“You’re sure man was destroyed everywhere else?”
“Well, of course. Once the Gods took over …”
“You’re sure they did take over? I know you’ve said that, but are you sure?”
“Bertran. Yes. They did take over. And they destroyed mankind. The only place in the galaxy where mankind was left was here. So, this is the only place in the galaxy where that question can be answered. I mean, it’s self-evident.”
He leaned back against the stone, seeming to sag there, almost bonelessly, Nela dragged with him, their breathing labored. “So there are gods out there who have destroyed mankind,” Bertran whispered. “And there are gods in here who are bidding fair to destroy what’s left. So, maybe the destiny of man is to be destroyed by his gods, and wouldn’t that be a nice ironic answer for them.”
“I’d rather not tell them that,” whispered Nela.
“If that is the answer, they probably already know,” said Fringe soberly.
“How did you ever graduate from the Academy?” Danivon fumed, plunging his arm into the guts of the flier where it sat on a sandspit beside the River Floh, just upstream of the Great Wall. “How did you ever get your operator’s clearance.”
“We didn’t have to fly these damned gnats,” Zasper muttered angrily. “We worked with vehicles large enough to stay put when the wind blew.”
“It was an updraft,” said Danivon angrily. “And the way you landed us …”
“I did land us,” Zasper pointed out.
“The way you landed us has knocked something loose in there, and I can’t see to fix it.”
“I’ll be glad to hold the light.”
“Whatever’s loose is behind six other things, and there’s room for only two hands in there. I need both of them to fix it. We’re going to have to wait for daytime, Zasper!”
“We’ve already waited too long. What do you smell?”
“Pain, Zasper. Suffering. Fear. Darkness. You want to add to the catalog!”
“No,” he said. “I just hoped they were still alive.”
“Oh, they’ re alive. And from what I can sniff out, still in the same place. Though why … now that’s a good question, isn’t it. Why. Why would these gods you speak of want Fringe? Or the twins?”
Zasper shook his head. “They were probably after you.”
“Because I asked questions.”
“Possibly, yes. But then, so did the twins. Maybe they were after any of us and just grabbed whoever was closest.”
That had a ring of likelihood to it. Danivon slumped against the flier and stared toward the east, waiting for dawn.
“I guess I should say thank you,” he said.
“For what?”
“For saving my life. In Molock. All those years ago.”
“Oh, you found out about that, did you? I suppose Fringe told you.”
“Yes.”
“Women cannot keep their mouths shut.”
“It was when she saved the girl in Derbeck. I tried to stop her.”
“Yes, well. I would have thought Curvis would have been the one who tried to stop her. He goes by the book pretty much. Of course, you have done too, when it was convenient.” He mused at the dark sky. “How did she tell you?”
“She yelled it at me, to explain why she was saving the girl. I should have expected her to do something like that. She’s been very upset with us lately.”
Zasper sighed. “I didn’t really want her to be an Enforcer. It’s hard for a woman. It’s hard for some men. The children were always hardest for me. Those places where they kept having them and having them and killing them and killing them, or just letting them die. At least your people, whoever they were, tried to keep you alive.”
“You met them.”
“Who?”
“My people. Cafferty and Latibor, at the boat. They’re my parents.”
Zasper stared at him, a mere silhouette against the stars. “Think of that,” he said at last, trying to decipher the feeling that had just run through his mind, leaving muddy footprints across his heart. Jealousy maybe? So Danivon had parents.
“Dawn coming,” said Danivon. “But it won’t be really light for a while yet. We might as well catch up on some sleep.”
• • •
The golden faces summoned their prisoners before them once more. Panting and pale, the twins managed to get into the cavern of the faces, though they could not rise after the obligatory reverence.
“You have the answer for us?” a face asked with poisonous sweetness.
“We have some possible answers,” offered Fringe, putting her hand on Nela’s shoulder, feeling the damp chill there, the sweating cold.
Tentatively, she suggested man’s destiny was to reproduce.
The faces howled with laughter.
“It’s the first thought we had,” Fringe said, swallowing bile. “Since that’s what we seem to do best.”
“No,” said a face, all the others echoing, no, no, no, no.
“We thought perhaps our destiny was to be destroyed,” she went on, hurrying, getting it over with. “Or to attain heaven, or simply to be brave.”
As soon as the word left her mouth, she knew she had erred.
“Brave,” gulped a voice. “Let’s see how brave….”
The twins stood it for a time, grunting and jerking, and then they slid to the ground all in one heap as Fringe screamed imprecations at the faces and knelt to draw Nela’s head into her lap. She felt the gray throat for a pulse, leaned down to detect a breath. None. None.
“You bastards,” Fringe screamed. “You bastards, you’ve killed them.”
She was thrust back against the wall by a forest of tiny tentacles, still screaming curses.
“What are you doing? What are you doing?”
“Separating them,” said a voice, a gulping voice. “They’re no good tied together like that. So, we’ll take them apart.”
“You’ll kill them! You can’t do that! If they aren’t already dead, you’ll kill them.”
“I can do it,” the voice said calmly. “I’ve been studying the matter, and I have everything I need, right here.”
The tentacles knew something, obviously, for the twins came back to life, enough at
