show you, if-'
He declined hastily. She must have gotten him to the cabin room, too-or more likely had a man haul him there. Had she also undressed him and cleaned his clothing, as Sola had done so long ago? The similarities were disturbing.
'It's all right, Sos. I have your bracelet, remember? I didn't stay with you last night because I knew you'd be out for the duration, but I'll be with you from now on.' She hesitated. 'Unless you changed your mind?'
She was so little, more like a doll than a woman. Her concern was quite touching, but it was hard to know what to say. She was hardly half his weight. What could she know of the way of men and women?
'Oh, is that so!' she exclaimed, flashing, though he had not spoken. 'Well, let's go back to your room right now and I'll show you I don't just climb ladders!'
He smiled at her vehemence. 'No, keep it. I guess you know what you're doing.' And he guessed he liked being chased, too.
She had guided him through right-angled corridors illuminated by overhead tubes of incandescence and on to another large room. These seemed to be no end to this odd enclosed world. He had yet to see honest daylight since coming here. 'This is our cafeteria. We're just in time for mess.
There was a long counter with plates of food set upon it-thin slices of bacon, steaming oatmeal, poached eggs, sausage, toasted bread and other items he did, not recognize. Farther down he saw cups of fruit juice, milk and hot drinks, as well as assorted jellies and spreads. It was as though someone had emptied the entire larder of a hostel and spread it out for a single feast. There was more than anyone could eat.
'Silly. You just take anything you want and put it on your tray,' she said. 'Here.' She lifted a plastic tray from a stack at the end and handed it to him. She took one herself and preceded him down the aisle, selecting plates as she moved. He followed, taking one of each.
He ran out of tray space long before the end of the counter. 'Here,' she said, unconcerned. 'Put some on mine.'
The terminus opened into an extended dining area, square tables draped with overlapping white cloths. People were seated at several, finishing their meals. Both men and women wore coveralls and smocks similar to what he had seen already, making him feel out of place though he was normally dressed. Sosa led him to a vacant table and set the array of food and beverage upon it.
'I could introduce you to everyone, but we like to keep meals more or less private. If you want company you leave the other chairs open; if you want to be left alone, tilt them up, like this.' She leaned the two unused chairs forward against the sides of the table. 'No one will bother us.'
She viewed his array. 'One thing, Sos-we don't waste anything. You eat everything you take.'
He nodded. He was ravenous.
'We call this the underworld,' she said as he ate, 'but we don't consider ourselves criminals,' She paused, but he didn't understand the allusion. 'Anyway, we're all dead here. I mean, we all would have been dead if we hadn't- well, the same way you came. Climbing the mountain. I came last year. Just about every week there's someone- someone who makes it. Who doesn't turn back. So our population stays pretjy steady.'
Sos looked up over a mouthful. 'Some turn back?'
'Most do. They get tired, or they change their minds, or something, and they go down again.'
'But no one ever returns from the mountain!'
'That's right,' she said uncomfortably.
He didn't press the matter, though he filed it away for future investigation.
'So we're really dead, because none of us will ever be seen in the world again. But we aren't idle. We work very hard, all of us. As soon as we're finished eating, I'll show you.'
She did. She took him on a tour of the kitchen, where sweaty cooks worked full time preparing the plates of food and helpers ran the soiled dishes and trays through a puffing cleaning machine. She showed him the offices where accounts were kept. He did not grasp the purpose of such figuring, except that it was essential in some way to keep mining, manufacturing and exporting in balance. This made sense; he remembered the computations he had had to perform when training Sol's warriors, and this
