Panille stared down at the dying man. Awareness of Thomas lay there in Panille’s mind, linked to Vata, to Waela, to most of the E-clones whose genetic mix traced itself back to the Avata. All of it was there, the complete pattern. How profound of Ship to take the Raja Flattery of Ship’s own origins and make a personal nemesis out of the man.

Thomas moved his lips, a whisper only, but even Oakes heard him: “I studied the question so long . . . I hid the problem.”

“What’s he talking about?” Oakes demanded.

“He’s talking to Ship,” Panille said, and this time his lips moved, his voice was the remembered voice of the poet, full of pouncing awareness.

A series of gasps wracked the dying man, then: “I played the game so long . . . so long. Panille knows. It’s the rock . . . the child. Yes! I know! The child!”

Oakes snorted. “He just thinks he’s talking to the ship.”

“You still refuse to live up to the best of your own humanity,” Panille said, looking at Oakes.

“What . . . what do you mean?”

“That’s all Ship ever asked of us,” Panille said. “That’s all WorShip was meant to be: find our own humanity and live up to it.”

“Words! Just words!” Oakes felt that he was being crowded into a comer. Everything here was illusion!

“Then throw out the words and ask yourself what you’re doing here,” Panille said.

“I’m just trying to survive. What else is there to do?”

“But you’ve never really been alive.”

“I’ve . . . I’ve . . .” Oakes fell silent as Panille lifted an arm.

One by one, the demons moved off at an angle away from the cliffside shelter. The first of them were at the cliff and moving up toward the high plains before Panille spoke.

“I release them as Avata released them. Still they do what they do.”

Oakes looked at the departing demons. “What will they do?”

“When they are hungry, they will eat.”

It was too much for Oakes. “What do you want of me?”

“You’re a doctor,” Panille said. “There are wounded.”

Oakes pointed at Thomas. “You’d have me save him?”

“Only Ship or all of us together can save him,” Panille said.

“Ship!”

“Or all of us together—it’s the same thing.”

“Lies! You’re lying!”

“The idea of saving has many meanings,” Panille said. “There’s comfort in the intelligence and potential immortality of our own kind.”

Oakes backed one step away from Panille. “Lying words! This planet’s going to kill us all.”

“What are your senses for if not to be believed?” Panille asked. He gestured around him, met Hali’s rapt gaze. “We survive. We repair this planet. Avata, who kept this place in balance, is gone. But Vata is their daughter as much as mine.”

“Vata?” Oakes spat the word. “What’s this new nonsense?”