could not think of a suitable song for the occasion.
"I thought you were dead!" Sosa cried at the shape.
A grotesquely- formless head swiveled to cover her.
"Hel-Helicon dead!" it growled.
"Helicon lives'." Neq cried, discovering suddenly loyalty
after his recent, drug-strengthened doubts. He brought up
his sword—and hesitated, knowing that so long as he saw
it as a sword, the narcotic was ruling his mind. "Stop
those flowers!" he cried at Sosa. "Use my flashlight—"
She came immediately and took it from him. She could
use it far more effectively than he could with the pincers.
She flashed it into the hole, searching for the vines that
had to be near.
Neq faced the creature. "Who are you?" he demanded.
"Dead!" the thing repeated. It stood near the hole, as
tall as a man, but with a scarred, hairless head.
"It's Bob," Sosa said. "Master of Helicon."
The former master! So he had escaped Sol's vengeance!
"I am master now," Neq said. "You and I must settle."
"Get out of here, Neq!" Sosa cried. "He's a real killer,
and you're under the influence of the—"
"This way," Bob said. His voice was barely intelligible,
as though it had not been used for years.
"Don't go there!" Sosa cried. "He's mad!"
The men ignored her. Bob descended into the grave
and Neq followed, feeling with his pincers to locate the
perimeters. He crawled along on elbows and knees, keeping
his sword clear of the rubble. Sosa did not follow.
They emerged into a palatial cavern whose floor angled
down into a steaming river: the Helicon water supply. It
was hot here, and there was light: electric light from bulbs
set in the ceiling.
"You've had power here—the whole time?"
~ "Certainly." Bob's voice was clearer now that he was in
his own territory, and the flower fragrance was fading. "I
prepared this refuge well, in case of need.There's a vent
to the summit of the mountain, with a ladder and escape
hatch."
"Why did you stay here, then?"
"It's cold up there." That was an understatement. The
top of the mounatin was always covered with snow, and
death lurked in the form of countless cliffs and crevasses
and avalanches. Mighty storms spun off the glaciers, feed-
ing the melt-rivers of the snowline whose waters plunged
into these atomically heated interior caverns. It would
take a desperate man indeed to leave comfort like this to
endure that.
"You are alone?" It was hard to believe that any man
could endure seven years in complete isolation.
"Of course not. I have a most obliging and disciplined
tion." He showed the way along the river to a series of
offshoot caverns.
There were animals here—mutant badlands creatures of
diverse shapes and sizes. Some slunk away as the men
approached, but others seemed to be tame. "These?" Neq
asked.
"This is part of it. These are workers and gatherers—
illiterate, of course. They do an excellent job of tending
and harvesting the hydroponics, but they aren't very
intelligent."
Neq saw that the ratlike individuals were nipping bits
of fungus from crevices and carrying them away. "Hy-
droponics," he agreed.
"You really must meet my wife," Bob said expansively.
"One thing about the life of the Helicon master: no
woman to yourself."
"I know." So one of the women had come there tool
"That forced objectivity, when there are constant deci-
sions of life and death, and no personal life—it isn't
Helicon you've inherited, it's Hell."
Neq had learned about Hell through his songs. The
parallel seemed apt enough. "I saw your traces in the
dining room. I wondered who had visited."
"Traces? Not mine. I blocked up the passage with
refuse and never used it, until you started burrowing from
the other side just now. I had to investigate that commo-
tion, of course."
Refuse—and the vine-flower spores had rooted there,
downwind from Bob's caverns but upwind from Helicon.
They had grown and blossomed, betraying the secret.
Sosa had not been excavating Neqa's grave or Var's cairn,
but Bob's refuge.
"Why did you try to kill the child Soli?" Neq asked as
though it were a matter of mere curiosity. Once he had a
clear answer coinciding with what he already knew of
the matter, he could consider his action. This time he
would make no precipitous mistake!
"I never tried to kill her. I tried to save Helicon."
"You failed."
"The failure was not mine. I knew that no nomad
would kill either a woman or a child, especially one as
fetching as little Soli. I knew that the barbarian warrior,
meeting her in the secrecy of the mesa, would either
allow her the victory or hide her unharmed and claim the
victory himself. In either case, Helicon was safe."
Bob, sealed in these caverns, could not have known the
story of Var and Soli. He had calculated correctly—
except for the human factor within Helicon. "Safe?"
"If she had the victory, the nomads were honor-bound
tion of her identity would neutralize the nomad leader
and have the same effect. Sos knew how to put pressure
on the mountain; he was a superb military tactician, and
he had studied our defenses from inside. He might have
won—but no other nomad would have had either the
motive or the ability."
Somehow it made sense—except that it had failed.
"Why didn't you tell the others your strategy?"
"A leader never tips his hand in advance. Surely you
know that. I had to make it work, then explain it or not,
as seemed best. Premature information could have been
disastrous."
Neq wondered how well his song and flower gambit
would have worked, had the group known what he was
doing before he assumed the leadership. He knew the
answer. Bob was right. Except: "But Sol fired Helicon!"
Bob glanced at him. "That barbarian? He lacked the
wit. / fired Helicon."
Amazed, Neq said nothing.
"Somehow the fool librarian got hold of some of the
information and the word spread before I was ready to
explain. Sol charged toward my office intending to attack
me personally, and I saw in the monitors that the others
actually sided with the fool. I have no tolerance for such
short-sightedness. So I pushed the DESTRUCT button on
my desk and came here. I never cared to return; it would
have been messy."
"Vengeance?" Neq asked softly, muscles taut.
"There is no profit in vengeance; you'll learn that one
day," Bob said condescendingly. "It was merely practical-
ity. When discipline deteriorates, the organization is
defunct. It is kinder to terminate it ou
tright."
"But the entire nomad society collapsed!"
Bob shrugged. "One must accept the consequence of
one's mistakes."
It was plausible. Bob had known what he was doing.
When others had tried to interfere, he had acted most
effectively to suppress the mutiny. This was true leader-
ship. Had Bob been in Neq's situation seven years ago,
he would have arranged to kill Yod before Neqa ever was
threatened. Neq knew that next to this man he was an
innocent; he lacked the fortitude to do what was neces-
sary. Neq had blundered through life, either prevailing
extemporaneously or suffering harshly.
They came to another large cavern. "Ah, here she is,"
Bob said. "A fine, loyal woman who embodies the very
principles of obedience and trust and discretion I require.
Had the functionaries of Helicon only been similar . . ."
A shaggy, beariike creature with aquatic flipper-feet
shuffled up: another fringe mutant. "Pleased to meet you,
Boba," Neq said.
"Not Boba—that's decadent nomad nomenclature," Bob
corrected him. "Mrs. Bob."
Neq nodded gravely. "Now I understand."
They met him the other side of the grave-dump. "What
happened?" Jim demanded. "Did you kill him?"
"Of course not," Neq said, walking briskly on. "There is
no profit in vengeance."
"But Bob was responsible for all the—" Sosa began.
"He has accepted the consequence of his mistake," Neq
said. "As have I. Seal off the passage, and don't worry
about the vines there; they make no difference." The
fragrance was strong here, and he wanted to get out of it
before his judgment was distorted again.
"Almost forgot," Jim said. "Someone's been trying to
reach us on the radio—not the crazies. I had it switched
to your office, but—"
In moments" Neq was there. The voice emerging from
the speaker was foreign. He strode out of the tunnel and
touched his broadcast button. "Speak English!" he snapped.
"This is Helicon." Too bad the narcotic didn't make all
things intelligible!
After a brief delay another voice came through, ac-
cented. "This is the Andes station. We have been trying
to reach you. There has been no contact for seven years—"
"Merely an interruption," Neq said.
"But we sent an envoy by helicopter two years ago,
and he reported that your premises were deserted—"
So that was the mysterious visitor! "There has been a
change in personnel. We regret that our former leader,
Robert, has had to retire. I am Neq. You may deal with
me henceforth."
The voice sounded worried. "We dealt many years with
Robert. How did he die?"
"Please, Andes!" Neq said, affecting shock. "Helicon is
civilized! Bob left his position in order to devote his full
energies to his wife—a charming creature. Send your
representative again and we'll introduce him."
There was a pause. Then: "That will not be necessary.
Are you in normal operation again? Do you need assis-
tance?"
"How is your supply of young women?" Neq asked.
"How is your supply of electronic equipment?"
Neq smiled. He had a job to do, and suddenly he liked it.