Imperial Earth

Karl’s breakdown was still a considerable mystery, which the Helmer family had never discussed with outsiders. The romantics had a simple explanation: he was heartbroken over the loss of Calindy. Duncan had always found this too hard to accept. Karl was too tough to pine away like some character in an old time melodrama–especially when there were at least a thousand volunteers waiting to console him. Yet it was undeniable that the breakdown had occurred only a few weeks after Mentor had, to everyone’s relief, blasted Earthward.

After that, there had been a complete change in his personality; whenever

Duncan met him in these last few years, he had seemed almost a stranger.

Physically, he was as beautiful as ever-perhaps even more so, thanks to his greater maturity. And he could still be friendly, though there were sudden silences when he seemed to retreat into himself for no apparent reason. But real communication was missing; maybe it had never been there…. No, that was unfair and untrue. They had known many shared moments before

Calindy entered their lives. And one, though only one, after she had left.

That was still the deepest pain that Duncan had ever known. He had been inarticulate with grief when they had made their farewells in the shuttle terminus of Meridian, surrounded by scores of other parting guests. To its great surprise, Titan had suddenly discovered that it was going to miss its young visitors; nearly every one of them was surrounded by a tearful group of local residents.

Duncan’s grief was also, to no small extent, compounded with jealousy. He never discovered how Karl -or Calindy-had managed it, but they flew up in the shuttle together, and made their final farewells on the ship. So when

Duncan glimpsed Calindy for the last time, when she waved back at him from the quarantine barrier, Karl was still with her. In that desolating moment, he did not suppose that he would ever see her again.

When Karl returned on the last shuttle flight, five hours later, he was

drawn and pale, and had lost all 50 his usual vivacity. Without a word, he had handed Duncan a small package, wrapped in brightly colored paper, and bearing the inscription LOVE FROM

CALINDY.

Duncan had opened it with trembling fingers; a bubble stereo was inside. It was a long time before he was able to see, through the mist of tears, the image it contained.

Much later that same day, as they clung together in mutual misery, an obvious question had suddenly occurred to Duncan.

“What did she give you, Karl?” he had asked.

There was a sudden pause in the other’s breathing, and he felt Karl’s body tense slightly and draw away from him. It was an almost imperceptible gesture; probably Karl was not even aware of it.

When he answered, his voice was strained and curiously defensive.

“It’s-it’s a secret. Nothing important; perhaps one day I’ll tell you.”

Even then, Duncan knew that he never would; and somehow he already yealized that this was the last night they would ever spend together.

WORLD’S END

Ground Effect Vehicles were very attractive in a low-gravity, dense-atmosphere environment, but they did tend to rearrange the landscape, especially when it consisted largely of fluffy snow. That was only a problem, however, to anyone following in the rear. When it reached its normal cruising speed of two hundred kilometers an hour, the hover sled left its private blizzard behind it, and the view ahead was excellent.

But it was not cruising at two hundred klicks; it was flat out at three, and Duncan was beginning to wish he had stayed home.

It would be very stupid if he broke his neck, on a mission where his presence was quite unnecessary, only two days before he was due to leave for

Earth.

Yet there was no real danger. They were moving over smooth, flat ammonia snow, on a terrain known to be free from crevasses. Top speed was safe, and it was fully justified. This was too good an opportunity to miss, and he had waited for it for years. No one had ever observed a wax worm in the active phase, and this one was only eighty kilometers from Oasis. The seismographs had spotted its characteristic signature, and the environment computer had given the alert. The hover sled had been through the airlock within ten minutes.

Now it was approaching the lower slopes of Mount Shackelton, the well-behaved little volcano which, after much careful thought, the original settlers had decided to accept as a neighbor. Waxworms were almost always associated with volcanoes, and some were festooned with them “like an explosion in a spaghetti factory,” as one early explorer had put it. No wonder that their discovery had caused much excitement; from the air they looked very much like the protective tunnels built by termites and other social insects on Earth.