to its knees, and never recovered. Twenty-five hundred years later, the species became extinct."

"Well." Caseway crossed one knee over the other, and scratched an ankle. "Maybe it's the Toynbee factor. Their species exhausted itself."

"That's a non-explanation."

"Richard—" Caseway paused. "I would like to know what happened on Quraqua as much as anyone. But the deluge is upon us. We have no time left for academic niceties."

"What deluge?"

Caseway looked momentarily startled. "Tell me," he said, "what you see in the future for us? For mankind?"

"We've always blundered through. I'm optimistic."

"I fear I have the advantage of you: I've read your books, and you speak often of the future. Unusual in an archaeologist, I would think. No, no; no protest please. I'm less sanguine than you are. And perhaps more of a realist. We have virtually unlimited power now. And we have the experience of the convulsions of the last two centuries. What good has it done us? You and I live well. But people continue to starve in frightful numbers; much of the damage to the environment has proved remarkably intractable; population is approaching the levels that preceded the Collapse." He stared pensively into his wine. "We have eliminated active warfare, but only because the League has the weapons. The Poles still hate the Russians, the Arabs hate the Jews, the People of Christ hate everybody. It's as if we've learned nothing."

"And the only solution is your Utopia on Quraqua."

"Yes. We select a small group. Leave the old animosities behind. Start over. But start over, knowing what we know now. That way, we may have a future. Earth surely does not."

Richard shrugged. "It's an old idea, Norman. But even if I grant you the premise, why the big hurry? Why not take the time to see what we can team from Quraqua? Then terraform away."

"Because it may already be too late."

"Nonsense."

"Not at all. Listen: the first step, which will happen in a few weeks, is to melt the icecaps. From that moment, it will be a half-century, at best, before the first member of the pilot colony sets foot on Quraqua. Fifty years, Richard. Middle of the century. What do you suppose will be going on by then?"

"Who knows?"

"Who indeed? Will political conditions be stable? Will there be money? Will the technology still exist?" Caseway shook his head. "Our experts predict a second Collapse within thirty years. Time is very much against us. Even today, we will be fortunate to bring this off. To create and populate a new world. But if we don't, I suspect we'll end very much like your Quraquat."

"It's a scheme. Leave the old animosities behind. You can't do that unless you find a way to leave their human nature behind. And you're prepared to sacrifice a major source of knowledge to this aberration." Damn the man and his arrogant smile. "Granting your premise, there will be other worlds. Why not be patient? Why not wait for a world you won't have to terraform?"

"Can you guarantee the discovery of a reasonable habitat within the next half-century?"

"Guarantee? Of course not. But there's a good chance."

"Perhaps you wouldn't object if we settled on Inakademeri? And kicked the Noks off?"

Richard stood. "I'm sorry to find you so determined."

"And I to find you so obtuse. But you're right: I am determined. Determined to see that we get another chance. And you must understand, this may be the only window. Delay, back off to save your pots on Quraqua, and someone may find a better way to spend the money. Once that happens, the game is over."

"It is not a game." He banged the glass down, shattering it. Gingerly he released the broken stem and mumbled an apology.

Caseway laid his handkerchief on the spilled wine. "It's quite all right," he said. "You were saying—?"

Richard plunged ahead: "Norman, there is potentially explosive information at the Temple of the Winds."

Caseway nodded. "And what is the nature of this information?"

"We have evidence there was a contact between the Quraquat and the Monument-Makers."

His eyebrows rose. That had hit home. "What sort of evidence?"

Richard showed him a copy of the Tull bas-relief.

"It's hard to be sure," Caseway said. He pointed over Richard's shoulder and the desert vanished. They were seated in a modest wood-paneled room, bare save for the two chairs and the coffee table. "Not that it matters. There are always good reasons to delay." His eyes narrowed. "Money. Political considerations. The promise of better technology next year. Did you follow the debates over whether we have the moral right to destroy an extraterrestrial ecology? The Committee for Common Decency almost got us canceled because we are subverting God's plan for Quraqua. Whatever that might be." His brow creased. "I know what you're saying. I even agree with you, up to a point. I should tell you that if I had my choice, I would go to Nok, take it over, and leave the Temple to you."

Later, when Richard replayed the conversation, the final remark chilled him, because it came from a man he had begun to like.

NEWS DESK

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Says Forests Beyond Recovery, Attacks Sanchez Brazilians Charge Theft, of Foundation Funds

4 NCA Winckelmann. Wednesday, May 12; 1410 GMT

Earth and moon fell behind.

Hutch sat on the bridge of the Johann Winckelmann, watching the familiar globes fade to bright stars. Once more into the breach, dear friends. Already Cal was receding, growing hazy, as if his existence were a Schrodinger effect, dependent on her presence. Maybe he was right about her.

Richard was moving around in back, unpacking, getting settled. She was grateful for the last-minute change in plans, which had saved her from a solitary ride out to Quraqua. In her present mood she needed a diversion. And her passenger was the perfect prescription: she knew him well enough to tell him everything, and he would tolerate no self-pity.

They'd had breakfast before departure, and then he'd disappeared into his notebooks. He was excited about something, which was another reason she was delighted to have him aboard. Richard was always on a crusade. He did not come forward after launch, but that was not unusual behavior either. At some point he'd wander up, probably when he got hungry, because he didn't like to eat alone. And he'd explain everything.

She knew about the enigma on Oz, of course. She was pleased that Richard was going to take a look at it, and she looked forward to hearing his ideas on the subject.

But seven hours out he still hadn't appeared, and she informed him they were about to make the jump. "Ten minutes," she said, over the ship's comm. And added: "Estimate twenty-five days to Quraqua."

"Thanks, Hutch." He sounded disgusted. That would be because he was anxious to get started. By the second day he would begin to prowl the ship and challenge her to chess matches and bemoan his inability to get around more quickly. He'd stand on the bridge and watch the Tran dimensional mists drift past while Wink proceeded with the apparent velocity of a flatboat.

He came forward carrying a package of cinnamon buns. "How we doing?" he asked.

"Fine. Buckle in."

He sat down, secured the web, and offered her one of the pastries. "Good to see you again."

The wraparound view panel was open. The stars were bright and lovely. Their soft glow suffused the bridge. The interior lights were off, save for a few of the status lamps. They might easily have been outdoors on a terrace.

Richard made small talk for a few minutes. And then, when she saw an opportunity, Hutch wondered aloud about Oz. "It's not really a product of the Monument-Makers, is it? I mean, it's not at all like the other stuff."

His expression clouded. "Until a few days ago, I wouldn't have thought so. Now I'm not so sure." He passed her Henry's transmission.

The similarity was quite clear. "They found this in an eleven-thousand-year-old excavation?"

"Yes. What do you think?"

"It's one of them." She chuckled. "They went down and got their picture taken. I'll be damned."

Hutch went through her checklist prior to insertion. "I always thought it had to be them," she said. "That built Oz, I mean. Who else is there?"

Richard looked disappointed. "We don't really know, do we, Hutch? Anyway, to be honest with you, Oz is a place that I've preferred to ignore. It doesn't fit any kind of rational scenario I can think of."

Hutch looked back at the Death-image. It touched something deep in her soul.

"Well," said Richard, "I'm sure Henry's people will have some ideas."

An amber lamp began to glow. "Insertion coming up," she said quietly. Power couplings activated. "Ten seconds."

Richard settled back into his web. "If it's really them, it might mean they suffered some sort of precipitous decline." His eyes drifted shut. "1 hope not."

The engines fired, and the stars went out. That was the only physical effect of the leap into Tran dimensional space. There was not even a sense of motion. Some claimed to feel a slight vertigo, but Hutch thought they were generally overwrought types anyway.

It was a little like passing through a tunnel. When the tunnel faded, a process that might require anywhere from half a minute to almost an hour, it had given way to the gray mist.

Systems went green, and she closed off the forward view.

"— I'd hate to think that, in the end, they went mad."

"Isn't that a little strong?" She had waited on the pastry. Now she poured fresh coffee and helped herself.

"Mad? You won't think so when you've seen Oz."

LIBRARY ENTRY WHERE IS THE PAYOFF?

… The wealth that was to accrue from interstellar flight has never materialized. We have had minor tech-nological advances that might have been achieved any-way, at a fraction of the cost. We have learned that intelligent species existed on two remote worlds, and that they exist no longer; and that, on a third world, another species is currently waging a global war. One might argue that these results (combined with our own failure to respond to deteriorating conditions on Earth) suggest that what we have really learned is that intelli-

gence is rarer than we thought. There is some reason to suppose it has yet to evolve. Anywhere. The annual cost of maintaining the interstellar pro-gram at its current level would feed every man, wom-an, and child in India and Pakistan. Currently, there are eighteen thousand researchers in extrasolar stations.

Many of these stations have been in place for thirty years, since the dawn of the Interstellar Age. And we thave reams of esoteric material describing climatic con-

ditions and tectonics on other worlds. The Globe has no quarrel with this acquisition of scientific knowledge. But it is time, and more than time, to strike a balance. We are in deep trouble. We cannot feed, or house, or care for, a substantial portion of the global population, Those who smirk at the Noks and their World War I-style conflict might note that the daily toll from famine and malnutrition in China is higher than the total dead in the Nok War last year.

Meantime, PSA lobbies for more funds to build more ships. It is time to call a halt.

— Editorial, The Boston Globe

May 22, 2202

5 Qumqua's Moon. Sunday, June 6; 0734 hours

Quraqua had a single satellite, roughly half the size of the Moon, ash-gray, scarred, airless. Tonight it was a bright yellow crescent, friendly, luminous. Inviting. But it was a moon with a difference. Six years ago, the pilot of an incoming packet had noticed what he thought was a city high in its northern quarter. "Richard?"

He was absorbed in a hand-drawn chart spread out on his knees and across a sizable portion of the instrument panel. He waggled his hand to indicate he'd heard. "Let Henry know we're here," he said. "And make for Oz."

Beneath the red sun Bellatrix, and cloud-shrouded Quraqua, Winckelmann's shuttle Alpha (there was no Beta) glided over the moonscape. Peaks and gorges and craters merged with glare and shadow. The shuttle crossed a low mountain range and hurtled out over a sea of flat polished rock. Richard sat quietly, as he always did at such times, leaning forward against his restraints, gazing placidly out the window. Hutch was uncomfortable with his insistence on coming here first. She would have preferred to complete preparations for the evacuation before they undertook any side adventures. There would be cargo to load, and last-minute problems, and she wanted all that worked out well in advance. Instead, she could imagine Richard getting caught up in the anomaly, and adding complications.

His attitude did nothing to dispel those fears. "Plenty of time," he said. "We have until the eleventh." Five days.

A ridge appeared, swept toward them, and vanished. The mare was heavily pocked. The Guide Book, which she had posted on her overhead display, indicated it was the oldest surface area on the moon. "Some of these craters," she said, "are two billion years old."

Richard nodded, not listening. He wasn't interested in geology.

A sensor lamp blinked on.

"Ship on the scope. Henry's shuttle."

"Good." His expression warmed.

"It's about twenty minutes behind us." Hutch switched to manual, noted her position on the navigational displays, and throttled back.

"Be good to see him again." His eyes brightened. "This has to be a hard time for him. We thought we had forever to excavate Quraqua. Nobody believed we'd be ordered off. It turns out we were too cautious. Should have plowed right in. Like Schliemann."

Hutch had met Henry twice. He was an odd, rumpled little man who had given a lecture she'd attended when she was trying to learn enough archeology to persuade the Academy that she could be an asset. Two years later, when they'd shared passage on the Moon relay, he'd surprised her by remembering who she was. He even knew her name. Priscilla.

The ground began to break up into canyons. A range of needle peaks swept past.

"What were they like?" she asked. "The Quraquat?"

"They lived a long time. Individually, I mean." He fumbled in his jacket. "I should have a sketch here somewhere—must have left it in my room. Or" — sheepishly—"at home." He kept searching pockets. "They looked like furry gators. But they were warm-blooded—"

"No: I mean what were they like? What did they do? I know they had two sexes, and they had long life spans. What else?"

"They had a lot of dark ages. Not as barbarous as Earth's, not as military. But stagnant. Sometimes nothing would happen for a thousand years. No political development. No science. Nothing. They also had a talent for losing things. For example, we know of three different occasions on which they discovered Quraqua was not the center of the universe."

"Why? Why all the dark ages?"

"Who knows? Maybe we'll go through them too. We just haven't been around very long. In the case of the Quraquat,

they might have been victims of their life spans. The wrong people succeed to power and don't die. Not for a long time." He tried unsuccessfully to brush his hair out of his eyes. "Think about that. Imagine having to deal with Hart for the next sixty years." (Adrian Hart was the current chairman of the Academy Board of Trustees. He was fussy and vindictive, a micro manager with no ideas.) An amber lamp started to blink. "Coming up," she said. Sunlight danced off the rocks ahead. The reflection splintered, and raced in both directions across the plain. They might have been looking at an illuminated highway, bright, incandescent.

Richard leaned forward expectantly. The light grew solid. It became a wall. Bone-white against the gray moonscape, it extended from a low range of hills on the south to the horizon on the north. Hutch throttled back, fired a series of quick bursts from the maneuvering rockets. She took them down near the surface.

The wall grew, and began to crowd the sky. It was enor-mous. The scale of the thing, as they drew closer, reminded her of the old textbook representations of Troy. She powered up the scopes, put the picture on the monitors: the thing appeared to be seamless.

Except that there were holes punched in it. Long sec-tions had fallen away, and there were places where the wall appeared to have been hammered into the ground. Rubble lay along its base.

"Look," Richard said. The structure was seared, scorched. "It does look as if somebody tried to knock the thing down."

"One would almost think so." "What kind of fire would burn out here?" "Don't know." He folded his arms and canted his head. "I was wrong to neglect this place all these years. This is a fascinating site." "So what happened here?"

"I have no idea." He sat looking for several minutes. "Frost," he said.

"Say again?"

"I keep thinking of Robert Frost. 'Something there is that doesn't love a wall— " He sank back, placed his fingertips together, and let the moment wash over him. "Magnificent," he breathed. "An utterly sublime mystery. It is really no more than a rock sculpture in an airless place. Why was it built? And who would assault it?"

It towered over them.

The only reasonable explanation was that it had been hit by a swarm of meteors. There was indeed meteoric rock in the area. And a lot of craters. But there seemed something purposive in the assault.

"It's probably an illusion," said Richard, who seemedalways able to read her thoughts. "It's the only artificial structure out here, so there's nothing to contrast it with except the random chaos of the moonscape. Still—" He shook his head. "It's hard to know how to read this."

It had been built, Hutch knew, between eleven and twelve thousand years ago. "Its age matches the Tull set."

"Yes," he said. "There may be a connection."

It was eerie, and she found herself scouring the plain for oversized footprints.

The wall was 41.63 meters high, and 8.32 kilometers on a side. It enclosed a perfect square. "The length of a side," she read off the display on the monitor, "is precisely two thousand times the height."

"Base ten," said Richard.

"How many fingers did the Quraquat have?"

"They weren't exactly fingers. But four."

"The Monument-Makers had five."

The shuttle nosed up to the wall. It hovered a few meters away. "Do we want to land?"

"No. Not out here."

The wall had been old before there were pyramids in Egypt. Hutch floated before it, and felt the transience of her own mayfly existence as she never had on lapetus, or at the other ancient sites. She wondered what the difference was. Maybe it is bracing, encouraging to know that beauty somehow survives. But to be outlived by such primal madness—

"This thing," said Richard, "is so different from everything else they left. If it is indeed theirs. The Monuments are light, exquisite, elegant. The race that created them enjoyed being alive. This thing: it's grim. Irrational. Ugly. A fearful creation." He pushed back in his chair the way people do during a simmy when the werewolf is approaching. "Take us up," he said.

She complied, moving at a leisurely pace.

Richard unrolled his chart again. "What've we got on the building materials? Where did the stone come from?"

She dug out the engineers' report. "All local. Quarries were found in several places, but nowhere closer than six kilometers,"

"They didn't want to spoil the appearance by chewing up the landscape. That's consistent, at least, with what we've seen elsewhere."

"I guess. Anyway, they must have modified the rock. One theory is that they reworked it using nanotech. There's a lot of feldspar and quartz lying around. Apparently waste material. The wall itself is a kind of enhanced calcite."

"Marble."

"Yes. But better. More durable. More reflective."

"They wanted it to be seen from Quraqua."

"Apparently." They were near the top now.

They closed in on a section that had been burned. "Henry thinks," Richard said, "that the damage dates to around 9000 B.C."

"That's when it was built," she said.

"Somebody got right after it, didn't they?"

"Maybe the builders had a falling out. Quarreled over their little amusement park."

Richard held out his hands in supplication. "As good a guess as any."

She went back to her screen. "There's a fair amount of trioxymethylene in the soil. Formaldehyde. But only around here. Near Oz."

"That doesn't mean a damned thing to me. My chemistry's godawful. What are the implications?"

"This thing" — she jabbed a finger at the screen—"offers no theories."

The pseudo-city appeared beyond the wall: a dark cross-hatch of wide boulevards and blunt, broad buildings and long malls. A city of the void, a specter, a thing of rock and shadow. Hutch's instincts demanded lights and movement.

"Incredible." Richard barely breathed the word.

It was immense. She took them higher, and simultaneously switched the cabin heater to manual, moving the setting up a notch. The city, like the wall, lay in ruins.

"Look at the streets," he whispered.

They were designed in exact squares. Kilometer after kilometer. All the way out and around the curve of the horizon. Oz was a place of numbing mathematical exactitude, overwhelming even in its state of general destruction. Avenues and cross streets intersected at precise 90-degree angles. She saw no forks, no gently curving roads, no merge lanes. City blocks had been laid out to the same rigorous geometry.

"Not much imagination here," she said.

Richard's breathing was audible. "If there is anything more at war with the spirit of the Great Monuments than this place, I can't imagine what it would be." No burst of inventiveness appeared anywhere. No hint of spontaneity. They called it Oz. But that was a misnomer. If Oz, the original Oz, was a land of wonder and magic, this place was pure stone. Right to the soul.

Hutch disconnected from the vision, and withdrew into the cockpit. The gauges and keyboards and status lamps were all familiar and warm. The aroma of coffee floated in the still air.

Oz had never been intended to shelter anyone. The structures that from a distance resembled houses and public buildings and towers, were solid rock, without even the suggestion of door or window. No bubble, of either plastene or energy, had ever protected the artifact. Henry's teams had found no machinery, no devices or equipment of any kind.

They drifted down the long avenues. Across the tops of marble block-buildings. Many of the blocks were perfect cubes. Others were oblongs. All were cut from flat polished rock, unmarked by any ripple or projection. They came in a multiplicity of sizes.

Hutch looked out over the network of streets. In its original form, before whatever destruction had come on it, the stones had stood straight. No arc curved through the parallels and perpendiculars. No avenue sliced abruptly right or left. No rooftop sloped. No decorative molding or door knob existed anywhere.

They floated down the streets at ground level. The blocks rose above them, ominous and brooding. They passed through an intersection. For the first time, Hutch understood the meaning of the term alien.

"The dimensions of the blocks are multiples of each other," she said. She brought up the numbers. Every block in the construct was divisible into cubes that measured 4.34 meters on a side. Thus, the various calcite forms that lined the squares and avenues could be perceived as so many units high by so many wide. Streets and open areas were divisible in the same way and by the same dimensions.

The commlink chimed. "Dr. Wald, are you there?"

"I'm here, Frank. Hello, Henry."

Hutch activated the video. Only one man appeared, and it was not Henry Jacobi. Frank Carson was about fifty, a trifle beefy, with an open, congenial countenance. He leveled a steady blue gaze at them, appraised Hutch without reaction, and spoke to Richard. "Henry's not here, sir. Things have got a little hectic, and we couldn't spare him."

Richard nodded. "Anything new on the Monument-Makers? New images?"

"Negative."

Richard seemed almost entranced. "Anybody have any ideas what all this means?"

"No, sir. We were hoping you could tell us."

Richard brought up the scheduling for Project Hope on his monitor. They were to blow the icecaps sometime Friday. "I don't suppose Kosmik has changed anything?"

"The deadline? No." Carson's expression showed disgust. "They're on the circuit every day with a fresh warning and countdown status."

Hutch glanced reflexively at the ship's clocks. Not a lot of time.

"Henry asked me to express his regrets. He would have liked to meet you here, but we just have too much happening." He spoke with military crispness. "What would you like to see?"

"How about the center of this place, for a start? And I'm open to suggestion."

"Okay. I assume your pilot has me on her scope?"

Hutch nodded.

"Why don't you follow me?"

She acknowledged, signed off, and fell in behind. "Tell me about Carson," she said.

"You'll like him. He's retired army. One of those gifted amateurs who are a tradition in archaeology. Like yourself." His tone was light, but she understood he was quite serious. "He's Henry's administrator and executive officer." He looked squarely at her. "And his pilot. If Frank weren't around, Henry would have to behave like a manager. As it is, Frank does all the routine stuff, and Henry gets to be an archeologist."

"Carson doesn't object to that?"

"Frank likes the arrangement. He's a little rough around the edges, and he has a tendency to overreact. But he's easygoing, and he can get things done without ruffling egos. He enjoys the work. The organization could do a lot worse."

Carson's vehicle was starting to descend. "Downtown Oz," said Hutch. The blocks were a little higher here than they were out near the wall. Other than that, the sameness was deadening.

There was a central square, anchored on each corner by a squat tower, or by the ruins of one. The square was about a half-kilometer on a side. A fifth tower, a unit shorter than the others, had been raised in the exact center. Each was as quadrilateral as everything else in Oz.

Richard was half out of his seat, trying to get a better look. "Tilt this thing a little, will you? My way—"

Hutch complied.

Two towers were piles of rubble. A third, on the southwest, was scorched. Burned black from the base up. The fourth was almost untouched. "There," Richard said, pointing to the black one. "Tell him to land there."

She relayed the message, and Carson acknowledged. "What are we looking for?" she asked.

He looked pleased. "How much do you know about the symmetry of this place, Hutch?"

"Not much. Just that it's there. What's to know?"

"Put a few square kilometers on the screen."

"Sure." She brought up a view centered on the middle tower.

"Now. Pick a target. Anywhere."

"Okay." She zeroed in on a cluster of oblongs forming a letter H. They were approximately two kilometers north.

"Draw a line from the group directly through the central tower. And keep going."

On the opposite side of the screen, the line touched another H. At the same range. "It's a reverse image," she said.

"Surprised?" Richard couldn't suppress a smirk.

Yes. The records she'd examined hadn't mentioned it. "Maybe it all has religious significance. Some high-tech species doing penance. That make sense?"

"Not to me."

Carson's shuttle was almost down.

Hutch turned the short-range scanners on the complex. "The central tower is nine units high, defining a unit as our basic block, four point three four meters on a side. The outer towers are ten. Like everything else here, they're solid. There's no evidence of any interior space." Carson landed, and she started her own descent. "Funny: you'd expect the central tower to be the tallest of the group. Not the shortest. They just don't think the way we do."

Carson had parked close to the edge. Hutch's lights touched the Temple shuttle. It was streamlined, intended for heavy atmospheric use. That meant a sacrifice in payload capacity. It was flashier than Alpha in another way too: the Academy had begun painting its spacecraft and CATs in an effort to shore up morale at remote field sites. The vehicle on the rooftop was a bright blue and gold. The Academy's colors. Probably another one of Adrian Hart's decisions.

She rotated the shuttle to bring the passenger's hatch inboard, toward the center of the roof. Give her preoccupied boss as little opportunity as possible to fall over the side. Carson climbed out and waved. She blinked her lights, and sliced down with easy skill, tread to tread.

Richard released his restraints, and reached back for his Flickinger harness. Hutch struggled into her own, pulled it over her flight jacket. Air tanks were okay. She activated the energy field, and helped Richard with his. When they were ready, she decompressed the cockpit.

Carson's military background showed. He wore crisply pressed khakis and a baseball cap, stenciled Cobra II, with a coiled serpent and lightning-bolt logo. His name was prominently displayed over the left breast of his jacket. He was a big man, broad in the shoulder, waist beginning to thicken. In the style of the time, he was clean-shaven, with black hair cut short and just beginning to gray. He stood waiting, legs spread, hands clasped behind his back.

Pressure went to zero, and both hatches swung open. Richard was not precisely clumsy, but Alpha seemed to have been designed with athletes in mind. To debark, it was necessary to climb out onto a stubby wing, and descend via handholds in the fuselage. Variations in gravity tend to confuse any passenger, but particularly someone like Richard, who was well along in years, and had never been light on his feet to begin with.

Carson appeared below the wing, and stood by, but made no actual move to help the older man. That was prudent: Richard did not like being helped. But he was there if needed. Hutch approved.

When her passenger was safely down, Hutch dropped lightly beside him. She clipped a tether around her left wrist and attached it to the shuttle. Take no chances on a rooftop in this gravity.

Richard was already on one knee, examining the charred stone. "What happened to this place?" he asked Carson. "Does anybody have any idea?"

"None. Nobody has been able to put together even a reasonable hypothesis."

"Maybe the construction ship blew up," Hutch suggested.

Carson frowned. "Doesn't seem like the kind of damage that would come from a single blast."

Richard got up and walked solemnly toward the edge of the roof. Carson moved as quickly to his side as the low gravity would permit. Hutch stayed a step behind.

"Spooky place," she said.

Carson smiled. His expression suggested he could see that someone might think so.

Richard did what people always do in high places. He leaned out and looked down. A plunge into the street, even from this height, wouldn't be fatal, unless you landed on your head. But you would sure as hell develop a limp. "Careful," said Carson, staying close.

"Is there a team currently working here?" Richard asked.

"No. There hasn't been any kind of presence in Oz for months. We pulled everybody out after we got the Temple deadline."

"There's not much traction up here," cautioned Hutch.

Richard stared out over the city. "Did you ever find any wreckage? Any trace of whatever was here?"

Carson shook his head. No.

"Anything at all left behind? Footprints? Marks in the ground—?"

The two spacecraft stood against the endless cubes and oblongs. Their fuselages and wings and pods were all rounded. A red guide lamp mounted between Alpha's treads blinked softly. Cabin lights in both vehicles spilled out onto the seared rock.

"There's nothing. Wish there was, Doctor." Carson glanced at Hutch, and returned his attention to Richard. "Did you want to see the quarries? Where the rock came from?"

"No. Thank you. What else here is worth seeing?"

"There's an inscription."

"Inscription?" Richard's interest soared. "Why didn't you say something before? The Abstracts don't mention it."

"The Abstracts are a year old. We've been a little too busy to monkey with updates."

Richard rubbed his hands together. An expression of beatific pleasure lit his features, and he waved an arm, a gesture which was too sudden and sent him reeling sideways and over the edge. Hutch and Carson both grabbed for him. They weighed so little in the low gravity, which was about one-tenth standard, that they'd all have gone down had Hutch's tether not taken hold. Richard let out a whoop, and they scrambled for balance, but he never missed a beat. "Thanks, Frank," he said. And, after righting himself: "What does it say? Have you been able to read it?"

"Not a word," said Carson, looking apologetic. "But you'll find it worth your time."

Hutch decided Richard was right. She did like Carson. He had not hesitated to risk his neck. That impressed her.

They flew west, using both shuttles.

The height of individual blocks gradually decreased as they proceeded away from the center, although there was no regularity in the process. Near the wall, at the limits of the city (Hutch could not help thinking of it in those terms), single-unit pieces had come to dominate so thoroughly that anything higher stood out.

They passed a section in which a chasm had opened. The land had dropped several meters. Avenues were broken off, blocks tossed about. "There are several craters within the walls," said Carson, speaking over the link. "Most of them came after the construction. In this case, the crater was already here, and they built over it. They filled it in, but the land eventually gave way. There are a few other places where the crust has simply collapsed under the weight of the blocks."

"The meteors that struck the city: have you been able to determine when they hit?"

"No. We can't date them with any degree of accuracy. We know that the craters in and around the anomaly are considerably younger, though, than they are anywhere else." "How much younger?"

"Most of the cratering took place between one and two billion years ago. But the local holes are, at most, fifty thousand years old. Of course, the ones in the city must have fallen after 9000 B.C. Incidentally, we don't understand where the burn marks came from, but we do know that whatever the nature of the fire, it came twice." "Twice?"

"In 9000 B.C., and again around 1000 B.C." Richard's brow crinkled. "This is certainly," he said with relish, "very puzzling."

"There's more," said Carson, "although it would have to be coincidence." "What's that?"

"The dates coincide with widespread disruptions on Qura-qua. Peoples vanishing from history, states collapsing, that sort of thing."

"That's right," said Richard, remembering the discontinuities. He lapsed into silence.

The somber gray cityscape moved beneath them. Ahead, Carson's navigation lights blinked red and white. Cheerful and brave against the eeriness. Hutch brought Carson up again on the display. "How long have you been out here, Frank?"

"Six years," he said. "Long time."

"I guess." His features betrayed no emotion. They were shadowed and highlighted by the illumination from his control panel. "Where's home?"

"Toronto. I was born in Edinburgh, but I don't remember any of it."

"Have you been back at all? For a vacation?" "No. I've been busy." Hutch knew that was unusual. Academy personnel were granted six weeks annual leave plus travel time. Carson was a workaholic.

Richard had been watching the patterns of blocks. "I wonder," he said, "why they're all cut to the same dimensions? Might they have had some sort of inflexible rock scoop? Only cuts one size? Then welds them together?"

Hutch put one of the blocks on the display.

"No," said Carson. "That's not it. The larger blocks aren't made of smaller pieces. They're just cut to be three, or eight, times as big. Whatever. Anyway, we're here. Look over to your left."

A tower rose from the general pattern of low-level obloids. But it was a tower with a difference: the thing was round. It was short, squat, about four stories high. It stood alone in a square.

Its roundness was remarkable. In that numbing display of parallel lines and right angles' and precise intersections, its simple circularity was a marvel, a masterpiece of invention.

They landed. Richard could barely contain himself during the cycling process, waiting for pressure to drop and hatches to open. Hutch, secure within her energy field, placed a restraining hand on his shoulder to remind him of the need for caution.

The tower was charred on the north side.

Carson opened his cargo door, and emerged with a small stepladder. Richard reassured his pilot, climbed out, and descended the handholds. A layer of dust covered the square.

At ground level, and out of the shuttle, Hutch felt the weight of the ages, empty streets and mock houses, mad geometry and ong shadows that had waited through the whole of human history.

Carson knew precisely what he was looking for. He walked to the tower, placed the ladder against it, adjusted it, tried it himself, and then stood aside and invited Richard to mount. "Careful," he said.

About five meters up, four lines of symbols protruded from 1 the marble. Richard climbed until he was at eye level with — diem, and used his lamp.

They possessed no resemblance to the exquisite symbols

Son lapetus. These were heavy, solid, blunt. Direct, rather than suggestive. Masculine. While he appraised them, Carson dropped a bombshell: "It's a Quraquat language."

Richard swayed on the ladder. "Say again? My understanding was that no one on Quraqua ever developed space travel."

"That's correct, Dr. Wald. We don't know much about these people, but we're sure they never had that kind of technology."

Hutch stood back to get a better look. "Maybe another kind of technology, then. Something we're not familiar with."

"Like what?"

"I don't know. If I could tell you, I'd be familiar with it."

"Well, it doesn't matter." Carson cut her off impatiently. "We know they had a horse-drawn civilization when people were speaking this language."

Richard was inspecting the symbols through a magnifier. "When would that have been?"

"Ninth millenium, B.C."

Same era. Hutch looked around at the blind oblongs and the long quiet streets. A chill worked its way up her spine.

"Would the speakers of this language," Richard asked, "be the same people who engraved the image of the Monument-Maker in the Temple?"

"Yes," said Carson. "The language is Casumel Linear C. It was spoken only over a range of about four hundred years."

Richard, still perched on the ladder, leaned back and peered up at the top of the tower. "Is this why Henry has pushed so hard at the Temple?"

Carson nodded. "Can you imagine what it will be like having an inscription from this place, and not be able to read it?" He shook his head in disgust. "The people who spoke the language inhabited the country around the Temple of the Winds. And they controlled the Temple itself at one point. We've been hoping to find a Rosetta stone. Or, failing that, to get enough samples of the writing to allow us to decipher it."

Hutch broke in. "I don't understand this at all. If the Quraquat never came here, how could they possibly have left a sample of their writing? Are you sure this is what you think it is?"

"No question," said Carson. "It's a perfect match."

"Then what are we saying—?"

"I would think," Richard said, "that the builders of this—

monstrosity—left a message for the inhabitants of Quraqua. To be read when they got here."

"About whatl" Hutch could scarcely contain her impatience.

"An invitation to join the galactic club," suggested Carson. "Or an explanation for Oz." Richard started down. "Who knows?"

Hutch looked at Carson. "Frank, how many of these ancient languages can we read?" "A few. Not many. Almost none, actually." "None." She tried to shake the fog from her brain. "What don't I understand? If we can't read any of these languages, what difference does it make whether we find a Rosetta stone? I mean, we're not going to be able to read the Rosetta, either. Right?"

"It won't matter. If we get the same text in three or more languages, we can decipher all the languages involved. Pro-vided we get a sample of reasonable size." Richard was back on the ground now. "If you've seen enough," Carson said, "there's something else you'll want to look at." "Okay."

"We need to go to the top of the tower." They walked back toward the shuttles. "We can use mine."

They climbed in. Carson left the hatch open. He adjusted his cap, and activated the magnets. The vehicle floated up the face of the tower.

"Is there," asked Richard, "another of these things on the other side of Oz?"

"Another round tower? Yes, there is."

"Another inscription?"

"No. Not another inscription."

"Interesting." Richard looked down. "Hey," he said, "the roof isn't level." He leaned out to get a better view. "It's the first slope of any kind we've seen here." "There's another," said Carson. "The other tower."

"Yes." They hovered just over the roof. "Frank." Richard Wald's silver eyebrows drew together. Is the location of the other tower a reverse image of this one?" "No." Richard looked delighted.

Hutch saw the point. "It breaks the pattern," she said. "A straight line drawn between the round towers does not pass through the central tower."

"A unique condition in Oz. Frank, does it happen anywhere else?"

"Nowhere that I know of."

"Good. Then we have only these towers to concentrate on." He swung around, trying to get his bearings. "The center of the city is where?"

Carson showed him.

"And the other tower?"

"Toward the north." He pointed. "Why?"

"Don't know yet. Frank, have you measured the angle of the roof?"

"No. I don't think anyone measured it. Why would we?"

"I don't really know. But look at it. The lowest part of it lies on the side closest to the center of the city. As you look out toward the wall, the slope rises."

"I don't follow."

"All guesswork so far. Is the same thing true of the other round tower?"

"I'm not sure I understand the question."

"You said the roof there is also angled. Is the roof on the other tower lowest where it's closest to the middle of Oz?"

"I don't remember." Why would anyone, his tone suggested, bother with such a thing? "Do you want to set down and look around on the roof a bit?"

"No, I've seen quite enough, thanks. We have one more job to do, and then I'd like to go with you back to the Temple."

"Richard." Hutch, who had guessed this was coming, tried to use her most serious, don't screw-around-with-me voice. "Don't forget we're supposed to be here to take these people off. Not augment them."

"I know. Hutch. And I won't forget." He took her hand, squeezed it. Their Flickinger fields flashed. "Be careful," she said. "What's the other job?" asked Carson. "We need as precise a measurement of the inclination as we can get. On both round towers. And we need to ensure that the lowest point on each roof really does match up with the central square." He winked at Hutch. "Maybe"-he beamed—"we have something."

June 6, 2202 Dear Dick,

…Thank God for the round towers and the slanted roofs. It is all that adds any touch of reason to the entire business.

You would have been amused at how we behaved. Very quiet. We kept our voices down, as if we were all afraid someone might be listening. Even Frank Carson. You haven't met him. He's not the sort of man to give way to anyone. But even he kept looking over his shoulder.

Truth is, there is a presence in those streets. You can't help but feel it.

Poor Hutch. She sees no rationale whatever, and consequently she was damned near unhinged at the end of our tour. Even with the small insight I have (and I know you have guessed what it is), I too feel unsettled. Oz is not a place for anyone with a halfway active imagination…

Richard

— Richard Wald to his cousin Dick Received in Portland, Oregon, June 24