The Secret City by Carol Emshwiller Page B

over his shorts. I zip him into Mollish’s sleeping bag, I squeeze his shoulder. I say, “Sleep now.” As I say it, I use two fingers and shut his eyes for him. “Sleep. Sleep.” (He might as well start learning the language.) Of course his eyes pop open again right away.
    I lie down. We’re head to head, both of us in the only place we can be, stretched out right in the middle of the trail. I turn out the flashlight. No stars, no moon. I wonder what he thinks of night on this world. Jet black. Scary. Maybe tomorrow night he’ll get to see stars. I hope so. With their two moons always in the way, my kind can’t ever have seen a sky full of stars.
    If he comes down with me in the morning, I’ll have to do something about that pompadour and that crazy shirt. Shorts for heaven’s sake!
    I HAVE A HARD TIME SLEEPING . I MISS ALLUSHA . We always slept next to each other, looking up at the stars and the moon—whispering after Mollish had gone to sleep. Mollish knew the stars as much as Ruth did. Sometimes she pointed out the constellations, too. Now both she and Ruth are dead and all my fault.
    And there’s a big problem, I don’t know the way. Neither towards town nor back to the city. If towards town, all I know is east and (I hope) south enough to avoid the town where I was in jail. But going east should be enough. We’ll hit Route 395 somewhere. No way to miss it. It goes north and south between two mountain ranges for hundreds of miles.
    And Youpas will be following us, waiting for a chance to kill me. When he finds out Allush got snatched and I didn’t stop her he’ll be after me more than ever. Should I turn back even so? Take this man to the Secret City to hide out there with the beacons and wait for rescue? Try to find it again, that is. But I don’t want to have a showdown with Youpas. I’ll take him to the Down. Give him a chance to learn a few things about this world. Maybe he can go back and tell our people to stop snatching us without asking. I wonder if it would do any good. Maybe there’s a reason they want us back. Could be as simple as that we’re dangerous to our own people here. What if we’re found out by the natives? Who knows what will happen then. Homo sapiens sapiens off, yet again, to wipe out Neanderthals.
    I N THE MORNING WE WAKE TO HAIL AND THUNDER . This ledge is a bad place to be in lightning. Here, there’s no shelter whatsoever. I have a decent hat, but he doesn’t even have one of those baseball caps the old ones always wore. I put my hat on his head. He says, “Ayyaa, ayyaa,” but I say, “Yes.” Then he ducks his head as, thanks.
    I pack up, give him Mollish’s backpack and we hurry on—down and east. I’m not thinking which way to go. I just want to get us back into the tree line to someplace more sheltered.
Then
I’ll think. Also, on this rough ground, I need a cane but there won’t be any possible sticks until we get into the trees. Thinking cane makes me think of Ruth again. Hers must still be up behind the pink wall where I got shot.
    Rain or no, the man stops every now and then and looks around. His stopping makes me stop and look, too. I try to imagine what he’s thinking—maybe that everything is ugly compared to his world, just like Mother said it was. Even so, whatever he’s thinking, I appreciate the view even more than I normally do. I think:
my
snowy peaks,
my
silvery waterfalls on the mountain across from us,
my, my, my
beautiful world.
    While we’re still fairly high, the rain stops. Shortly after it does we watch a turkey vulture soar out from the cliff, just above us. Later, in the trees below, we walk through fireweed as high as our heads. In this sheltered side of the mountain, it’s still in bloom. A magpie flies across our path and I hear the man gasp. I guess no magpies back on our home world. I’d rather not be where there aren’t any magpies.
    We don’t stop to eat until we’re well into the valley. We sit on a rock and I chew that