Both servitors complied, floating back toward the faxnode pavilion. Hannah led them across the valley. There were no trees, no grass, no signs of life whatsoever, outside of the four human beings glowing in bright color.
“What are we hunting for?” asked Hannah, stepping over what might have been a small stream in summer—if, indeed, summer ever came to this place.
“Is this the site of the Burning Man?” asked Harman.
Daeman and Hannah both looked around. Finally Daeman spoke. “It could be. But there were—you know—tents and pavilions and rest rooms and flowdomes and the forcefield over the valley and big heaters and the Burning Man and daylight and . . . it was different then. Not so cold .” He hopped gingerly from foot to foot.
“Hannah?” said Daeman.
“I’m not sure. That place was also rocky and desolate, but . . . Daeman’s right, it looked different with the thousands of people and sunlight. I don’t know.”
Ada took the lead. “Let’s fan out and hunt for some sign that the Burning Man was held here . . . campfires, rock cairns . . . something. Although I don’t think we’ll find your Wandering Jew person here tonight, Harman.”
“Shhh,” said Harman, glancing over his blue shoulder at the distant servitors, then realizing that they were broadcasting their conversation anyway. “All right,” he said with a sigh, “let’s spread out, say a couple of hundred feet apart, and look for anything that . . .”
He stopped as a large, only vaguely humanoid shape appeared from a side canyon. The creature picked its way across the rocks with a familiar awkward grace. When it got within thirty feet, Harman said, “Go back. We don’t need a voynix here.”
One of the servitors answered, its voice in their ears even though the sphere itself floated far behind them. “We must insist, my gentlemen and ladies. This is the most remote and hostile of all known faxnodes. We cannot risk the small chance that something here could harm you.”
“Are there dinosaurs?” asked Daeman, his voice on edge.
Ada laughed again and opened her arms and hands to the dark and howling cold. “I doubt it, Daeman. They’d have to be some tough recombinant winter breed I’ve never heard of.”
“Anything’s possible,” Hannah said, pointing to a large rock near the entrance to another side canyon about fifty yards to their right. “That could be an allosaurus right there, just waiting for us.”
Daeman took a step back and almost tripped over a rock.
“There aren’t any dinosaurs here,” said Harman. “I don’t think there’s any living thing here. It’s too damned cold. If you doubt me, lift your cowls for a second.”
The others did. The molecular earphones rang with their exclamations.
“You stay back unless called,” Harman directed the voynix. The creature moved back thirty paces.
They walked up the valley—northwest according to their palm direction finders. The stars shook from the force of the wind and occasionally all four of them would have to huddle in the shelter of a large boulder to keep from getting blown over. When the gale lessened in intensity, they spread out again.
“There’s something here,” came Ada’s voice.
The others hurried to join the yellow form a hundred feet to their south. Ada was looking down at what at first appeared to be just another rock, but as Daeman got closer, he saw the brittle hair or fur, the odd flipper appendages, and the black holes or eyes. The thing appeared to be carved from weathered wood.
“It’s a seal,” said Harman.
“What’s that?” asked Hannah, kneeling to touch the still figure.
“An aquatic mammal. I’ve seen them near coastlines . . . away from faxnodes.” He also knelt and touched the animal’s corpse. “This thing’s dried out . . . mummified is the word. It may have been here for centuries. Millennia.”
“So we’re near a coast,” said Ada.
“Not necessarily,” said Harman, standing and looking around.
“Hey,” said Daeman, “I remember that big boulder. The beer pavilion was pitched just below it.” He made his way slowly to the boulder near the cliff wall.
“Are you sure?” asked Ada when they’d caught up. There was only the rock slab rising toward the coldly burning stars and hurrying clouds. Everyone looked on the ground for signs of the tent or campfires or carriole tracks, but there was nothing.
“It was a year and a half ago,” said Harman. “The servitors probably cleaned up well and . . .”
“Oh, my God,” interrupted Hannah.
They all turned quickly. The orange-suited young woman was looking skyward. They lifted their heads, even as they each noticed the play of colored light on the rocks around them.
The night sky was alive with curtains of shimmering, dancing light—bars of blues and yellows and dancing reds.
“What is it?” whispered Ada.
“I don’t know,” Harman responded, also whispering. The light continued to writhe across the uncloudy portions of the sky. Harman lifted off his thermskin cowl. “My God, it’s almost as brilliant without the night-vision. I think I saw something like this once decades ago when I was . . .”
“Servitors,” interrupted Daeman, “what is this light?”
“A form of atmospheric phenomenon associated with charged particles from the sun interacting with Earth’s electromagnetic field,” came the voice from the distant machine. “We no longer have the particulars of the scientific explanation, but it goes under different names, including . . .”
“All right,” said Harman. “That’s enough . . . hey.” He had pulled on his cowl again and was looking at the rock slab in front of them.
There were complex scratchings on the rock. They did not look as if they had been made by the wind or other natural causes.
“What is it?” asked Ada. “It doesn’t look like the symbols in the books.”
“No,” agreed Harman.
“Something from the Burning Man?” said Hannah.
“I don’t remember scratches on the rock near the beer tent,” said Daeman. “But maybe the servitors scratched up the surface moving some of the stuff out after the celebration.”
“Perhaps,” said Harman.
“Should we keep hunting around here?” asked Ada. “Try to find some sign that this woman you’re after was here? Or even that the Burning Man was here? Maybe there are some ashes left.”
“In this wind?” laughed Daeman. “After a year and a half?”
“A pit,” said Ada. “A campfire. We could . . .”
“No,” said Harman. “We’re not going to find anything here. Let’s fax somewhere warm and get some lunch.”
Ada turned her yellow head to look at Harman, but she said nothing.
The two servitors had floated toward them and the voynix loomed just behind them.
“We’re going,” Harman told the closer servitor. “You can use your flashlight beams to illuminate our way back to the fax pavilion.”
It was just after midday in Ulanbat and the usual hundred or so guests were milling at Tobi’s ongoing Second Twenty party on the seventy-ninth floor of the Circles to Heaven. The hanging gardens rustled and sighed from the breeze blowing off the red desert. Daeman was greeted by a host of young men and women who had not noticed his absence over the past few days, but he followed Harman, Hannah, and Ada as they found hot finger food at the long banquet table and had cold wine poured by a servitor. Harman led them away from the crowd to a stone table near the low wall at the edge of the circle. Eight hundred feet below, camel caravans driven by servitors and followed by voynix padded in on the hard-packed Gobi Highway.
“What is it?” said Ada as they sat in the garden shade and ate. “I know something happened back there.”
Harman started to speak, paused, and waited for a servitor to float past. “Do you ever wonder,” he asked, “if that utility servitor is the same one you just saw somewhere else? They all look alike.”
“That’s absurd,” said Daeman. Between bites on a chicken leg, he was licking his fingers and sipping his chilled wine.
“Perhaps,” said Harman.