Ah Tran looked briefly at the android. What he saw shocked him. The slackness of the android's expression, the ghostly paleness of his flesh, the stillness of his breathing, the absence of tension in his muscles. This man, Ah Tran thought fearfully, though only for a moment, is dead.

But no. The android was not dead. At least, not in any physical sense. He was not even a man-he was a flesh and blood machine-and, as such, was proving, as Ah Tran and Cargill had hoped, to be the perfect conduit. Ego-death would be simple for him: killing a child was always a simpler process than slaying an adult man.

Around the circle, the others were ready too. Ah Tran sensed that it was time. Close. Very close. He could feel them-no, it-waiting for him to come.

But he hesitated. Could the android be expected to bear the strain? In the past Ah Tran had willingly risked his own life and sanity, but now he was demanding that another-an innocent-take these same risks. Did he have that right? His doubts, previously stifled, rose in tremendous unity.

But he had to decide yes. Not yes, he had that right, but rather yes, it was necessary. Outside these peaceful walls, the future existence of the human race was threatened. It sounded like a line from a creaky old melodrama, but if life could sometimes be seen to follow art, why not melodrama too? Besides, the android wasn't human. What God gave, God could take away; what man (as God) gave, he could also take away. Wasn't that logical? Didn't that make strict sense? Ah Tran shut his eyes. He leaned easily back. He made his mind an utter blank. I am no one. Ah Tran is gone. I am not he. I am no one, not any one, he is dead...

And when Ah Tran was gone-the spirit which had once been his merged with the fused mass of the gestalt-then the entirety of the twenty-four could finally rush forward to enter and consume the empty vessel which had once been Eathen.

After that-for a moment that seemed to stretch endlessly-utter silence dominated the tiny room. Twenty-five empty bodies sitting motionlessly, as if all life had been drained from them. Nothing moved, breathed, thought, spoke.

Then-at the center of the circle-Eathen screamed.

A moment afterward, he let go a second dreadful cry. The muscles in his arms and legs and chest tightened. He sprang to his feet. He clawed at the top of his skull. He howled. Wailed.

Finally, he fell over. To his knees. Hands clenched in front of his chest. Fingers interwoven. A brief, fleeting expression of horror passed across his face. Then he fell over on his face and, after that, didn't move.

Ah Tran was the first of the circle to awake. Seeing Eathen, he rushed forward and knelt down. He turned Eathen over on his back. Leaning down, Ah Tran seemed to be kissing the android. Actually, he was trying to force the air from his own lungs down Eathen's throat. As he labored, the others also awoke and came forward, gathering in a circle to watch the attempted resurrection. When Ah Tran breathed, Eathen's chest expanded. When Ah Tran backed off to rest, nothing happened.

A minute passed.

Two minutes.

One of the disciples-a young, thin, handsome girl-broke the silence: "He's dead."

"No," said another. "Ah Tran will save him."

"It's been too long," the girl insisted. "I took a class once. His brain is damaged. Even if-"

"He's an android. He doesn't have a brain."

Another, speaking in a voice filled with uncertain awe, said, "Didn't you feel that-that thing up there?"

"I did, yes."

"Me too."

"Yes."

"I think all of us did."

Ah Tran continued to force air down Eathen's throat, into his lungs, heart, bloodstream.

"It was like-I can't explain it. I don't remember." She shook her head.

"I do." This was the first girl-the one who believed that Eathen was dead. She spread two fingers minutely and showed them to the others. "We were this close. To that place. We were floating up."

"We were going to make it," said another.

"I saw the White Light."

"Oh, that's silly superstition."

"I saw something."

"We were going."

"Yes. Oh, yes."

"But then something-I don't know-that-that thing. It stopped us."

"Something lives up there."

"It came down and stopped us. The pain was awful. It was like hurting without being hurt. The pain was all inside."

"And-" the girl pointed at Eathen "-it killed him."

Ah Tran drew away. He leaned back on his haunches and wiped the sweat off his face. He peered down at poor dead Eathen and wondered if death for an android was the same as death for a man. Of course, there was no way of knowing for sure; he had no idea. But he did find it hard to accept that androids might have souls. Wouldn't death for one of them have to have the same insignificance as death for a car or plane-any gadget or machine-not death but merely cessation, a blackness, the end? But Eathen had never been a machine. Ah Tran, who had known him, knew better than that. Eathen had been as close to a man as any creature could possibly come without actually being a man, and maybe that last wasn't true: maybe-by the end-Eathen had indeed become a man. Who could say? Did he have a soul? How was Ah Tran supposed to know that? He was dead-that was all-but the meaning of that death would long remain a veiled mystery.

He stood up.

The girl asked him: "Is he dead?"

Ah Tran said, "Yes."

One of the young men asked, "What was that thing we felt up there? Did you feel it too?"

"I did."

"But you don't know what it was?"

"I know."

"Can we kill it? Or go around it? Does it live up there? Does it mean we'll never make it?"

"I don't know yet."

"Well, tell us what it is," another broke in. "We have a right to know."

"No, you don't," Ah Tran said. He hurried toward the door without another word. Nobody tried to stop him or follow. He went into the room that served as his bedroom, locked both connecting doors, then lay down on the bed. He knew he ought to call Cargill; he should have done it as soon as he woke without wasting time trying to play messiah and bring back to life a man-or android-who was already thoroughly and irrevocably dead.

But he knew what it was that had stopped them up there. He even knew its name.

It was Karlton Ford.

But, still, he did not get up to call.