World's End

Page 168

He slides into the seat as I get up. My legs give way;

I have to hang on to the panel for support. I look down at Song, sitting rigidly in the copilot's seat. "Song?" Her eyes are open, staring, but she does not move. I shake her gently. She falls back into the seat, completely limp, still staring. "Song!" My own voice shouts in my ears. The Lake is gone, and the silence is almost unbearable. . . . Gods, what have I done?

"What the hell happened?" SB says again, pulling at my arm. "BZ--?"

"The Lake," I say, and for a long moment it is all I can say. "It let us go."

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I feel them look at each other, and at me. "Then everything you said is really true," HK breathes.

"Where are we?" SB looks down at the readouts on the panel.

"On a course that will get us back to civilization in about half a day." Half a day's painless, normal flight.

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WORLD'S END

My hands touch my face. I feel a kind of amazement.

We've survived.

"You mean the Lake is alive?" HK is sitting behind me. He holds up the globe, peering in at the droplet of stardrive.

I nod, relieved to see that he still has it.

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"And you can talk to it?"

"I did. In a way." SB looks back at me. HK stares with childish awe as I fall into a seat beside him. "I don't hear it anymore. I don't expect it hears me, either." I feel empty, bloodless. I glance at Song again.

"Thank the gods you didn't drop that." SB looks over his shoulder at the globe.

"Drop this?" HK shakes his filthy head, holding it up.

"I'd die first. I'd kill first. Ye gods, SB, do you know how much this is worth?" He giggles.

"Nobody knows how much it's worth! More than anyone ever dreamed! We found our treasure." He peers out at World's End. "The hell with buying back the family holdings. We'll Page 169

buy whole planets!"

SB laughs. "We'll sell it to the highest bidder. We'll rent it. We'll have the Prime Minister on his knees, begging us for our secret--"

"We'll buy the water of life! We'll live forever!"

I push myself up. I reach out and take the globe from

HK's hands. It whispers faintly, comfortingly. "Aren't

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you forgetting something?" I ask.

They look at me blankly.

"This is my discovery."

"BZ--"

"You can't--!"

Their voices clamor in the tight space of the cabin, rattling off the walls.

"--selfish--"

"--all we've suffered--"

"--share it with ms?"

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JOAN D. VINGE

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"We deserve it!"

"Shut up." I glare at them. "The stardrive belongs to the people of the Hegemony. It's their heritage, their right. And I'm giving it back to them. No one is going to hold it for ransom."

"You're going to give it away?" SB says scornfully.

"You can't be serious."

"I've never been more serious in my life--" I blink and frown as life echoes memory. . . . Just the way I saw it. The last shadows of doubt about my sanity begin to fade. I move back to Song, and hold the globe in front of her eyes. "Listen," I beg her. She seems to focus on it, but she doesn't move.