The Project Gutenberg eBook of Forever We Die!, by Stephen Marlowe

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Title: Forever We Die!

Author: Stephen Marlowe

Release Date: November 26, 2021 [EBook #66825]

Language: English

*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK ***

Rhodes faced the agonies of alien torture

because he knew the secret which held an entire

world in bondage. It was a secret proclaiming—

Forever We Die!

By C. H. Thames

[Transcriber's Note: This etext was produced from

Imagination Stories of Science and Fantasy

August 1956

Extensive research did not uncover any evidence that

the U.S. copyright on this publication was renewed.]

The guard spat in Phil Rhodes' food bowl, closed the grate, and trudged away down the stone-walled corridor.

Darkness returned to the narrow, coffin-shaped cell. Rhodes reached for the bowl of gruel. It was tepid, not hot. The cell was very cold. In the square of light admitted briefly when the grate had been opened, Rhodes had seen the big, unkempt guard's breath, a puff of smoke on the cold air. He had also seen the guard hack spittle into the bowl of gruel.

It was no whim on the guard's part. Rhodes grinned wryly, and realized he was doing so, and encouraged his facial muscles in the act. Nothing around here was a whim. Absolutely nothing. It was all part of a plan, and the purpose of the plan was to break Rhodes.

Given: one Earthman.

Problem: to degrade him by subtle psychological torture.

Purpose: a big, fat question mark which, by itself, was almost enough to drive Rhodes crazy.

He ate the gruel. He held his breath and got it down somehow, got it down because he had to.

It had been some time since the last question period, and Rhodes expected to be summoned momentarily. Why me? he thought for the hundredth time. That was part of it, too. Why Rhodes? He was only a student at the Earth University at Deneb III, here on Kedak now—that was Deneb IV—to do field work in extra-terrestrial anthropology. And the Kedaki had come for him one night, how long ago? Rhodes had no idea how long it was, and that was part of the plan too. His sleep was irregular, usually disturbed by one or another of the guards as part of the overall pattern of psychological torture.

Rhodes began to shiver. It was growing suddenly cold. Naturally, that was no accident. The cell was very small and so shaped that Rhodes could neither recline fully nor stand up without jack-knifing his spine. Obviously, he couldn't engage in much physical activity to keep warm. The Kedaki knew this: it was part of the maddening plan.

Rhodes shook with cold, felt the skin of his face going numb, heard his teeth chattering. The abrupt cold now was his entire universe. He made an effort of will—you're warm, he told himself, you're warm. His lips took on that peculiar numb puckering sensation which meant, he knew, that they were blue with cold. He felt a welcome lethargy, then, as if the terrible cold were a bed of repose, the most comfortable, most wonderful bed he'd ever had. He wanted to sink back in it, surrender to it.

If he did, if he surrendered to the blood-freezing cold, he would die.

No, he told himself. That was wrong. They wanted him to think he would die. But it was out of the question. If they'd wanted to kill him, there were easier ways. What they wanted was a state of mind. They wanted terror, a simple animal fear of death.

You're not going to die, Rhodes told himself. They need you—for something. They're very good at making you think so, but you're not going to die.

A sudden blast of hot air belched into the freezing cell.

It was Turkish-bath hot, and it dissipated the cold at once. It was stifling. Rhodes, who was sitting awkwardly because the cell was constructed for minimum comfort, opened his mouth and gulped in the hot, wet air. His lungs needed more oxygen; his head was giddy with the need; his pulses throbbed.

He sank into a troubled sleep, shoulders propped against rough stone. He slept for half an hour while the unseen vents in the cell poured heat on him.

There was a grating sound, and footsteps. Something hard prodded Rhodes' back. He opened his eyes. The heavy boot struck again, thudding against his kidney. He rolled away from it.

"Crawl out of there," the guard said in Kedaki.

Rhodes, who was a student of the Kedaki civilization, understood the language perfectly. But even if he had not, the tone of voice was unmistakable. Rhodes crawled toward the grating on his hands and knees. The roof of the cell was so low, he could barely crawl. It was more a slithering motion. Part of the treatment, Rhodes told himself, able to bear it better because he understood. Part of the process of degradation. Turn a man into an animal, and he'll do whatever you wish.

"More questions?" Rhodes asked in Kedaki when he stood up outside the cell, stretching the cramped muscles of his back, shoulders and legs.

"What do you think?" the guard replied, and prodded him forward down the brightly lit corridor.

The room was very clean. It was spotless, possibly antiseptically clean. That, too, was part of the plan. For Rhodes' cell was filthy. Rhodes' clothing was stiff with his own foul sweat. Rhodes' skin itched with encrusted dirt.

"Sit down," the Kedaki said politely.

Rhodes sighed. This was the polite one. He had two interrogators, one cruel, brutal, harsh, the other as polite and suave as the rustle of silk. To keep Rhodes guessing....

He sat down across a metal desk from the interrogator. The man was, Rhodes judged, in his thirties. He had the faintly purple skin of the Kedaki—not really purple, but as purple as the skin of an American Indian is red. He was slightly built, smooth-skinned, almost beardless. His eyes were very friendly but somehow very deadly.

"You have been here three months," he said conversationally.

"Three months! Yesterday, they told me...."

"Yesterday? Indeed? And how do you know it was yesterday?"

"Well, I thought...."

"You see, you have no way of knowing."

"But three months! You haven't even told me why I'm a prisoner. If I could just make a call," Rhodes said, his voice rising to an almost hysterical whine although he attempted to keep it level. "Just one call to the Earth Consul...."

"Mr. Rhodes," the interrogator said softly. "You are a student, merely a student. I do not say this deprecatingly, but merely to point out that you are not a servant of your government and as such shouldn't undergo torture because you consider it the, ah, patriotic thing to do. How old are you, Rhodes?"

"I'm twenty-one," Rhodes said.

"A very young man, but stubborn."

"Listen!" Rhodes cried, his voice rising out of control again. "I don't even know what you want to know! Every day you change your questions! And every day you change how you react to my answers. I don't know what you want! I think you're crazy, all of you!"

"Do you really think so?"

"No," Rhodes admitted in a subdued voice.

"I will tell you something, Rhodes. We Kedaki are experts at psychological torture. You know that, don't you, as a student of our culture? Yes?—good. Eventually, we get what we want. Since no Kedaki fears death because he knows he will be reincarnated—"

"You say."

"No Kedaki doubts this fact. Other creatures are not reincarnated, but the Kedaki are. As a consequence, the Kedaki are fearless. The fear of death does not exist for us and therefore, the fear of pain and violence is also minimized. The Kedaki, as you know, make wonderful soldiers. I tell you all this only to prove that we are the galaxy's most adept practitioners of psychological torture, as a necessity. I tell you all this only to save you further trouble."

"But I still don't know what you want."

"Nor will you, ever. Even when we are finished with you. I'll tell you, Rhodes. We want the answer to one question. We are asking you hundreds. When we break you completely, when you answer every question the way we want it to be answered, you will answer the one important question. Are you ready?"

"No," said Rhodes.

"What do you mean, no?"

"Because I can never tell in advance whether you want the truth or lies. Because either way I give myself a hard time. Look: just ask me the one question. Maybe I won't mind answering it."

"You'll mind. Besides, when we're all finished here, we don't want you to know. What kind of work do you do, Rhodes?"

"You know what kind. I already told you, fifty times."

"What kind of work do you do, Rhodes?"

"I'm a student of extra-terrestrial anthropology at Deneb University, doing field work here on Kedak...."

"Good."

Good, thought Rhodes. They're accepting the truth today, not rejecting it. He settled back in his chair and answered the unimportant initial questions almost automatically. His family back on Earth. Mother, father, younger sister. What he thought of Deneb III and the university there. Why he wanted to be an extra-terrestrial anthropologist. Exactly what kind of field work he was doing on Kedak.

"Reincarnation," Rhodes said. "At least, a planet-wide belief in reincarnation. It's unique in the galaxy, as far as we know, and it sets the pattern for Kedaki civilization."

"You are making a planet-wide study?"

Rhodes shook his head. He'd been asked these questions many times before, but it was the subject he loved and he felt himself warming to it. "Not a planet-wide study," he said. "Just this city. Just Junction City. But if you can learn how a sweeping social institution controls one center of population, then...."

"I'm sure," the interrogator said dryly.

"Besides, there are the ruins outside the city."

"Indeed, there are the ruins."

"Because an anthropologist is interested in the history of his subject as well as its merely ephemeral present. And there are those who believe that the Balata 'kai ruins hold the origin of your belief in metempsychosis...."

"Do you, Rhodes?"

"Yes. Yes, I do."

"Have you found anything to fortify this belief?"

"I have."

"What have you found?"

"The Balata 'kai Book of the Dead. Oh, it isn't a book, really. It's some tablets—five thousand years old."

"You have seen these tablets?"

"Yes," said Rhodes.

"Where?"

"The Temple of the Golden Dome, Balata 'kai."

"They are there now?"

"No," said Rhodes. "I took them."

"You took them where?"

"Well, I hid them."

"Where?"

Rhodes grinned. "I'm not going to answer that," he said. He was thinking. Prolong the interview, Phil old boy. Because it's clean here, and neither too warm nor too cold, and you can sit comfortably or stand if you want to.

"Why aren't you going to answer it?"

Rhodes grinned again. "I realize this isn't very important to you...."

"Everything is important to me while I do my job."

"But it's very important to me, I was going to say. Because The Book of the Dead is an anthropological find, that's why. Because I intend to have an exclusive on it until I've finished my work here."

"What makes you think The Book of the Dead isn't very important to us?"

"Don't tell me," Rhodes said incredulously, "that I'm in jail and being tortured because I won't tell you where I've hid an anthropological curiosity which may not even be genuine!"

"No, I won't tell you. Now, as to the genuineness of The Book of the Dead...."

Rhodes felt suddenly sleepy. He'd been awakened to come here. He was always awakened to come here, sometimes after what he thought was a full night's sleep and sometimes after what seemed only a few moments. He listened sleepily as the interrogator went on, surprisingly doing most of the talking. He hardly heard the words, had all he could do to keep his head from slumping down on the desk. It just wasn't very important. It was preliminary to what really mattered, to the questions about Earth history, sociology, engineering, economy, which always followed.

But why me? Rhodes thought. My subject is extra-terrestrial anthropology....

"... therefore, Rhodes," the interrogator was saying, "The Book of the Dead is not only the oldest known written document on Kedak, but also, clearly, genuine. Do you agree?"

Rhodes stood up and paced back and forth. The interrogator permitted this, even encouraged it. There was neither room to stand nor to pace in Rhodes' cell, a fact which made it difficult for Rhodes to do anything but cooperate completely with his interrogator. Well, why shouldn't I cooperate? he thought. If I cooperate, they'll let me out of here. Let me out of here? No, how can they do that? They're holding an extra-Kedakian illegally, and they know it, and I know it, and they know I know it. My God, Rhodes thought suddenly, are they going to kill me when they're finished with me? It seemed the only logical outcome of all this.

"... population growth of the Earth colony on the planet Mars?"

Rhodes supplied the answer, knowing it was one you could find in any textbook on the Martian colony back in the solar system. All this, he thought, for what? Because Kedak is resisting its incorporation into the Galactic League? Because the Kedaki rulers want to be left alone, fearing that their doctrine of reincarnation will be discredited by intercourse with other worlds?

But the one maddening question remained: why Rhodes?

"... titanium deposits on the moons of Jupiter?"

"Sorry," Rhodes said, "I don't know the answer to that one."

At that moment, the room shook.

Trained since his imprisonment to expect the unexpected, Rhodes thought it was part of the treatment. But the interrogator seemed surprised.

There was a deep rumbling which seemed to rise up from the very bowels of the planet. The room shook again. Rhodes felt himself flung violently across it, colliding with the far wall. The interrogator's head slammed against the metal desk, then the interrogator stood up, blood on his face.

"Guard!" he cried. "Take this man back to his cell at once!"

The room shook a third time, plaster sifted down from the ceiling, and a big crack appeared over Rhodes' head. Through it he saw daylight—the first daylight he'd seen in three months, if he could believe the interrogator.

"Guard!" screamed the interrogator, his composure gone.

Kedak was, Rhodes knew, an earthquake-prone planet. All young worlds were, and Kedak was a young world. Was this, then, an earthquake?

The room swayed, tilted. Rhodes staggered uphill back to the desk, clutching its edge for support. Underfoot, there was a rolling, booming sound. You could not merely hear it, you could feel it. It rolled on from a long way off, coming closer every second, like the distant boom of a thousand cannon fired at split-second intervals.

The door opened, and the guard stood there. The interrogator pointed at Rhodes, shouting something which was swallowed completely by the rolling, booming sound. The guard shouted something back, unheard in the noise, then walked toward Rhodes.

He never reached the Earthman.

The room rocked. The floor came up suddenly, jarringly, and the ceiling came down.

The guard stood there, a look of horror on his face. Not fear of death, Rhodes found himself thinking in the final few seconds. The Kedaki, believing in metempsychosis, did not fear death. But the choking, blinding fear of any man a split-second before personal catastrophe.

Then, literally, the ceiling fell.

The guard pivoted slowly, as if he had all the time in the world to return to the door. He took one small step and the ceiling hit him. It came down not in one sheet but sectionally, Rhodes found himself thinking with amazing objectivity, because—see?—the guard is being struck now, but I haven't been touched....

The guard fell, and the ceiling crumpled on top of him. Rhodes saw the guard's head, very close to the floor, bent at right angles to his body, which was stretched out and hidden by the shards of plaster and stone. There was a worm of blood trickling from the guard's nose. His eyes were opened wide, but the eyeballs had rolled up in the sockets.

The interrogator screamed, and Rhodes heard the sound faintly above the thunderous booming before the tons of plaster and stone came down on both of them.

CHAPTER II

He stood up.

I'm dead, he thought. How can I be standing, if I'm dead?

It was dim, but not completely dark. He breathed deeply, and gagged on plaster dust. He heard a siren distantly, and the brisk, businesslike sound of flames crackling nearby.

A pile of masonry covered the broken, battered desk. Automatically, he groped behind it. There was someone there. They had been talking, he remembered.

He found the man, a Kedaki. Am I a Kedaki? he thought. He did not know. He remembered nothing about himself.

Shock, he thought reasonably enough. You've been through hell, so just calm down and it will all come back to you. The man behind the desk was dead, his skull flattened on top and pulpy. The man nearer to the door was also dead, his neck broken. He went around the corpse and to the door, which opened into the room. He opened it, was driven back by a wall of flame.

He slammed the door, but not before his eyebrows were seared. He went quickly to the center of the room and smelled something like feathers burning before he felt the pain. Then, instinctively, he beat his hands against his head. His hair had caught fire. He shouted with pain and looked up and saw the smoke and the fluctuating brightness of the flame and by the time he got it out he knew all his hair was gone. He felt his scalp gingerly. It smarted, but there didn't seem to be any blisters. Third degree burn—he was lucky. Only for the moment, he realized. Because the fire was still out there and while the door seemed flame resistant, it wouldn't resist forever.

He had to find some other way out of here if he didn't want to perish in the flames.

He made a swift circuit of the room. There was no other door. There were no windows. He was engulfed momentarily by panic, but could still think objectively. See? he told himself. You're afraid. Afraid to die. So you know at least this much: you're not a Kedaki, whatever else you are. For the Kedaki wouldn't fear death, that was sure.

Returning to the door, he opened it a crack. The flames were dazzling, roaring, dancing things. He shut the door and felt its surface. It was uncomfortably hot to the touch. He waited a few moments, listening to the sounds of the flame and the still-wailing siren. Then he touched the door again. Unmistakably, it had grown hotter. He stood at the door and shouted for help, then laughed. Nobody would hear him. And certainly, nobody could come through the fire to rescue him.

He made a prowling circuit of the room once more. Nothing.

Then something stirred overhead. He looked up, and the laughter bubbled in his throat, almost hysterically.

Beams and masonry and sky.

The ceiling had come down. Or, most of it had. There was a way out and he'd not looked for it, not found it at first, because he hadn't expected to find it over his head.

He jumped, came down again. What's the matter with me? he thought. It's way over my head. I'm acting crazy.

He looked at the door. It was glowing a dull red now. There was a dry burning sound. A flame licked through the door tentatively. Got to hurry, he thought.

The pile of masonry covering the desk seemed tall enough. He climbed it, stood there, reached up with his hands. Short, by several feet. He looked at the door: hungry flames were devouring it. He crouched, tensing his muscles, then jumped. But the loose-piled masonry offered no purchase and was dislodged by his feet. The result was that his groping fingers did not even come close to the beams overhead.

A second time he tried it, and this time the rubble underfoot shifted and he was flung to the floor. This won't do, he told himself. This won't do at all. If you don't get out of here, and get out of here fast, you're going to be roasted.

Now the distant siren's wail had come closer. Something rumbled outside, and the next moment he was deluged with water. By this time the flames were eating their way along the wall on either side of the door. They leaped to the rubble on the floor, found something combustible there, and burned. He began to choke on the smoke and the steam as water hissed and boiled on the masonry.

They'd put the fire out, all right, he thought. Eventually, they'd get it under control. But if I'm not broiled by the flames I'm going to be boiled in their fire-fighting water, so what difference does it make?

He tried the desk again, but could not jump high enough. He stood there, panting with the effort to get enough oxygen into his lungs. The flames danced playfully around him. The fact that there was so much in the room that could burn surprised him.

Once more he jumped. He hardly had the strength to clear the floor with his feet. His left ankle was numb and when he came down he knew he would not be able to jump again.

That was it. He'd burn.

A crafty look suddenly came into his eyes. You're hysterical, he thought, and was right. But it didn't matter. He got down on hands and knees, then on his belly. Cooler near the floor, he told himself, still smiling craftily. You're outfoxing the fire, old boy. You crafty devil. Close to the floor, he could breathe. But it was hot, and the flames circled him, expectantly, it seemed, as if they had burned through the entire prison just for a chance to get at him.

Tentatively, a tongue of flame licked at his arm. He brushed it away as you would brush an insect away. It came back, playfully. It hardly seemed to hurt but he screamed anyway.

When the fire was finally brought under control, they found him. His skin was red and blistered where it was not black and crisp. His prison uniform had been consumed completely by the flames, as had all his body hair. Miraculously, he was still alive. It was a slow, irregular heartbeat and they did not expect it to last long, but dutifully they took him to the aid station.

He was lucky there.

Among the doctors on duty to treat the thousands of victims of the Junction City earthquake was an Arcturan named Quotis. Now Quotis, unlike the Kedaki, had a high regard for human life. For Quotis did not believe in reincarnation since Quotis was not a Kedaki. The other doctors looked at the burned thing which had been a man and shook their heads and one of them said, "It doesn't matter, my friend," patting Quotis on the back and winking at the others. But Quotis, shrugging, replied, "The man is still alive and if he is alive it's my job to keep him alive." The Kedaki physician pointed out that there were bones to set elsewhere, and states of shock to be treated, and lacerations to mend, but Quotis would not hear of it.

The case intrigued him. The man should have been dead, but was still living. Besides, he was a Kedaki, wasn't he? And the Kedakis held death in very little regard. Therefore, Dr. Quotis told himself happily, he would be able to practice his new theories of skin rebirth on the injured Kedaki. But he had to hurry because a loss of half the epidermis was usually fatal, and this Kedaki had lost all of it to either first or second degree burns. Why, you couldn't even see the faintly purple tint of the skin anywhere....

If he died in the treatment? Quotis shrugged. No approved of treatment could save him. Still, on most civilized planets the answer would have been no. But on Kedaki? On Kedaki it was different. Smiling and eager, Quotis gave the order that took the dying man to a hospital near the aid station. Of native Kedaki hospitals, of course, there were none. Firm believers in metempsychosis, the Kedaki did not waste time and effort keeping moribund people alive. The injured, yes: but the injured could be treated, as the situation demanded, at aid stations like the one set up after the Junction City earthquake.

The hospital which Dr. Quotis took his patient to was the Arcturan hospital in Junction City, an institution made necessary by the fact that many Arcturan nationals lived on Kedak, particularly in Junction City, which was not only a native but an interplanetary trading center.

While the patient was made ready, Quotis thought: You cannot graft skin on a man with no skin left. For the only effective graft is that of a man's own epidermis—or that of his identical twin, should one exist.

Then why couldn't you supply brand new skin tissue? thought the Arcturan happily, utterly involved in his scientific detachment. Impermanent, of course. But that didn't matter. It would keep the patient alive and would stimulate the growth of new skin before it sloughed off. Say, a month. One Kedakin month. The new skin would be identical with the artificial skin and not with the patient's former epidermis, but that didn't matter. Too bad I don't even have a picture to go by, though, he Arcturan thought. Perhaps there is a mole or some other blemish which, foolishly, he would want reproduced. Well, no matter. At least the faint purple pigmentation of the Kedaki is easy to make, yes, very easy. Now an Arcturan with his vivid orange skin would be something else again, Quotis admitted, or an Earthman with the subtle gradations of pale tan. But those could come later. It would be enough, for now, to save this one life with the revolutionary development in skin regrowth.

"Patient is ready, doctor," the orange Arcturan nurse said.

"Still alive?"

"For the moment, yes."

"You give him...."

"Only a few minutes, I'm afraid."

"Then we must hurry," said Quotis, and rushed into the operating room.

CHAPTER III

"How do you feel?" Quotis asked.

"Still stiff," said the patient.

"But otherwise?"

"Otherwise fine. They told me how you saved my life, doctor," the patient said in Arcturan.

"I'm still surprised how well you speak my language."

"I seem to have a gift for tongues. I can speak Earthian, Arcturan, Sirian, Fomalhaution, and naturally, my own Kedaki. All of them with just about no accent, all of them equally well."

"We'll be taking the bandages off today. You still don't have any hair, but that ought to grow back later. You're alive, and that's what counts. Can you believe that every square inch of your skin surface was gone when they found you last month?"

"That's what the nurses keep telling me. Do you think that after the bandages are removed, doctor, they might find out about me?"

"We were hoping your memory would come back of its own accord. Otherwise," Quotis shrugged, "there are other ways. As you can imagine, thousands of your fellow Kedaki are still missing, after the quake. Most of them probably will never be found, so there ought to be thousands of people through here to look at you—when you're well enough. Never fear, one of them will know you."

"But the prison office? Doesn't it mean something that I was found in the prison office?"

"It might, but the prison authorities report that all their men are accounted for, safe, killed, injured—none missing. Why, do you remember working in the prison?"

"No," said Rhodes, "I don't remember anything."

"Relax! Please, relax. Someone will know you. Someone will be able to trigger that memory of yours. Relax, if you will...."

"There were no marks of identification on me?"

"No, none. Your clothing was burned off. You were naked as well as completely skinned," said Quotis, beaming. "Remarkable cure. Remarkable. On Arcturus, when I return, I will astound the medical profession. Here on Kedaki, unfortunately, there is no such organized profession. Well, now, about your new skin...."

"What about fingerprints?" Rhodes persisted. "My identity may not be important to you, doctor. But it's important to me."

"I understand, I understand. I didn't mean to be so callous. But consider. You have no fingerprints. It will be a while before the whorls re-establish themselves on your new skin. Immediately after the operation, before you were bandaged, we took your retinal pattern, but there was no record of it in the Junction City Identity Center or with the local police. There is absolutely no way you can be identified, except through your own memory or the efforts of your Kedaki friends and relatives to find you. In time, I'm sure everything will straighten out. Meanwhile," said Quotis, smiling, "if you're ready, we can remove the bandages from your face. Tomorrow, from the rest of your body. If there are any imperfections, don't worry. Eventually, the artificial skin we have given you shall become your old skin again. I mean that literally. For example, if we have left out—through ignorance—a birthmark or a mole, it will reappear again after six or seven months have passed. Your fingerprints will also, as I have indicated, re-establish themselves. If we have made your pigmentation too light or too dark, your true color will also appear after some months.... Well, then, are you ready? Ready for that first look at yourself? It might help, you know. It might trigger something!" cried Quotis enthusiastically.

Even while he was speaking, he had begun to remove the bandages from Rhodes' face. "The room will be dark," he said. "Gradually, we will increase the light. Your eyes have been in darkness for a long time."

"My eyes...." said Rhodes in sudden fear.

"You are worrying about them? You needn't. They were examined when the retinal pattern was taken. Miraculously, as miraculously as the fact that you are alive, your eyes are all right. Now, then, here we are! See—ummmm, no you cannot see yet. It is dark. There, a little more light. A little more. The eyes, they are all right?"

"It seems awfully bright."

"Any light would, at first. There, a little more. But you are young! Hardly more than a boy, I should judge. The purple of your skin—yes, the purple looks fine.... Not a mark, not a trace. My boy, you will not even be scarred."

His face still felt stiff, but very cool. The contact with air was very welcome and the soft stirring of the currents of air as the doctor's hands did some final adjustments on the bandages which still covered him from the neck down, tucking them back into place.

The first thing he saw was the doctor, a small bespectacled man with the vividly orange skin of a full-blooded Arcturan. The doctor was all smiles, and understandably. Then he saw a mirror. It was held before his face and he was aware of the doctor's slight intake of breath as he waited for a reaction, hoping some forgotten memory might be triggered.

He looked in the mirror. "I—I'm purple!" he gawked.

The doctor frowned. "Of course, purple. The Kedaki color."

"I'm sorry. I don't know why it startled me."

"Well, I can tell you. I am an Arcturan. This is an Arcturan hospital, and we have been speaking Arcturan. Even if you had been unable to see until today, you associated everything about this place with Arcturus. Probably," and Dr. Quotis laughed, "you were expecting orange skin."

"Probably," said Rhodes, and laughed with him.

"Well, enough excitement for one day. If you are strong enough, tomorrow we can have the first of your visitors, people trying to identify you. I warn you, there will be hundreds, thousands."

"Any time you say," Rhodes replied eagerly. But behind the eagerness was a certain vague confusion. Why had the purple tints of his new skin stirred him so strangely? Purple. Kedaki skin color. What else did he expect?

The Director of the Five Bureau, the Kedaki Secret Police, said, "Stop acting like a fool, please."

"But sir," wailed the prison warden. "I tell you, the Earthman's body was not uncovered in what remained of the prison."

"What does that mean?" the Director demanded scornfully. "I have here the final earthquake casualty report for Junction City—shall I read it to you? There are over six thousand people still missing, my dear warden. Six thousand."

"Yes, I know," persisted the prison official. "But doesn't it seem strange that of all the inmates and guards at the prison, the Earth archaeologist alone is missing?"

"Nevertheless, we can assume that virtually all of those missing are dead, buried forever under the debris of the municipal disaster."

"Still, you know how important this Earthman is, what trouble he can cause...."

"I know," snapped the Director arrogantly, "But do you?"

"Well, I have been told...."

"Told! Told what you had to know, told to furnish the Earthman with a maximum security cell, and so forth. You know nothing!"

"I still...."

With a wave of his hand, the Director dismissed the warden. Then, sitting alone at his desk, he lit a cigarette. It was an Earth-cigarette, and a good one. These things, the Director mused, we accept from the outworlders. Their little luxuries. But their way of life, he told himself, never. Whatever threatens our way of life, we seek out and destroy. He leaned on a corner of the desk's surface and in a moment a serving girl came obsequiously into the room with a tray. Patting her rump playfully, as you might stroke the head of a dog, the Director selected the bottle he wanted from the tray, indicating that she should make him a drink. He waited, watching her graceful movements as she set down the tray and poured the liquid into a delicate glass of Regan crystal. The drink, heady and delicious, was Aldeberanean fire wine. He savored it slowly, then with a gesture indicated that the girl, who wore nothing but a kirtle to cover the nakedness of her loins, should depart. He leaned back and thought: This too—not the wine, but the woman.

Because the woman would be impossible if the Kedaki way of life were changed. A system, he went on thinking, founded on bedrock as strong as the pull between the planets.

Metempsychosis....

Do you believe in reincarnation? he asked himself. He chuckled, the sound deep in his throat. He was no fool and did not hold a fool's belief. But the others? The servant classes, the slaves? Yes, they believed. All their lives, they were indoctrinated to believe. Reincarnation was the stuff of which their dreams were fashioned, and so it was that they accepted the hard lot of lifelong servitude with the hope that in their next birth, had they led a good, loyal life, they would be born to a higher station.

Change that? thought the Director. He shook his head slowly, grimly. But the Earthman Rhodes had been a problem, for in the age-old ruins of Balata 'kai he'd stumbled on the manuscript of The Book of the Dead, a five thousand year old document which had first propounded the beliefs of metempsychosis. The Book of the Dead was a dangerous document, a document which could ignite Kedak in revolutionary conflagration, for it showed clearly that the so-called gods of the earliest Kedaki civilization were not gods at all and their so-called revelation of metempsychosis not a revelation at all but a clever trick calculated to win them a life of ease at the expense of gullible subjects.

What am I thinking? the Director asked himself. The Earthman Rhodes is dead, of course. He couldn't possibly be alive. I'm as bad as the warden, but the warden is a fool who knows nothing.... Still, even if the warden is a fool and Rhodes is dead, The Book of the Dead is still missing. And if there is one chance in a million that Rhodes lives, then every stone on this planet must be turned to find him....

CHAPTER IV

"Tired, my young friend?" Dr. Quotis asked.

"Disappointed, I guess," Rhodes admitted.

"I know how you feel. For three days people have been coming here to see you with the hope that you might be a missing relative. But—"

"But none of them knew me," Rhodes finished bleakly. "And yesterday they were only a trickle."

"All it will take is one."

"Doctor, I don't have to tell you I owe my life to you, but—well, I'm restless."

"You're young," Quotis said with a smile.

"I've got to get out and find the lost threads of my life. I'm well enough, you said so yesterday."

"But a man in your condition—"

"Amnesia? So what? I'm perfectly able to take care of myself. It isn't as if I'm on an alien world or something. Kedak is my home. Kedak is—"

"Do you believe in reincarnation?" Quotis asked abruptly.

For a while Rhodes did not answer. And, when finally he did, it was with a question of his own. "Why do you ask that?"

"Because it might answer at least one question for you: whether you are of high or low birth. If of low, then...."

Rhodes said with a smile, "Since I haven't jumped on your back and started gouging out your eyes, I guess I wasn't Kedaki baseborn."

"You highborn Kedaki certainly make no attempt to hide your irreverency!"

"Well, why should they?" said Rhodes. "After all, the system is clearly one which...."

"They? Did you say they?"

"I guess I did."

"Doesn't that strike you as rather odd?"

Rhodes shrugged, then said, "Look, I'm all confused. I just want to get out of here and find my life and pick it up where I left off."

"But you know nothing of your past. Where will you go?"

"I might as well start at the prison. That's where they found me, isn't it?"

Quotis shook his head firmly, and his usually mild voice took on surprising strength. "Don't be a fool, man!" he cried. "We've already checked with the prison. None of their personnel is missing. However, I don't know if they'd checked the inmates at that time. Don't you see?"

"You mean, if I belong at the prison at all, it's as a prisoner?"

"Exactly."

"Still, if I'm to find out anything about myself ... maybe some discreet inquiries—"

"Which should never be made by you, my young friend, at least not in person. If you remain on here and allow me to look into the matter for you, I'd consider it part of the treatment."

Rhodes shook his head, saying, "I appreciate that, doctor. I appreciate all you've done for me. But from now on, I start paying my own way."

Quotis squinted at him. "Paying your own way? That's an idiom, isn't it? Surely not Arcturan, as it translates so poorly into the Arcturan language. Kedaki?"

"I don't know," Rhodes admitted.

"Well, I doubt if it is Kedaki. The Kedaki language is not the galaxy's most imaginary. It has fewer idiomatic phrases than any. Could I have ... no! No, forget it."

"What were you going to say?"

"There's no sense confusing you further when Lord knows you're confused enough."

"But you've got to tell me if it's something which might help me learn my identity. Don't you see that, doctor?"

"I was thinking ... well, is it possible—just barely possible mind you—that you are not a Kedaki?"

"Not a Kedaki? But my skin! My skin is purple!"

"Because I made it purple. That's no answer. If you're determined to leave here, you ought to at least know that much. You know absolutely nothing about yourself. You could be mistaken in everything you think. For example, you probably are a Kedaki—but you consider yourself a highborn Kedaki when you might well be lowborn. It makes sense, doesn't it? All your life, as a lowborn Kedaki, you've been waiting for death and rebirth, hoping you'd get your chance at a higher station in life. Now, after near-death, your subconscious mind is unwilling to accept a return to your lowborn status, so you no longer believe in reincarnation and hence trick yourself into thinking you're highborn. It could explain the amnesia, too."

Rhodes shook his head. "That's a neat theory, except, if true, I wouldn't understand a word you're saying. In the first place, I probably wouldn't know any extra-Kedakian language. In the second, I wouldn't hear such irreverent talk without going berserk. In the third, I wouldn't understand terms like subconscious mind and even metempsychosis." Rhodes grinned. "But anyhow, you've given me an idea."

"What's that?"

"I'll need a name for myself. In a way I died and was born again, as happens to all good Kedaki. So, how about Matlin?"

"Matlin? That means The Reborn, doesn't it?"

"The Reborn," Rhodes said, nodding. "Well, doc, The Reborn is going to get dressed and out of here. And thanks for everything."

"Will I be able to contact you anywhere, if I learn something?"

"I'll contact you, after I get settled."

An hour later, Rhodes signed the Arcturan hospital release form. He signed the form with his new name, Matlin.

The Dean of the Department of Archaeology of the Junction City branch of Kedaki College entered the hospital twenty minutes after Matlin had walked out into the dazzling Denebian sunshine. The Dean, whose name was Gawroi, hardly seemed the academic type. For Gawroi was a strapping baseborn Kedaki who had done the near impossible: Gawroi had risen in life to a position of some importance among his people. He was a big fellow with enormous shoulders and an appetite for life second only to his appetite for eating. But Gawroi, for all his hedonism, was not soft. He was a hard, capable man—who passionately believed in the Kedaki doctrine of reincarnation.

That Five Bureau Director, he thought with admiration. Smart. He was smart, all right. He's finally got a lead on this Earthman, Rhodes. But he doesn't send a Five Bureau Operative. Why should he? An extra-Kedakian like the plastic surgeon Quotis of Arcturus would be suspicious of a Five Bureau Operative, wouldn't he? The Kedaki Secret Police—of course he would be suspicious. But of a fellow scientist, an archaeologist? Never!

Gawroi grinned in admiration, then waited until the grin vanished, waited until his big, earnest face assumed its most earnest look, and entered Quotis' office. Quotis, he observed, was a small bespectacled Arcturan with vivid orange skin. Quotis rushed around his desk, beaming, to pump Gawroi's right hand in the Earth gesture which had swept the galaxy.

"Gawroi!" he exclaimed. "I've heard of you. This is a pleasure, a real pleasure."

Gawroi sat down, settling down and trying to mask his impatience while Quotis talked of various discoveries in Kedaki archaeology. Quotis was a garrulous fellow, he thought. Perhaps all Arcturans were garrulous; he did not know much about Arcturans: he hardly had had any desire to study the extra-Kedaki people, any of them.

"But, to your business," Quotis finally said. "I apologize, my friend. You should have stopped me. I'm sure you didn't come here to hear an old man talk."

Gawroi assured him it had been a great pleasure listening, then said, "There was an Earthman co-worker of mine at the College, a bright young fellow named Rhodes—you've heard of him?"

"No. Should I have?"

"Mr. Rhodes has been missing since the earthquake, Dr. Quotis. He had been assigned to the College by his home office in order to make a study of extra-terrestrial penal conditions, in this case, the penal conditions here on Kedak, in Junction City. He was at the prison at the time of the quake, and since every other person there has been accounted for, living or dead, and Rhodes has not...."

"Why come to me?"

"Because the Five Bureau tells us that a badly burned man was brought here, was treated by you. Tell me, doctor, was he an Earthman? Did he survive? Is he here now?"

"If he survived," said Quotis slowly, "wouldn't he have got in touch with you?"

Gawroi said, "We thought an injury, a blow on the head...."

"The man I treated was a Kedaki."

"Yes?"

"Yes."

"You speak in the past tense," Gawroi said. The words came automatically. He was thinking: you fool, Gawroi. That was a mistake. A bad mistake. Naturally, if Rhodes was your friend Rhodes would have contacted you after his accident. How can you think it was amnesia, when total amnesia is such a rare thing? See? See the Arcturan doctor? He's suspicious now. Does that mean the man was an Earthman?

"I treated him," Quotis said. "He's gone now."

"Treatment successful, doctor? But that is wonderful. I heard the man was severely burned. Do you have his picture?"

"No," said Quotis promptly.

"Could you have been mistaken?"

"About what?"

"About this man's planetality? Tell me, doctor, could he have been an Earthman?"

"His skin was burned completely. His memory was gone. He might have been anything," Quotis admitted reluctantly.

Gawroi thought: that was a break. The man actually did have amnesia. He said, "There, you see? It was as I thought. But tell me, doctor: he suffered from amnesia, and you let him go?"

"He was an adult. It was his decision to make. I didn't approve of it."

"You have a clinical description of the man?"

"Of course."

"Can you forward it to my office?"

"I'll do that. If it's possible for you to tell me why this Earthman is so important to you...?"

"Why? Why is Philip Rhodes important?" boomed Gawroi. "Because he was my friend, Dr. Quotis! I want to find my friend! Is that strange?"

"No," Quotis admitted.

"Well, did Rhodes leave a forwarding address?"

"He did not. He may contact me. I rather think he will."

"Splendid, doctor. Splendid. When he does, assuming there is some possibility that this is the same man, will you tell him to contact me at once. With my help he will be able to take up the thread of his former existence," Gawroi finished enthusiastically. But he was thinking: in a Five Bureau torture cell, where he belongs, this extra-Kedaki, this alien who has dared to counterfeit his own criminally inaccurate version of the Book of the Dead.

"I'll let you know," Quotis said. "If you happen to have a picture of this Earthman Rhodes, I may be able to offer an opinion now."

Gawroi nodded. "I can oblige you with that." He rummaged in a pocket of his tunic with big, capable hands. He handed a small glossy photograph to Dr. Quotis. It was of a young, smiling Earthman, in color, showing the faintly tan, almost white Earth complexion starkly against a background of green vegetation.

Studying the picture, Quotis mused aloud, "It's possible. It certainly is possible. The features seem the same, Gawroi. But how can I be sure? Matlin—"

"Matlin? He called himself The Reborn? He dared to!"

"It was symbolic to him, I guess."

"Symbolic? But he dared...."

"See here, Gawroi. You're a scientist. You ought to keep a check on your emotions. And you oughtn't be so opinionated. Don't the highborn Kedaki look with suspicion on the doctrine of metempsychosis?"

"You extra-Kedaki like to think so," Gawroi said, keeping his voice down with an effort. "I—I'm sorry for the outburst, doctor." But more than ever, he was convinced that the man who called himself Matlin was the Earthman Rhodes, an outsider who wanted to smash five thousand years of Kedaki tradition with an alleged seeking after the truth.

"Matlin, as I was saying," Quotis went on finally, "was utterly bald. His hair won't grow in, you see, until the follicles have had a chance to adjust to the new skin. Without hair, a face assumes different proportions. The nose seems larger, the brow more noble. Then, of course, Matlin's skin is purple, and that also makes a difference. Still, I'll admit it: it could be the same man."

"I thought so!" Gawroi said triumphantly. "Doctor, I sincerely want to find my friend. You'll help?"

"If Matlin contacts me, yes. Otherwise, I can do nothing."

"He had complete amnesia?"

"Total amnesia, yes."

"Even if there was something very important to him—something he was working on and believed in very strongly, for example—he couldn't remember that?"

"No, but if he runs across it, it might serve to trigger his memory."

Gawroi stood up, shook his hands once more, chatted amicably for a few moments with the Arcturan physician, then went outside. It was a dazzlingly bright day, and hot. Much of Junction City was still in ruins, great piles of rubble lining the streets, broken buildings—their walls shattered, their insides exposed nakedly—condemned but not yet torn down, aid stations only now being cleared away. But Gawroi was not thinking of this. He was thinking of The Book of the Dead, and of the Earthman Rhodes.

Somewhere, Rhodes had hidden The Book—or, his version of The Book. Rhodes had done an admittedly magnificent job of forgery, or so the Five Bureau had said. Rhodes' Book looked like the real thing and, since the masses were ignorant, might serve to sway them. Naturally, Gawroi knew, this could not be accomplished overnight, but the seeds for discord and strife could be sowed by a clever extra-Kedaki like Rhodes in the night of ignorance and discontent. Then, Rhodes had to be found, had to be stopped, had to be killed if necessary.

But first Rhodes had to lead them to his Book of the Dead. Gawroi's enormous hands clutched. He personally, would see that this was done.

CHAPTER V

The man newly named Matlin, which meant The Reborn, stood at the bar in the Hotel Deneb. Matlin wore an inexpensive tunic supplied him by the Arcturan hospital, and still had a few silver denebs in his pocket, also courtesy of the Arcturan hospital. Matlin was not drunk, but wished that he was.

He should not have come here. He knew that now. It had been wrong to surrender to drink like this, before he had time to think, to prowl the damaged streets and seek out the familiar in a world which seemed totally alien because his mind was lost somewhere in the shattered prison building. Had he been a drunkard in his earlier life? or at least a not very forceful man who readily lost himself in some form of lethe or another when his problems weighed heavily on his shoulders? Had this, indeed, been the weak character he'd been trying to resurrect?

Lethe. He thought: lethe. But what is lethe? It is not a Kedaki word, but in your thoughts you use it. Isn't it said that a man tends to think at least some of his thoughts in his native tongue, no matter where he lives or how long he has been away from home?

Lethe. It meant: forgetfulness. The waters of ... no, the river of forgetting. Lethe. It meant that all right. But in what language? This Matlin did not know.

The bar of the Hotel Deneb, since the hotel was Junction City's best, catered to extra-Kedaki and to highborn natives. You could always tell the highborn by the rich-looking tunics they wore, tell their ladies by the way you could see breast and loins through the transparent, clinging garments, and tell both sexes among the highborn by their arrogance toward lower born Kedaki and toward all extra-planetary peoples. You could, all right, Matlin thought desperately, but why do I think this? A lowborn Kedaki would not: he would hope for rebirth, someday, as a highborn. And a highborn? But a highborn would never admit it, not even to himself.

Matlin ordered another glass of Sirian whisky with a soda chaser. Sirian? Why Sirian? He seemed to like the fiery brew, but Sirius was five hundred and some years across intergalactic space. Was he a Sirian? That didn't seem likely, for the Sirians were chauvinistic, rarely leaving their homeworld....

Chauvinistic. Another word, like lethe. Not a Kedaki word. A word from somewhere else, but Matlin could not recall where. As it turned out, he did not have time to pursue the matter, for a voice at his elbow said:

"I'll say it again. You were eyeing my woman with lust."

This jolted Matlin, until he realized he was not being addressed. The words were spoken by an expensively-dressed highborn Kedaki on his left, but the man's face was averted. He was talking, Matlin realized, to a baseborn Kedaki further down the bar who, from the looks of his tunic, probably had no business here.

Between them, an amused look on her face, stood a Kedaki woman. She was incredibly beautiful with the extremely arrogant beauty found among the highborn Kedaki ladies who, it was said, might have each toenail painted by a different lowborn slave if they so desired. Her face was pampered but insolent, and her body, its beauty of line and curve and hue enhanced rather than hidden by the diaphanous folds of her veil-like garment, was magnificent. She said, in a deep, throaty, contralto voice, "Now really, Felg. Don't you think that's enough?"

The man named Felg was a big fellow, tall as Matlin but heavier, with a dueling scar on each cheek. Duels, Matlin knew, were common on Kedak as copter zoning tickets were on other worlds, for you had nothing to lose in a duel but your life, and what did this matter against the possible loss of honor if your death would immediately usher a—possibly better—rebirth?

"I don't think it's enough," said Felg. "This lowborn was gawking at you and while you are beautiful, he should not gawk at another's woman."

"I am neither your woman nor anyone else's," the beautiful creature said coldly.

This angered Felg. If there had been the chance of preventing a duel, that chance was gone now, trampled in the dust of what might have been by the woman's insolent words. "Well, then," Felg said slowly, "you are my woman at least as long as I am your escort. You, there!" he roared, turning again to the lowborn Kedak who stood waiting quietly, patiently and almost indifferently. "Are you armed?"

"I am armed, master," said the lowborn. He was a small, thin Kedaki with a piping but unfrightened voice. Instinctively, Matlin sympathized with him. Smaller, weaker, with less to remember and less to look forward to, victimized by a system hardly above slavery, he was forced by tradition to wait on the highborn Felg's pleasure, even if that pleasure were to mean death in an uneven duel with the spike-studded Kedaki maces.

Felg laughed harshly. "No dagger, you fool. I mean a mace."

"I carry no mace," the lowborn admitted.

"Barkeep!" roared Felg, but the barkeep, highborn as Felg himself, shook his head slowly, saying:

"We serve extra-Kedaki here, see? The place is full of them. There will be no duel here tonight, or any night."

"But it's lawful," said Felg stubbornly.

"Lawful or not—" began the barkeep. Then the beautiful woman smiled at Felg, a smile not for him but at him, a baring of the teeth in amused contempt. And she hissed:

"Felg, I swear, you are a barbarian."

Felg slammed his hand down on the surface of the bar. "It is lawful. I demand my rights! Bring maces!"

"I await you, lord," said the lowborn.

"Not here," the barkeep said softly, not wanting to create a disturbance. Then he looked at Felg's eyes. Felg's eyes told him that Felg had been made a fool of before the woman, but they did not tell him what Felg did not know: Felg had been made a fool of by himself. The eyes did say, however, that if Felg did not have satisfaction from the lowborn, he would have it from the barkeep himself. And the voice, a roaring, thundering bellow, confirmed this. "I'll duel with him here!" cried Felg. "Here and now I will!" He added softly, almost purring: "Or I'll duel with you outside, friend. Do you believe in metempsychosis, friend?"

Matlin knew what the barkeep's unspoken answer was by the ashen look which came over the man's face. He most assuredly did not believe. He was afraid to die. He did not want to duel with Felg, a bully and probably an expert with the mace. He sighed, shrugging his shoulders. He looked at the lowborn and shook his head. He said, "I'll get the maces."

"Room!" someone bellowed, excitement in his voice. "Give them room!"

Kedaki and extra-planetaries moved away from the bar, forming a rough square a dozen paces across. The barkeep ducked through a doorway and Matlin heard a lady tourist from Polaris say, almost squealing the words, "This is so exciting." The tone of her voice disgusted him. The extra-Kedaki, he thought. Perhaps they were guilty too. At least, if they enjoyed the fantastic mores of Kedak, if in any way they encouraged them, then they shared guilt with the Kedaki highborn.

But not equal guilt. No, not that. For clearly, the man named Felg was chiefly to blame here. Big, powerful-looking Felg—a murderer. Because, Matlin told himself grimly, it would be murder. The smaller Kedaki, the lowborn, didn't have a chance. Looking at his face, Matlin knew that the man was aware of this. And Felg? Felg was aware of it too. In the case of the lowborn awareness did not bring terror, for virtually all lowborn Kedaki believed in reincarnation. Thus, facing death, Felg's victim was almost sure he would be reborn in a higher station in life. But Felg did not believe. Felg was a trained maceman: the scars on his cheeks—white scar tissue over crushed cheekbones—proved this. Felg would kill the lowborn and it would be cold-blooded murder morally if not in the eyes of the Kedaki law.

A buzz of eagerness stirred the crowd as the barkeep returned with the traditional melgast, the metal bar from which the two dueling maces hung on hooks. The maces were a yard long, their stems extremely light-weight and thick enough around at the base for a man to hold comfortably, their heads round and heavy and black and studded with a score or so of half-inch long spikes. As the barkeep brought the melgast forward, the maces swung back and forth on their hooks.

The Polarian woman who had been excited gasped. Whispers ran through the crowd. "Let me see them," Felg demanded coldly, and examined the maces as the barkeep lifted the melgast over the surface of the bar with both hands.

"You can still change your mind," the barkeep suggested.

Felg raked him with a glance. "Would you want me to?"

The barkeep could not stare at him long. "No," he said. "Not if you don't want to."

"I am ready, master," the lowborn said.

Felg bowed to him, mocking him. "Select your weapon, then, and tell me your name so I may have it for the report I must file after our duel."

The beautiful woman looked at him coldly. "You already have this man dead and cremated, don't you, Felg?" she asked contemptuously.

"He'll live on!" cried Felg, in mock reverence. "Don't we all. We live forever—as we die forever! On with the cycle! Hooray for life! Hooray for death! Are you ready, lowborn? Ready for your passage to a higher station?"

The woman whispered fiercely, "You don't believe a word of that, do you?"

Instead of answering her, Felg hefted his mace and waited for the lowborn's reply. "Ranmut is my name," came the other's piping voice. And again he said, "I am ready, master." He held the mace uncertainly, awkwardly. It was obvious to everyone present that he barely knew how to use it and would not have a chance against the experienced Felg. But still, he had courage....

No, Matlin thought, his courage is based upon a lie! The Book of the Dead—a tissue of lies fabricated thousands of years ago and still keeping the lowborn Kedaki in fearful bondage to the highborn. But—but how, Matlin wondered wildly, do I know this? How....

He was very adept with the Kedaki mace. He knew that suddenly too, and at first the knowledge surprised him. Then the memory came. It was the first clear memory of the time before the Earthquake that he had experienced. It was a single memory-picture, devoid of all connections, devoid of any real meaning. He was in a room. The walls were padded and the floor was padded. He had come there for exercise. It was—it was a gymnasium. You fought with Kedaki maces in this gymnasium, but see? see? they were not real maces. They were padded instead of spiked and if you swung with all your might you could possibly knock your antagonist senseless as you would in Earth-style boxing, but nothing else. And, in the memory, Matlin usually won.

Also in the memory, Matlin's skin was the tan-white of Earthmen!

"Wait!" he blurted, and silence fell like a shroud on the large room.

Felg and the lowborn named Ranmut were squaring off with the maces. Felg snapped, "Well, what is it?"

Again the shroud of silence. Padded maces, thought Matlin. It was a memory, a vague, troubled, unclear memory. Perhaps I was very good with padded maces, but in their padding they did not hold death, the kind of death this man Felg had delivered with spiked maces and would deliver again....

"Well, come on, man, come on!" shouted the overwrought Felg impatiently. Ranmut merely looked at Matlin, neither glad nor sorry for the temporary reprieve, awaiting the end which a five thousand year old fabrication told him was merely the beginning.

Forever we die!—these were the first words of the Book of the Dead. But—to live again? The writers of the book had lied, for they hadn't known. No one had known, thought Matlin.

The Sirian whisky roared through his veins. His vision clouded, then cleared. "I am Matlin," he said.

A Kedaki nearby gasped and Felg cried: "The Reborn! You dare to call yourself that?"

"That is no name," Ranmut whispered, his voice strange.

"I am Matlin, for the record you must keep," Matlin told Felg, his words dropping like peals of thunder on the silence in the great room. "I am bigger than this man Ranmut and I can use the mace. I challenge you, Felg."

Felg appraised him, then said, "Later, if you have a grievance. But I don't know you, Matlin."

"No! Now. I wish to take Ranmut's place." Don't think, he told himself. Don't think that in the memory your skin was white as an Earthman's. And don't think that you fought with padded maces only.

A voice called: "It would be far fairer."

Other voices took it up, and Felg's beautiful woman companion turned and looked coolly, then with quickening interest, at Matlin. She smiled at him and it was a smile like consuming flames. She said, with a laugh, "Oh, Felg! Poor Felg, you're in for a fight now."

Ranmut stared at Matlin. Someone pushed Ranmut forward and Matlin took the mace from his hand. He patted the little man's shoulder because Ranmut still looked dubious, and then someone cried a warning. Matlin barely had time to realize it was the woman, and then—from the corner of his eye he saw Felg charging!

Felg came so swiftly that Matlin barely had time to whirl and face him. Felg came like a rocket, his big brutal face contorted with hatred. Felg came with a wild bellow meant to stop Matlin dead in his tracks. Felg came with a rush and the rush spelled death. Then Felg swung his mace.

All this happened in a split-second. Matlin threw himself to the floor, lacking time to bring his own mace around to parry the unexpected attack. The mace blurred by inches over his head as he went down and he realized that it would have split his skull like a ripe melon had he still been standing. Spike-studded, it crashed into the side of the bar, splintering the richly-grained hardwood as if it had been a flimsy sheet of wickerwork.

The spikes caught and held in the wood, but with a wrench of his hand Felg got them loose before Matlin could climb to his feet. Felg swung again, putting his whole body behind the blow. He swung downward and the deadly head of the mace splintered the floor as it had splintered the hardwood bar. It had been so close that some of the spikes caught in Matlin's tunic. When he scrambled upright, he was half naked and there was a welt from his armpit to the bottom of his ribcage.

He swung his own mace, but Felg caught it expertly with the haft of his weapon, twisting suddenly and almost tearing the mace from Matlin's grasp. Then Felg advanced with a lightning-swift series of short, jolting blows from his weapon. Matlin took them all on the haft of his own, but his hands ached with the shock and his arms grew numb. Across the room he reeled before the powerful onslaught. Sparks leaped between the maces as they struck; the sounds were of a smithy in hell.

Felg was big, powerful. Matlin knew he must summon memory to survive the attack, for already his arms dragged so wearily he barely could hold the mace crosswise in front of him with both hands to take the rain of blows. Something he must remember ... had to remember ... must bring forth to save his life....

He fell abruptly to one knee, and the Polarian tourist woman gave a little scream of terror and enjoyment. Leering, sweat streaming from his face, Felg brought his mace up for the coup. And Matlin dropped his other knee to the floor.

Felg's face spoke mutely of Felg's knowledge of the move, but the heavy mace already swung down and could not be checked. It blurred across Matlin's shoulder, the spiked head splintering the hardwood floor behind him. For an instant, Felg leaned over him, wrenching at the mace helplessly and exposing his middle.

Slowly, aware he had all the time in the world, Matlin brought his own mace up. I'm going to kill this man, he thought. I can kill this man now. I merely have to drive the head of the mace against his abdomen, ripping through the wall of muscle to the quivering viscera beneath. He will scream, the blood will flow, the mace will fall from his nerveless fingers, and they will hail me here as hero. But I have saved the man Ranmut's life, so why should I kill this one? The thought astonished him: it was no Kedaki thought....

Symbolic of his triumph, he placed the head of his mace against Felg's belly and pushed. The big Kedaki stumbled back, the wind driven from him. He collapsed on the floor and his mace, still spikefast in the hardwood, quivered there. Matlin walked to it, braced both feet, strained his back, and drew it clear. Then he took both maces and returned them to the melgast.

"No! No!" screamed Felg, his breath returning. "Kill me! Kill me, you fool!"

Ranmut said, but quietly, "Kill him, lord. He would have killed me. He expects to be killed. Otherwise, his honor dies. Kill him, lord."

Matlin looked at the barkeep, who shrugged and held his silence. The faces of the crowd told him nothing. And Felg's woman? She had no love for Felg: she was Felg's companion for the night, no more. She wore the look of a Sphinx on her beautiful face and when she saw Matlin watching her the smile she turned on him was a smiling of the mouth only. Her eyes were cold and distant, but beautiful.

Matlin took one of the maces from the melgast. The spikes held blood, and bits of scraped skin and flesh adhered to them. So this was the mace Felg had used, for blood had been drawn from Matlin's ribs. With this mace, Matlin walked to the man he had conquered. Felg had not risen from the floor. He sat there and he looked up at Matlin, who made no move to use the mace, and he said, his voice a tight whisper now, barely audible, "Will you kill me? I can't stand the waiting."

"I read somewhere," Matlin heard himself saying, "that at the moment before death life is so precious that a man will crave it even if it is a life of torment on torment, a life of torture, a life of terrible pain. But life, any life, rather than the black sleep of death. Life as a slave, and toil without end, and streaming sweat mixed with blood, but life! This I read, but of course it was not on Kedak, for here on Kedak death means nothing. Well, does it?"

"Kill me now," said Felg, uncertainly.

Matlin lifted the mace slowly. "Here on Kedak, how can death hold such terrors? Death is not the unknown. Death is not a sleep of forever, a sleep without waking, or the unproven expectation of sharing a dream of immortality with the god. Death here on Kedak is merely a way station in the passage of life, many lives. So why should we fear death? You believe this, do you not? Believe the transcripts from the Book of the Dead as our religious teachers read them?"

"I believe," said Felg quickly, without passion, without conviction.

The mace was high over Matlin's head now. The crowd came close, watching. Someone touched the single mace remaining on its hook, and the mace swung slowly. The swinging motion caught Felg's eye and he watched, fascinated. But the mace was out of reach and he must have known it. Everything but death was now out of reach, forever out of reach.

"That death is not a cold sleep from which there is no awakening?"

"Yes, yes!"

"That reincarnation will come to you?" Why am I doing this, Matlin wondered. It was to prove a point: but he knew not what point he wished to prove.

"Yes, yes...."

"That the loss of life is to be suffered before the loss of honor?"

"Yes. By the holy pages of The Book of the Dead, kill me!"

"All this you believe?"

Light caught the spikes of the mace. They flashed. Someone had to carry the Polarian tourist to a chair and settle her there. Sweat made her clothing cling to her body, revealing a figure like a sow's. Sweat beaded her face, but her ugly little eyes gazed on Matlin as if he'd made love to her.

"State your belief," said Matlin.

"Kill me." A barely audible whisper.

"State your belief, Felg."

Felg's eyes riveted on the mace. His face was gray. His eyes pleaded with the mace, as if cold metal, death-dealing metal, might heed the message Matlin would not. Silence was a wall between this room and the rest of the world.

And Felg screamed, "I don't want to die! I don't want to die!"

His eyes blinked. Tears streamed down his cheeks and he rolled over to fall on his knees before Matlin. "If you had killed me at once," he sobbed bitterly. "If you would have killed me. Damn you, I don't believe, I don't believe...."

"Then live," said Matlin indifferently, all at once not caring if Felg lived or died.

A roar went up from the crowd of extra-Kedaki, but the Kedaki themselves were sullen. Highborn like Felg, they also did not believe in reincarnation. They saw themselves on the floor, craven before what seemed to be a lowborn member of their race, lives spared and honor destroyed.

The beautiful woman who had been with Felg took Matlin's elbow. "They're ugly now," she said. "You'd better get out of here."

"What difference does it make to you?"

"Difference? No difference. Felg is a fool and you gave me pleasure."

"Come with me," Matlin said on impulse.

It was very hot outside and for the first time when they reached the street Matlin knew that he had been close to death.

CHAPTER VI

"Listen," said Matlin. "You don't have to come with me."

"You told me to."

"That was before."

They had walked a long time through the hot damp stillness of the Kedaki night. They had not spoken. Matlin's thoughts drifted aimlessly; the woman was content to share his silence.

"Listen," he said again as they passed the bright glowing lights of the Junction City bus depot, where the big gas-turbine-driven busses snarled as they turned out of the streams of traffic. "I'm going somewhere."

"You're walking, yes."

"I don't mean that. Somewhere. And I don't even know your name."

"It's Haazahri. Where are you going?"

Matlin said, "Balata 'kai."

"The ruins of the First City? Why in the world...."

"I don't know why. It doesn't matter why. Something in me says go there to open the tombs of memory."

"You don't have memory?"

"The Earthquake," said Matlin. "I remember nothing before it."

"Well, you can't go to Balata 'kai."

"You don't have to come with me."

"I didn't mean that. It's against the law."

"Since when?" demanded Matlin.

"Since the quake. Until they are rebuilt, the ruins are no place for tourists. Until they are rebuilt, the ruins are a fine place for thieves. Since the records of the birth of our civilization are among those ruins, the police have orders to kill any trespassers. That's why you can't go. Is it terribly important to you?"

"I feel that it is. I don't know why. As if—as if something's waiting there for me."

"You shouldn't tell me. I'm supposed to report you. I—"

"Will you?" Matlin asked indifferently.

"I will not," said Haazahri promptly. "I'll go with you."

Matlin shook his head, bemused. He couldn't believe his ears. His troubles were his troubles. Why should the beautiful Haazahri accompany him? Why should she want to?

He asked, "Why?"

"Because you gave me pleasure."

Matlin felt disappointed. "You enjoyed the beating Felg got? You enjoyed his shaming?"

"No, I don't mean that. It's your name and how ... how you live up to its suggestion of heresy. Religion is a good thing on other worlds, Matlin. I have spoken with people. On the planets of Antares, where the folk accept with choice a pantheism of total godhood, that is good; on Earth, where several religions freely proclaim the worship of a single great deity under different names, that is good. But don't you see, here on Kedak—but of course, you see. The point I make is, you say what you believe. If another...."

"But I don't believe. I'm an iconoclast."

"If another feels as you do, but says nothing...."

"You, Haazahri?"

"I. And so you give me pleasure. You're a strange man, Matlin, but a brave one. If you lost your memory, is Matlin a new name you have given yourself?"

"Yes."

"I wonder," Haazahri mused, looking at him and smiling. She was a tall woman, her face almost on a level with his own. She stared frankly into his eyes, boldly, still smiling. "I wonder if you have any family, if you are married...."

"I'm a long way from home," Matlin said abruptly.

"Now, what does that mean? What is your mind trying to tell you?"

Matlin shook his head in wonder. "The words—just came!"

Haazahri was still smiling. "No, you wouldn't be married."

"Why not?"

"Because," said Haazahri, "until this day you hadn't met me."

"Haazahri, listen...." he began.

"Don't start that again. I'm coming with you to Balata 'kai."

"Haazahri...."

But she swung to him abruptly, clutching his tunic and drawing herself close to him. "Matlin," she breathed tremulously. "Matlin, love...." They were in the pleasure district of Junction City, the lights a mad whirl-and-flash, the crowds noisy, drunken, unconcerned.

They stood together, as stone. But the blood boiled in their veins, and their hearts were not stone.

"Haazahri," he said. Then he kissed her.

CHAPTER VII

Gawroi's office at Kedaki College was furnished home-style with low benches and a central mat rather than chairs and a desk. The home-style furnishings, in their simple beauty, were not popular here on Kedak. Typical, thought Gawroi angrily. For five thousand years home-style is good enough for the Kedaki. For five thousand years no muddle-brained agitators question the value of home-style, its beauty or its function. Then a wave of false galactic brotherhood sweeps Kedak and the big, ungainly desks and chairs clutter more offices every day, so a man finds it difficult to move about without striking his body against some sharp edge or other.

And emotionally? Emotionally it is the same. The Kedaki religion is—the Kedaki religion. The cornerstone on which the world-spanning structure that is the edifice of Kedaki culture rests. The womb of knowledge and the sum of knowledge. But—questioned now. Doubted secretly by some among the highborn, as if they get a masochistic satisfaction from believing their gods are false and their fifty-generation belief in metempsychosis an attempt of their own class to keep the lowborn in servitude. Why, it was ridiculous!

"Come in, come in, my dear fellow!" Gawroi boomed, motioning his visitor to one of the low benches. "So you are Felg."

"I came as soon as I saw your announcement," Felg said, seating himself uncomfortably on the low bench.

"Tell me about it, Felg. What you said by phone, it could be very important."

Felg licked his lips nervously. "You realize I'm not usually an informer, but when I saw that the Chairman of the Department of Archaeology at the College and the police were both seeking this Matlin...."

"The police were not my idea," Gawroi growled. And they weren't, but not for the reason he would have this Felg think. If the Five Bureau decided to ring in the police, he supposed that was the Five Bureau's business. But the police might make Matlin—the Earthman Rhodes, he was sure—wary. "Now, then. You say you know the whereabouts of Matlin?"

"I think so."

"May I ask, Felg, why you...." Gawroi let his voice trail off, hoping Felg would interrupt him. And Felg did.

"Why I inform on this man? Because it is my duty as a loyal Kedaki, as a servant of my world and the world-idea which governs us, through five thousand years, from Balata 'kai."

"Good," said Gawroi. "Now tell me."

"Last night the man Matlin took a bus to Haatok."

"The northern outskirt of the city?"

"Yes, Haatok. This was as close to Balata 'kai as public conveyance could take him."

"He's going to Balata 'kai?"

"The bus was night darkened. I was on the bus. I got off the bus at Haatok, as he did. He was in the company of a woman named Haazahri."

"Haazahri," said Gawroi, writing the name down. "Go ahead."

"On the bus, he and the woman Haazahri spoke softly, but I heard some of their words. In the morning, that is, today, they were going to Balata 'kai."

"Why? Did they say why?"

"I failed to hear them. Why do you want this Matlin?"

"Isn't his illegal entry into Balata 'kai enough?"

"You didn't know that," said Felg, "until I told you."

"I'll ask you a question, Felg. Why did you want to inform on Matlin?"

"I already told you...."

"And I'm asking again. What were your personal reasons?"

"I have no personal reasons."

"Well, not that it matters."

Felg said suddenly, "You want to kill Matlin, don't you?"

"Eh? What's that?" Gawroi, startled, looked down at the reclining man. He had an impulse to kick the smirking face. Then he calmed himself with an effort and said, "But that's ridiculous! I have reason to believe that the man who calls himself Matlin is actually an Earthman named Rhodes, a victim of amnesia, suffered in the quake. Rhodes was a colleague of mine, you see, and...."

"I hate Matlin!" Felg said in a soft but hate-filled voice. "There's a brother to my hate in this room, I know there is, and nothing you can say will hide it. But don't you see, Gawroi? You don't have to tell me about your hatred. You can keep it secret. The important fact is, you hate. You want to kill this man. I hate him. I want to destroy him. I hate that man."

"Rhodes...." began Gawroi mildly.

"Rhodes? All right, all right, Rhodes. Maybe Matlin is an Earthman somehow wearing purple skin. I don't care. It means nothing, nothing. Together, if we can find Matlin out there, in Balata 'kai...."

Gawroi was thinking: perhaps I can use this man's hatred. Because now that the Five Bureau had seen fit to call in the police, it was very dangerous. The police could be a problem. The police did not work secretly. Whatever the police did would be open to public scrutiny. So, if the police caught Matlin-Rhodes, he might escape with his life—and even his secret. The secret! The knowledge Matlin-Rhodes carried around in his head, lost to the world, lost even to himself—that was important!

Rhodes had said it was The Book of the Dead. The real Book of the Dead. Now, Gawroi and any loyal Kedaki knew better; it was not The Book of the Dead; it was a fantastically clever forgery; and it could bring the multiple hells of uncertainty to Kedak if Rhodes were given the chance to find where he had hidden it and the chance to make its contents public. Rhodes had told him about it. "The Book of the Dead, Gawroi," he had said, before the quake. "I'll tell you about this holy of holies of yours, Gawroi, and if I'm irreverent, I can't help being irreverent. Man, look around you! Must the lowborn remain lowborn, with no chance to better themselves, generation after generation? Do you really need human footstools to support the soles and heels of your vanity? They thought so for five thousand years, and they gave you a legacy. They gave you The Book of the Dead, with its lies and exaggerations and fabrications and deceit. Reincarnation! The writers of that book didn't know anything more about reincarnation than I do! But the lowborn swallowed their story for five thousand years. Well, it's time this stopped...."

And Gawroi had said, "What's it your business? You, an Earthman?"

"Sure, I'm an Earthman," Rhodes had answered. "But I'm a scientist first. I seek the truth, Gawroi, and I've found the truth. It won't be hidden much longer."

"Hidden?" Gawroi had asked incredulously. "It's hidden?"

"Hell, yes, it's hidden. Don't you think I know the score? I'd be beaten if necessary, for possession of that book."

Beaten was an understatement. The next day, Rhodes had been imprisoned. His mistake, Gawroi thought coldly, was confiding in me. I was a fellow scientist, though, and men like Rhodes make much of the scientific fraternity. Well, I'm a scientist second, a Kedaki first.

And now, this. Now Felg. Through Felg and with Felg, he could perhaps get to Matlin-Rhodes before the police. And make sure that the false Book of the Dead, and its forger, were not allowed to poison the minds of a whole people.

He asked Felg, "Why didn't you go to the police?"

"At first," Felg said, "I thought I would go to the police. There in Haatok, though, I changed my mind. Listen, Gawroi: I reasoned that if the police wanted him and you wanted him too, then your reason must be more than merely academic. And, while this Matlin spent the night in an Haatokian inn with the woman Haazahri, I told myself: Gawroi's the man for you. Go to Gawroi because neither your personal reason for hating Matlin, nor his, need bow before the will of the police. The police, capable but indifferent, might bungle. But Gawroi and yourself—"

"That's enough," said Gawroi. "I see what you mean. Felg listen to me. If we do this thing together, if we join forces, my motives must never be questioned."

"Nor mine."

"Good. Very well, Felg. I hate this Matlin. And you—you want Matlin killed?"

"Killed," echoed Felg.

"One promise. He is not to be killed until he leads me to something."

"Where? We can't be chasing all over Kedak."

"In Balata 'kai, probably. That's why he went there."

"Is he really an Earthman named Rhodes?"

"I believe so. Does it matter?"

"It doesn't matter to me. But it might matter to the police."

"Exactly. You haven't told anyone else?"

"No."

"And the woman with Rhodes? Haazahri? What of her?"

"You leave Haazahri to me," Felg said.

Gawroi shook his hand, regretting the need for the Earth-style gesture which had swept the galaxy. He had an instinctive dislike for Felg, but thought Felg just the man to help him, just the man to join him at Balata 'kai, just the man to see to it that Matlin-Rhodes never returned to Junction City alive....

CHAPTER VIII

Balata 'kai!

Even the word was like heady wine.

Balata 'kai!

Where, five thousand years ago, civilization—and a lie—had been born on Kedak. Where now the ruins were ghostly in the early dawnlight, standing like grim sentinels against the still dark sky, silhouetted there on the limestone crag above the floor of the desert.

"Would you believe it, Matlin," Haazahri said, "I'm a native of Junction City, but I've never seen the ruins of Balata 'kai?"

"Sure. It's like that all over. Only the tourists are interested in what makes where you live famous," Matlin said, and smiled. He was happy. He felt happy for the first time since his accident. The woman? She was part of the reason, but not most of it. Did he love her? He hardly knew, and wouldn't press it yet, not until he remembered. Because it wasn't fair either to Haazahri or whatever he was, whoever he was, in lost memory.

It was Balata 'kai. He belonged here. Somehow, he could sense that. The navel of his people, was that the reason? Because any Kedaki would feel at home where the world-idea that governed his planet had been born, fifty centuries ago?

But not Matlin. Matlin was an iconoclast. Matlin did not believe, Matlin wished to smash idols, Matlin wished....

Did he? He didn't know what he wished. He'd come here on an impulse. Idol-breaker? But why? And what idols?

"Look," he said, pointing at the limestone crag. There was something at once ineffably serene and tumultuously exciting about the five thousand year old slabs and columns perched there. There were stories they could tell, stories of generations long turned to dust, stories of the past and how, from the past, the present came, child of history, buffetted by forces it only half-understood, the helpless, passionate, living present, the moment for which, whether we admit it or not, we all live, ephemeral, hardly palpable, thrilling and then gone, dead, history, the navel for tomorrow which is today....

"It is beautiful," Haazahri said slowly.

A wind stirred, swirling little puffs of sand at their feet, their clothing, even their faces. The sun was very hot already and would be much hotter soon. Dazzling white Deneb, far brighter than Sol....

Sol!

But Sol was the day star of the planet Earth, remote on the other edge of this small filamental arm of the galaxy. So, why Sol? Look at your skin, Matlin. Matlin, the Reborn! Proud, insolent name! But look at your skin. Gaze on it. You're Kedaki. Of course you're Kedaki. What else could you be?

"Have you ever been here before?" Haazahri asked.

"Yes, I think so."

"Probably it's why you wanted to come."

"I've been here. I know I have, Haazahri. Many times. Straight ahead, there, see where I'm pointing? There used to be a staircase there, carved in the living rock. For tourists to climb to the top, to see the ruins. See the jumble of rocks now? We'll have to climb, but it won't be like climbing stairs. We'll—"

"Get down!" Haazahri cried suddenly, and threw herself at him, and bore them both to the sand, where they lay still. "Where you were pointing," she whispered. "Look, but don't turn your head. Don't move. Someone's up there."

They were a hundred paces from the base of the limestone crag, obscure in the dimness of its early morning shadow. The crag was perhaps another hundred paces high and at the top, where the three tallest columns of Balata 'kai stood, piercing the sky for half the height of the crag or more, a figure was marching.

"Police," whispered Haazahri. "Has he seen us?"

"No," said Matlin. "It's dark down here. We're all right, I think."

"There is treasure in the ruins," Haazahri told him. "It's what the tourists come to see mostly. But since the quake, the ruins are off-limits. Thieves have been out here in the dark of night, defiling the temples and...."

"Defiling?"

"Defiling, if one believes."

"Do you believe, Haazahri?"

"You're a strange man, Matlin. We're down on our bellies in the sand, hiding from the police, and yet you ask a question like that. I—I don't know if I believe or not. I believe a people need something, some faith...."

"Do you believe in reincarnation? Do you believe that every poor craven lowborn, if he leads a meek, servile life, will be rewarded in a fresh incarnation by moving up a rung in the social ladder? Do you believe?"

Slowly, Haazahri shook her head. "No," she said, confusion in her eyes. "I never could admit it to myself before, Matlin. But you have a way ... you put it so simply. No, Matlin. I don't believe that."

"Good, because otherwise we would have been defilers."

"I don't understand."

"I'm not sure I do, either. But we're going up there. We can work our way up among the rocks, when the guard is out of sight. We can—"

"It will be dangerous."

"I have to chance it. You don't."

"I'll go with you. I already said so, Matlin. But why will we be defilers?"

"Because there's something up there. Oh, I don't know what. Something, though. Waiting for me. My head, Haazahri! My memory! As if I've been sundered, disembodied, and part of me is up there. I—I had it once, this thing. I had it, and lost it. No ... wait. I had it, then hid it. It was something—dynamite, Haazahri. Something so explosive that I didn't know what to do with it but knew I must do something. Like playing with fire, the memory says."

"What kind of fire?"

"Fire for the Kedaki. Cultural fire. Idol-breaking, iconoclastic...."

"But you don't remember what?"

"No."

"And the way you speak of us, The Kedaki. As if you, as if you're—alien."

Matlin said nothing. His head ached with the half-thoughts, the dream-thoughts. The wind had died down and he breathed deeply of the clear hot morning air. When he looked up and saw the ruins of Balata 'kai silhouetted against the brightening sky, he could see nothing of the guard.

"Come," he said, and stood up, helping Haazahri to her feet. She leaned against him for a moment, the maiden suppleness of her ripe against his thews and chest. He held her and she breathed against his ear, touching the lobe of it with her lips. "I love you, Matlin," she said. "Whoever you are, whatever you are. You know that, don't you?"

"Haazahri," he said, pushing her away gently. "You may only hurt yourself. I don't know. I don't know! I can't say anything, can't think anything of that, until I know. My name is not Matlin. I don't even know my name."

A faint, wistful smile played about her lips as she said, "All right, lead on to what's left of that staircase of yours."

They took half a dozen strides toward the base of the limestone crag. Limestone. On the desert, with little water to erode it, how long would limestone endure? A dozen eternities, thought Matlin, and more. Balata 'kai—forever....

Suddenly, he was running. Something had moved in the shadow at the foot of the cliff. Since it hadn't called out, whatever it was, he hoped that it would not. He ran silently, swiftly.

He reached the spot. There was nothing. He gazed around. The shadows were dark.

Something just above his head made a sound. A pebble was dislodged, dropped on his shoulder and to the sand. He did not look up. On his way he'd seen a ledge there, its flat surface at about the height his hand could reach. The ledge, narrow, barely wide enough for a man to stand on, would not be empty now.

His hand blurred up at it, grasped something which yielded, then struggled. He tugged and a voice pleaded: "Lord, I'll fall!"

With a yank, he pulled the man off the ledge. He had hold of the man's ankle, then let go of it, and leaped on the man when he had fallen to the sand. There was a brief scuffle, and he had the man by the throat. He let his hands go loose for a moment and hissed:

"Who are you?"

"Please, lord. I mean no harm."

"Who are you?"

Just then Haazahri came up. "Why, I know this fellow," she said. "And so do you, Matlin."

He looked again. It was a woe-begotten face, meek, homely, the eyes terror-filled. Its owner said, "I am Ranmut the lowborn, lord."

"Ranmut!" Matlin cried.

"Yesterday you took my place and won, though why you did not kill Felg, I do not know." He grinned hopefully when Matlin's fingers did not return to his throat. "Lord, I came seeking you."

"You followed us all the way out here from Junction City last night?" Matlin asked, amazed.

"It was the least I could do. You saved my life, lord, and while the life means nothing, is but one pathway among many, nevertheless this lowborn like many has a family and even if I go on to a higher pathway that wouldn't help my wife and children, who probably would have starved. Therefore, lord, am I thankful."

"You followed just to tell me this?"

"No, lord. Last night Felg was very angry. When you left the bar with this lovely lady, Felg came after you."

Matlin looked at Haazahri. She nodded, said, "He would."

"All the way to Balata 'kai?" Matlin asked.

"Not this far, lord. The man Felg came as far as Haatok."

"Don't tell me you were on the same bus with us?"

"Yes. And Felg also. Then, last night, after reading the newspaper, Felg rushed back to Junction City. I have saved the newspaper, lord," Ranmut said proudly.

"Saved it?"

"I took the liberty of following Felg back to the bus station. He deposited the newspaper in a trash receptacle. He had marked something."

"Let me see that," Matlin urged as he heard the rustle of paper. Ranmut spread a crumpled sheet before him on the sand and he saw that a small part of the first column was circled in red.

He read, his heart thumping against his ribs: "... professor of archaeology at Kedak College. Ser Gawroi believes this Matlin to be the missing Earth scientist, Philip Rhodes. While the police maintain that Rhodes is harboring some unspecified material deemed not in the best interests of Kedak, Ser Gawroi would not comment on this. 'Rhodes,' the archaeologist said, 'was a colleague. If Rhodes is sick and needs help, we'll have to find him.'

"No reason was given as to why the alleged Earthman was seen in the streets of Junction City last night, to all appearances a native of Kedak. His name, according to Gawroi, is Matlin. If anyone has any knowledge of...."

Then Haazahri took the paper and read it. She returned it to Ranmut, her hand trembling. "Do you know Gawroi?" she asked Matlin.

"No."

"An Earthman? Do you think that's what you are—purple skin or not?"

"Don't look at me like that," Matlin said, smiling. "Earthmen are human too. Just as human as Kedaki."

"I know, but—"

"Yes, I think I'm an Earthman. I think I'm this Philip Rhodes. I—"

"Oh, Matlin! Then you remember?"

"No, but there have been other things—no time to go into them now...." Quotis, he thought. The Arcturan doctor. There had been no mention of Quotis, but there should have been. It was as if the Kedaki authorities and this Gawroi wanted to ease Quotis out of the picture, and Matlin did not like that. Why? Why shouldn't Quotis have been contacted? Quotis knew more about Matlin than anyone did. Gawroi disturbed him more than the police. He sensed that he knew the Kedaki archaeologist. Besides, if Gawroi's purpose for finding Rhodes had not been sinister, wouldn't he seek Quotis for whatever help the Arcturan could offer?

"It means something to you, lord?" Ranmut asked, indicating the newspaper.

When Matlin answered, his words were addressed to Haazahri. "Tell me, would your friend Felg go to the police or to this Gawroi?"

"Felg would avoid the police if he could. Do you trust this Gawroi?"

"No," said Matlin promptly, not bothering to give his reason.

"Then you think Felg and the archaeologist are now in league against you?"

Matlin nodded, grasped Ranmut's shoulders. "Ranmut," he said, "I don't have to tell you you've done enough for us already. You came all the way out here to help, and—"

"I have done nothing, lord. Last night you saved my life, for my family."

"Do you wish to stay at Balata 'kai?"

"We lowborn are told Balata 'kai is a frightful place," said Ranmut, shaking his head dolefully. "We lowborn are told it is most dangerous for us to approach this shrine."

"And still you came," Matlin marveled. "Will you leave now?"

Ranmut shuffled his feet in the sand. "I'll stay if the Lord Matlin wishes."

But Matlin shook his head. "By all means go back."

"If the Lord needs me—"

"No, you can deliver a message for me in Junction City. In the Arcturan hospital, to a Dr. Quotis. Tell him that his patient Matlin is seeking his lost memory at Balata 'kai. Show him the newspaper article and say for certain reasons Matlin does not trust the archaeologist Gawroi. And tell him Matlin has not gone to the police because first he must find something which the police don't want him to find. Ask Quotis to contact the Earth authorities in Junction City, if he thinks that best. You'll do this?"

"Of course, lord," Ranmut said simply, and bowed.

"And don't do that. Don't bow. You're a man, Ranmut. You're as good a man as I am, or Felg, or anyone."

"Yes, lord," said Ranmut doubtfully. He smiled shyly at Haazahri, then Matlin offered his hand and Ranmut shook it solemnly and trudged back across the sands on his long walk to Haatok.

Ranmut was in luck, for a bus was just arriving that would soon take him back to Junction City. He jingled the few remaining denebs in his pocket thinking, proudly, that he had not asked Matlin for money. He owed the strange-talking highborn Kedaki this much: he would defend the message to the alien Quotis with his life if necessary, and it seemed ridiculous to ask money for it, even for the bus fare to Junction City.

He stood in the dusty throngs on the raised sidewalk alongside the bus while its passengers stepped onto the ramp, stretched themselves and claimed their baggage. Suddenly, he froze. Two men came through the wide bus doors together. The very large man he did not know, but the reasonably large one he did. The reasonably large one was Felg and Ranmut turned away quickly, trying to push his way through the crowd. But Ranmut was a small, slender man, and arms, legs and bodies could easily detain him. It was very hot there, and he began to sweat. He felt the sweat streaming from his face, dampening his armpits, coursing down his sides and flanks. He pushed and struggled in the pressing crowd, and the ranks of the indifferent, as if in league with his enemies, closed in.

"Careful, lowborn!" an indignant Kedaki woman chirped, and Ranmut offered her an obsequious smile, then helplessly felt the surging crowd, pushing forward now to find seats on the bus, turning him so that he faced Felg and the man who must be Gawroi.

The two highborn Kedaki were just alighting from the bus, their feet touching down on the section of the ramp which had been roped off for disembarking passengers. Gawroi said something, and Felg answered. They were very close. They were far closer than Ranmut had realized. Then Felg pointed and his finger, unwavering, speared air in Ranmut's direction. Ranmut tried to make himself very small. Sweat beaded his brow, stung his eyes. He wanted to disappear into his mean clothing. Felg pointed again and walked quickly with Gawroi to the rear of the crowd, where Ranmut lost them.

Several minutes later, the crowd had swept him to the doors of the bus. He held his three denebs overhead in one wet hand, waiting for the conductor to exchange them for a ticket to Junction City. Heads taller than his were everywhere. He could not see the conductor. Then something plucked the three denebs from his hand and a smile of relief lit his woe-begotten features momentarily. He expected to feel the bus ticket thrust between his fingers, where he would clutch it almost lovingly. It did not matter that the bus was already crowded and he would have standing room all the way back to Junction City. It mattered only that Felg had not pointed in his direction, that by now Felg and the archaeologist Gawroi were gone from the depot, and....

A hand closed on his elbow. A voice hissed in his ear: "This way, Ranmut." He knew the voice, and despaired. It was Felg.

They took him quickly from the bus station and thence across the hot dusty streets of Haatok to a small hotel where a sleepy-eyed desk clerk admitted them, gave them a big brass key and went back to doing absolutely nothing and wishing he could do less without even seeing their faces. Ranmut wanted to scream out for help, but the hotel clerk would be no help at all. Ranmut allowed them, Felg and the man Gawroi, to lead him upstairs to a small, dingy room with scabbing walls and a dirty floor and a faintly foul smell. Gawroi, who had held his elbow all the way from the bus station, flung him across the room as Felg shut the door. He fell on the bed and he did not weigh much, but the bed collapsed under him. At another time, it would have been very funny.

"What are you doing in Haatok?" Felg snapped.

He got up. Felg pushed him and he fell on the mattress and remained there.

"What are you doing in Haatok?"

He was not glib. He had never been glib. He could think of absolutely no answer, no fiction to substitute for the truth. He remained silent. Something rustled as he leaned uncomfortably on his left side. It was the newspaper with the circled article. If Felg found that, Felg would know. So, Felg must not find it. He shifted his weight to that side, trying to cover the telltale edge of paper protruding from his pocket.

"What are you doing?" Felg said.

He rolled over. The paper rustled. He wanted to scream.

Felg took hold of his arm and dragged him to his feet. The other man, Gawroi, merely stood and watched. Felg was going to get the newspaper, Ranmut knew. He broke away and ran toward the door. Felg stuck his foot out and Ranmut fell over it headlong, skidding across the dirty floor to the door, where he lay in a heap. Directly in front of his face was Gawroi's large shoe, the toe under his chin. But Gawroi's shoe did not move.

Felg reached down and got the newspaper. His face became dark with blood when he saw it. He pulled Ranmut to his feet and shook the paper before his face and bellowed, "Where did you get this?"

"In the bus depot, lord."

Felg thrust Ranmut back toward the broken bed and showed the newspaper to Gawroi. "I marked it. It's my paper," he admitted.

"That was clumsy of you, wasn't it?" Gawroi said. He had a powerful voice, but there seemed to be very little concern in it, as if whatever happened hardly mattered to him at all. "So now Rhodes knows you're after him."

"You think this slave told Rhodes?"

"Look at him. Dust-covered. Can't you see he's been on the desert, Felg? Can't you see anything?"

"Yes," Felg grumbled. "Then what can we do?"

Instead of answering, Gawroi said to Ranmut: "You realize we can do with you as we wish. No one knows we brought you here. The hotel clerk saw nothing. What sort of errand are you running for Rhodes?"

"Who," said Ranmut, "is Rhodes?"

"For Matlin."

Ranmut said nothing.

Felg growled, "We can break the bones in your body one at a time, you fool!"

"Yes, lord," said Ranmut meekly, speaking to gain courage from the sound of his own voice.

"But we won't do anything of the sort," Gawroi said. "Why should we? Listen."

A rumbling sound could be heard in the street. It became a growl and then a loud smooth purr of power. "The bus to Junction City," Gawroi said. "The only bus. What can this fellow do here in Haatok."

"He can go to the police."

"Who are seeking Matlin? Don't be ridiculous."

"Well, I don't trust him."

"Did I say I trusted him? But it doesn't matter, if he's quite helpless."

"Alive, he isn't helpless."

Gawroi said, "Violence satisfies a certain need in you, doesn't it? Do you want to hurt this little fellow? Is that what you wish? I have no interest in the matter, but I am ready to go to Balata 'kai."

"Alive, he isn't helpless," Felg repeated.

Ranmut did not let the relief show on his face. Words now, just words. They were going to let him go. And somehow, for the first time in his life, he wanted to live. It was very important that he lived. He had no wish to die. Because he did not believe? In truth, he could not tell himself that. Because he had always been a good man, if a lowborn, and had no desire for reincarnation if the highborn were men such as Felg and Gawroi? Something of that passed through his mind, but it was not altogether clear. I'm going to live, he thought. After all, I'm going to live. And he allowed himself the luxury of a slow smile. The smile dropped from his face when Gawroi said:

"All right, Felg. Do as you wish. I won't interfere with your pleasure. But I'm going downstairs. I'm renting a sand-car to take us to Balata 'kai. I'll meet you outside."

"Alive, he—"

"Don't try to rationalize it for my benefit. Do as you wish. I have utterly no interest in the matter." Gawroi gave Ranmut one final, utterly indifferent look, and left the room. That look told Ranmut his doom was sealed.

He was small and weak and Felg was a strapping, strong highborn. Felg said, when the door shut, "You had an extra day of life, for you should have died by my mace."

Ranmut said nothing.

Felg said, "Are you happy? You probably led a life exemplary for its lack of significance, as a lowborn should. You ought to be happy—your next incarnation will be a higher one."

"Please kill me if you are going to, lord," said Ranmut.

"Don't you believe? Aren't you glad for the chance to die? What have you to live for?" Beads of sweat stood out on Felg's forehead, and Ranmut did not understand.

"Kill me, lord. I won't resist, I won't prolong it."

"Then you do believe?" demanded Felg softly, passionately, his fingers closing on Ranmut's frail throat without applying pressure.

"No, lord," said Ranmut. "I do not believe."

"You've got to believe in reincarnation!" Felg screamed.

"I no longer believe."

"You must! Don't you see, you must?"

"I only know that my belief fades like the leaves in autumn in deep southern climes."

"Believe!" screamed Felg.

This was all madness to Ranmut. He waited for the fingers to tighten on his throat, to constrict there. But they did not.

"Believe!" The hands uncoiled, made weak fists and beat without strength against Ranmut's chest, beat beseechingly. "I need your belief!" Felg screamed, and, when next he spoke, he was sobbing with bitterness and fear. "I need your belief, please oh please, I need it to make my own belief strong. I need it, I need you, Ranmut, please, you've got to believe, because you're a lowborn and you have nothing to live for and if you don't believe then surely I, I can't believe either and that leaves nothing.... Ranmut, Ranmut, I don't want to die, Ranmut...."

Despite everything, Ranmut felt himself engulfed by waves of pity. He said, softly, "But you're not going to die, lord."

Felg hit him and his eyes and nose stung, the hot blood trickling from his nostrils. Then Felg sobbed and did not look at Ranmut again. Sitting on the broken bed, Ranmut watched the big man lumber, sobbing, from the room.

Outside, a horn blew. Gawroi was waiting and Ranmut sensed that if Felg were weak, Gawroi was strong. Together they were going to Balata 'kai after Matlin and there was nothing that he, Ranmut, could do to warn his friend that danger and possibly death was approaching across the sun-scorched sands.

CHAPTER IX

The walls glowed.

They had come a long way, Matlin and Haazahri, through tunnels carved in the soft, limey rock under the Balata 'kai ruins. The last signs for tourists had long-since vanished behind them and the way would have been totally dark but for the strangely glowing walls. Matlin went confidently at a dog-trot. Occasionally he stopped while Haazahri rested, and she saw the look on his face and never questioned him.

He knew where he was going, without knowing how he knew. But he had been this way before—seeking ... no, hiding. He had found something in the ruins, in an airtight box which had preserved it as if it had been left there yesterday and not five thousand years ago, and he had come this way to hide it, because it needed safe-keeping until he was ready for it....

If he could only find it!

For he knew that it held the key to his memory. A blow on the head, the Arcturan physician Quotis had told him once, was not enough to destroy memory. The blow was merely a trigger. Unconsciously, the victim of amnesia wanted his memory destroyed, to forget something intolerable, to hide something....

To hide something. Prison. Dark, wet walls. Torture. Subtle psychological torture. He held out, but couldn't hold out much longer. The fire, the beams falling, the horrible burning. And gladly surrendering memory because, miraculously, he had not died. Surrendering memory to hide—what lay before him in these caverns! One look, he thought as he ran, leaving Haazahri momentarily behind, and it will all come surging back like the sea at ebb tide. One look and I'll know not merely what it was I hid here, but the secrets of myself as well.

"Haazahri," he said.

Abruptly he stopped. He was here and the walls glowed and he could see but needed no vision for this.

"Haazahri," he said again, and she came up to him. "We're here, Haazahri," he said.

The passage looked like all the others. He'd led the way to it instinctively and knew that if he lost whatever instinct had guided his feet, they would be lost in this labyrinth forever. But it did not seem very important now. What was important had been hidden here, in this cavern.

"Where?" Haazahri asked. "Where is it, whatever you seek?"

He touched the wall near her head and she heard a shifting, a grinding of heavy stones. Part of the wall swung slowly to one side, revealing a dark recess, a niche with walls that did not glow. Matlin thrust his hands within the niche and took out a large, heavy book with a black, unmarked cover. When he got it clear of the niche, he looked at it a moment in the glowing cavern light and his eyes grew big and round and the book dropped from his hands to the floor of the cavern. He stood there, clutching his head with his hands and Haazahri cried:

"What is it? What happened, Matlin?"

The pain of returning memory thrust at him like a sharp knife, but was not intolerable. He remembered! He remembered!

"Rhodes," he said in a dream. "My name is Rhodes. Phil Rhodes, and I'm an Earthman. They took me and they tortured me and I was going to break. I must have known it, subconsciously. So I welcomed amnesia, as the one way I could not reveal where I had hidden this. I had revealed once the fact that I'd found it, to Gawroi, before I told the Earth authorities. The Earth authorities still don't know, but when they do know, when they see what has been found...."

"But what is it?" Haazahri asked him.

He stooped, picking up the book. "Earth doesn't want to dictate to your people, understand that. You are a sovereign people. But if in your sovereignty a small percentage of you have used lies and fabrications to enslave fifty generations of your people, and if Earth decides to do something about that...."

"But what is it?"

With both hands, Rhodes held the big book over his head. His face shone with triumph and he said softly, his voice almost a whisper, "The Book of the Dead, Haazahri."

She looked at it, and at him. Then abruptly she fell to her knees and touched the floor with her face. "The Book," she said. "The Book? You mean that?"

"Haazahri, listen. You're important. You're very important. I knew it would be dangerous coming here. Maybe, instinctively, that's why I let you come with me. Because you're so important. You're a Kedaki, don't you see? With a Kedaki's reactions. I know about this Book. It's sacred. It's had five thousand years in hiding to become sacred. Even your rulers today probably didn't know where it was. Excerpts only, key passages out of context, remained from the days the book had been hidden, remained to keep most of the Kedaki enslaved, chained to the lies of metempsychosis.

"I know, Haazahri. I know what it must be like. This book is the center of everything you believe. Your loves and dreams and hopes. Right now you must be telling yourself you ought to remain there, forever, your face in the dust before it. The Book of the Dead, Haazahri! Well, the Book is lies, do you understand? Lies! And I can prove it, the Earth scientists here on Kedak can prove it to all your people. Listen to me, Haazahri. This book doesn't explain the wonders of reincarnation, as you thought it might. No, Haazahri! Although, out of context, what material your leaders had might indicate that it did.

"This book is a book of instructions for the ruling classes of Kedak, through the unborn generations. The lies are explained, codified, systematized. There is no doubt, nothing left to interpretation. Keep them base, the book says. Keep them base and promise them a better life in their next incarnation, and they'll obey you. That's the cynical message of The Book of the Dead, Haazahri! Don't you see the difference between this and the true religions, in their many forms, of the other worlds? Yes, good behavior is rewarded, and should be rewarded. But what is good behavior for the Kedaki lowborn? Good behavior is merely servitude, slavery. And the reward which the slave-masters hold out is one which, in the beginning, in this book, they did not even believe themselves. It's a fiction, Haazahri! And they say so. They say so here. Do you believe me?"

For a long time Haazahri did not answer. When she did, her voice was choked with sobs. "You ... you're an Earthman. You brought me out here to ... test me with The Book and see ... not because you wanted me ... not because you love me. Matlin, Matlin...."

Rhodes said, "Stand up, Haazahri, and show me your face. Stand up, Haazahri, and let me kiss your tears. And don't cry, Haazahri. There isn't any reason to cry. Yes, I'm an Earthman. But I love you, Haazahri; I love you—"

She stood quickly and somehow he could sense that five thousand years of dogma and superstition were slipping away as, in time, with the passing of a generation perhaps, and with the understanding and patience of the rest of the galaxy, they would slip away for all of Kedak's peoples. She stood up boldly in the face of The Book, but seemed shy. She said, "Then Matlin is no more?"

"I am Matlin and more than Matlin. Matlin was only a part of me. But you can call me Matlin, if you wish. All our lives."

"Do you wish?"

"It is not my name."

"Philrhodes?"

"It is customary," he said, smiling, "to use one half or the other."

"Phil? Phil?" she breathed tremulously, and came into his arms. Then, after a while, he tucked The Book of the Dead under one arm and her hand under the other and started on the long trek back toward the sunshine.

Daylight was very bright, dazzling them.

"There they are!" a voice shouted, and Haazahri screamed:

"It's Felg!"

Rhodes said, "Watch the Book," and flung it to one side. They had come out into the daylight on the high limestone crag which jutted above the desert floor and Rhodes as yet could see no more than shadows against the fierce sun. The shadows came apart and one went toward Haazahri and the Book, and the other toward Rhodes. Tears sprang from Rhodes' eyes in the effort to see. Neither man was armed. It seemed right, somehow, that they battle for the Book which had been born with the birth of a civilization, with their bare hands.

Then he was closing with Felg and heard Haazahri scream and knew the noise of their fighting would summon the guards, who would take the Book from him.

"My life!" screamed Felg hysterically. "You destroyed my life!"

The words meant much to Felg, but meant nothing to Rhodes. Felg was mad—and strong with the strength of madness.

He forced Rhodes slowly back, and back meant toward the edge of the precipice and Rhodes got a quick vision of it as he was spun around, the world down there, far down, the tiny sand-car gleaming in the sun and the long stretches of sand and far away the huddle of stone structures that was Haatok gleaming in the sun. And then, still being forced back, he saw Haazahri, sprawled on the sand before one of the three great columns of the ruins of Balata 'kai. Blood trickled from her mouth and she was not moving. Of The Book of the Dead and Gawroi he saw nothing.

Then his own madness matched and surpassed Felg's own. Haazahri, he thought, Haazahri. His hands found Felg's throat and held there a moment, but not long. He shifted them and got Felg's weight up and Felg screamed a thin sound in the high air and then he sent Felg's body hurtling down, the scream fading, over the precipice.

He did not wait to see it land, but ran to Haazahri. He touched her breast and she was warm, warm! her heart beating....

"Haazahri," he murmured.

Her eyelids fluttered. "Go after him! Quickly, for he has The Book. I'll follow."

He whirled and sprinted for the broken, ruined staircase on the side of the cliff. Down it he went, tumbling, falling, sliding from rock-ledge to rock-ledge. The staircase, what was left of it, turned and twisted, and he could not see Gawroi below him.

When finally he hit the hot sands of the desert he saw Gawroi's figure ahead of him. Gawroi, running swiftly, and The Book! Heading for the sand-car, swift, swift—

And if Gawroi won the race, a people would remain in bondage. How long? Another five thousand years?

Gawroi looked over his shoulder once, redoubled his efforts. The sand was hot and the wind whipped it at Rhodes' face, but he was closing the gap rapidly on the ponderous Gawroi. Still, there was no time. The distance was too great.... Gawroi stumbled, rolled over, lost The Book, clutched it and began running again. Rhodes was closer, closer—

And Gawroi flung himself into the sand-car.

The engine growled, caught. The wheels spun in the sand, tractionless at first. But soon their big treads gained traction, and the car leaped forward with a surge of power.

Defeat....

But the car spun around, bore down on Rhodes. At the last moment he realized what Gawroi was attempting. He knew too much and Gawroi wanted to kill him.

Gawroi was going to run him down.

The car came screaming across the sand at him, whine of tires and whine of over-heated motor and Gawroi's grim face, growing, growing....

Rhodes flung himself aside, then leaped. His hands caught the side of the open car, clung there even though it felt as if his arms would be wrenched from their sockets. He had a quick glimpse of a dot which was Haazahri working her way down the staircase on the side of the cliff and another—a guard—pursuing her. Then he pulled himself up into the sand-car and was grappling with Gawroi.

They fought, and the wheel was forgotten, the car lurching from side to side across the sand. The cliff blurred ahead of them. How fast were they going? Seventy miles an hour? Eighty? If they struck at that speed....

Gawroi was a man possessed. He didn't care. If the crash would destroy The Book of the Dead, destroy Rhodes, who knew of The Book, it was enough.

Rhodes pushed flank against flank in the narrow front seat of the open sand car. Gawroi's hands tore at his face, ripping skin and flesh. All Gawroi needed was a few seconds, and it would all be over. Gawroi, who was fighting for an idea, fighting to preserve a five thousand year lie. And Rhodes, who was fighting that a people might live, after five thousand years....

Abruptly Gawroi tumbled from the car, clawing at air and screaming before he hit the sand at terrible speed, rolling and tumbling and coming to rest with his head at an impossible angle.

Then Rhodes was battling the car, and for a time which seemed extended over a yawning gap of infinity, he did not know if he would be able to bring it under control in time. The base of the cliff loomed. He could not see above it. He stamped on the brake and still the cliff blurred at him. He felt himself flung forward....

And gazed at the wall of rock, two feet in front of the now motionless car.

In a daze, he watched Haazahri climb in beside him. Close by a guard was shouting something; in the car, Haazahri was saying something about his cut and bleeding face.

The guard would find Felg, his body broken from the fall; would find Gawroi, his neck broken. The guard would summon help.

But by that time, Rhodes knew, The Book of the Dead would be in safe hands. Ever since the earthquake, thieves had been looting Balata 'kai. They were thieves in the eyes of the guard, only that. There was no reason for special pursuit and, in Gawroi's sand-car, they would reach Junction City.

And the pages of The Book of the Dead would be flung open for all the worlds to see. A generation might pass before the Kedaki could assume their rightful place in the civilized community of worlds, a generation in which the kind of thinking that had put Rhodes in a prison cell must be stamped out.

But in the end, the Kedaki would know freedom, and a mingling with the peoples of the other worlds.

He started the sand-car. Haazahri smiled at him, and kissed his bleeding face. And the love between him and this girl of the Kedaki was a symbol....

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The Project Gutenberg eBook of Forever We Die!, by Stephen Marlowe

Forever We Die!

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