pondered. 'But he one also, too.'
'Eh? He's one. Just one man?'
'But many… also. One… many.'
'This is beginning to sound suspiciously theological again,' John said. 'One-in-many. Next they'll be expounding on the doctrine of the Trinity.'
'How did they tumble to all this?' Liam asked incredulously.
'These two know everything,' Susan said. 'I've always had the feeling that Winnie has known everything all along.' '
Can you explain, George?' I asked. 'Explain. Say more?'
George scratched his belly and cogitated. 'Pime. He… not man.'
'Oh. He's not? What is he?'
''Splain.' He looked as if a headache were coming on. 'He…' The belly scratching grew more vigorous. George screwed up his face in frustration. 'He… Pime… he…'
'Okay, okay. Don't get upset. It's all right that you can't say it.'
'He all of them!' George blurted. 'All. One. Many.' He stopped scratching. Something dawned on him, a faint light at the horizon of his understanding. His gaze was drawn out the port to the sky. 'Me,' he said. He stared for a moment, then lowered his eyes to Winnie. 'Winnie, too. She also. We.' He pointed to her, then brought his stubby index finger back to rest on his chest. 'Me. Us.' He tapped the finger. 'We many.' That said, he sighed, looking a bit sad. ''Splain no more.' There was a long silence.
Presently, I said, 'Thanks, George, Winnie.' Winnie gave me a hug and got down.
'Well, gang,' I said, not particularly apropos of anything.
'Yes. Well,' John said.
'What do you say we get moving?'
'Yeah,' Susan said emptily.
I turned forward, put my foot on the accelerator pedal, and took hold of the control bars. 'Start her up, Sam.'
Sam did. The engine thrummed to life.
I looked out across the valley at the green-glass fairy palace, and finally thought of something to say. I suppose there was an impish grin on my face when I tried to come out with, 'Well, gang, we're-'
'If you say `We're off to see the Wizard,'' Sam declared, 'I'll come out of my hidey-hole and bite you on the ass.'
3
The trip across the valley floor was leisurely and uneventful. We passed other structures along the way, ones we hadn't really noticed with the green fortress riveting our attention. We took time to puzzle over them now. One looked like a cross between an Ionic temple and a chemical factory. Another was in the shape of a squashed silver sphere melded to a blue pyramid. A third, lying some distance off the road, was a free-form aggregation of butterfly-wing shapes. There were others less easy to describe. Needless to say, we didn't have a clue as to what they were or what functions they served, if any. I suspected that some of them weren't buildings, exactly. Sculpture? Possibly. Machines? Maybe.
The Emerald City was different. There was a fanciful quality to it. Its lines were graceful and romantic, belying its bulk. It imparted a sense of solidity, though; it was big enough to contain a city, and if it truly were a fortress, a castle, it looked the part, high ramparts braced against the wind. It looked to have been carved out of a single uniform block of material. No seams, no joints.
It was a castle, but it was unlike anything you'd see in history books. An alien hand had drawn the blueprints; I was willing to bet on that.
Sam asked, 'What was that about an entrance at the foot of the mountain?'
'That's what the man said.'
But what was there was simply the end of the the road. The Skyway, that maze of interstellar road that stretched throughout the galaxy, terminated at the base of the citadel in front of a stand of short purplish trees. Road's end. We had come a long way.
I braked.
'Whoa!' Sam yelled. 'What's this?'
The juncture of road and hillside parted, the edge of the hill rising like a hiked skirt, scrubby trees stitched to the hem. It stopped just high enough to admit the truck, forming an arch that revealed the mouth of a tunnel. The road continued through.
'What do you think of that, Sam?' I asked.
'Nifty.'
'Shall we drive on in?'
'Sure. I'll put the headbeams on.'
I looked at the underside of the tunnel mouth as we drove through the aperture. It was all metal inside. No earth or debris rained down on us, and I couldn't for the life of me figure out how this trick was being done, but I didn't have much time to study it.
The tunnel was smooth-walled, lit by oval recessed fixtures positioned at regular intervals directly overhead. Otherwise it was featureless and reminded. me of the Roadbug garage planet, where the Bugs had caught us then dragged us across light-years to this place. The tunnel bore through the mountain for about half a kilometer before it debouched into a dimly lit, expansive cavern.
But here the similarity to the Roadbug planet ended, though the place did look like a garage. The skeletal shapes of huge cranes and gantries loomed in the shadows. Strange machinery lay everywhere. There were scores of vehicles here, too, some parked out in the middle of the floor and appearing ready for use, others occupying numerous maintenance bays recessed into the walls. The vehicles were of every shape and description.
'How much to park here by the hour?' Sam wanted to know.
'Where's the attendant?' I asked. 'But seriously, folks, how the hell do we get up to the city from here?'
'Elevator, I guess,' Carl said.
'Yeah,' I said. 'Where? This place is big. See anything?' We roamed through the place for a few minutes.
'What's that?' Roland said, pointing.
'Where?'
'Looks like a ramp. See? Through that opening right there, against the far wall. No, now you can't see it- behind that big electrical coil-looking thing.'
'Oh.' I eased the rig forward and saw it. It was a sharply inclined ramp barely wide enough to admit a small vehicle. No go for the truck.
'Looks like some sort of way up,' I said, 'but we'll have to hoof it.'
'Looks like I stay here,' Sam said.
'Sorry, Sam.'
'Well, I'd be a little obtrusive sitting at the table, anyway. Enjoy your lunch.'
I scrammed the engine. 'Okay. Here we go.'
The cavern was cool, redolent of garage smells-not oil and grease, just the definite ambience of heavy machinery. 'Everybody have everything?' I asked when all the crew had gotten out. 'We might not be back here for a while.'
'Got all my Nogon camping gear,' Susan said while reaching behind to adjust a strap on her backpack. 'Don't know what use it'll be, but what the hell.'
'Good idea to bring anything we might possibly need,' I said. 'There's no telling what's up there. Anybody else?' Everybody was content to make the trip up with what he had.
I took out my key and spoke into it. 'Okay, Sam. Take care and keep an eye out for trouble.'
