e old race, but
out in the hills. If he had a future at all....

He went up the ramp again, toward his own room. No one else was in
sight. They had all gone to bed, perhaps. They wouldn't expect him to
try to run away now.

He began to walk, as aimlessly as he could, in the direction of the
aircar. He saw no one. Perhaps it wasn't even guarded. He circled around
it, still seeing no one; then, feeling more secure suddenly, he went
directly toward it and reached up to open the panel and climb in.

"Is that you, Eric?"

Walden's voice. Quiet as always. And it came from inside the car.

* * * * *

Eric stood frozen, looking up at the ship, trying to see Walden's face
and unable to find it in the darkness. He didn't answer--couldn't
answer. He listened, and heard nothing except Walden, there above him,
moving on the seat.

Where was Lisa?

"I thought you'd come back here," Walden said. He climbed down out of
the aircar and stood facing Eric, his body a dim shadow.

"Why are you here?" Eric whispered.

"I wanted to see you. Without the others knowing it. I was sure you'd
come here tonight."

Walden. Always Walden. First his teacher and then his friend, and now
the one man who stood between him and freedom. For a second Eric felt
his muscles tense and he stiffened, ready to leap upon the older man and
knock him down and take the ship and run. Then he relaxed. It was a
senseless impulse, primitive and useless.

"The others don't know you have any idea what's happened, Eric. But I
could tell. It was written all over you."

"What did they find, Walden?"

The old man sighed, and when he spoke his voice was very tired. "They
found two women. They tried to capture them, but the women ran out on a
ledge. The older one slipped and fell and the other tried to catch her
and she fell too. They were dead when the men reached them."

Eric listened, and slowly his tension relaxed, replaced by a dull ache
of mourning. But he knew that he was glad to hear that they were dead
and not captured, not dragged away from the hills to be bathed and well
fed and imprisoned forever under the eyes of the new race.

"The old one was blind," Walden said. "It may have been her blindness
that caused her to fall."

"It wasn't."

"No, Eric, it probably wasn't."

They were silent for a moment, and there was no sound at all except for
their own breathing. Eric wondered if Lisa still hid in the aircar, if