"Why didn't Prandy recognize you?" Glory asked.
"Well, I grew a beard and a mustache and I put on some weight," I said. "Mainly, though, I figured that my new personality would provide me with a whole new horde of mannerisms and that they would make the real difference. But I'm not sure that it mattered. She only had eyes for Adam when she turned up here."
Eryx chuckled. "You put in a lot of work on this one," he said. "Now you tell me you're not after the action?"
"I was more interested in understanding Adam's motives."
"If you don't know now, I don't think you'll ever know," he told me. "He's not about to give us anything, and it doesn't really matter. I don't see any special action, and I'm closing the hunt. Schrodinger's box is about to be opened. Now, are you after a piece of the reward or aren't you?"
"What would you give me?"
"Standard finder's fee, just because you kept an eye on him all this time, plus a bonus for softening him up for me— though I didn't ask you to do it."
"No thanks," I said. "I just want to see how it all turns out."
"It's over," he said. "There's nothing to see."
I brushed myself off and stretched.
"I'm not so sure of that," I said.
"What's left?" he asked.
"Ezra Pound's thirtieth Canto."
"What?"
"It's a poem that affected me profoundly when I was in college. I spent days meditating on it. Even went back and read Schiller on naive and sentimental poetry. At that time, I didn't know why it was reaching me that way. Now, of course, I do. You take Adam back, and even if he is the Kaleideion they're going to kill him, or its equivalent."
He nodded.
"So? He knew the chance he was taking when he did what he did."
"I know. But I dislike killing things now. So I decided not to take him in."
"You're a colosodian! We don't have to like or dislike killing. We just have to do it when the time comes."
"Oh, I can do it if I have to, and I still like the hunt as much as ever. I might just become a temporal private eye."
Eryx shook his head. "Do whatever you want. You'll snap out of it one of these days. In the meantime, I'm going to secure the cat-man and take him and this whole damn place back to the end of everything."
Two quick steps and I stood between him and Adam. Eryx halted and stared at me. "You planning on opposing me in this?" he asked.
"Afraid so," I said.
"Then you are jumping my claim."
"Damn! I hadn't thought of it that way," I said. "Okay. I am."
"You know I can't let you get away with it."
"No."
He sighed. Then, "All right," he said. "Let's have it out."
A studded wrist strap swept through the air where my head had been but a moment before. I landed a light blow to his throat, avoided three body strikes, and had my left cheek grazed by studs. I was surprised when a double-handed thumb shot to his solar plexus connected and I was able to club the back of his neck, bring my knee up into his face, and deliver a palm strike to the crown of his head. As I did so, I recited:
Rising suddenly, he caught my wrist and threw me across the room. More sophisticated than earlier, I landed upon the wall, ran up it and across the ceiling, and delivered a half-dozen blows to his face before he assimilated the stunt and began fending me off. Moments later, he was attacking, and he caught me on the point of the chin with a blow that knocked me over backwards. Fortunately, it laid me flat upon the ceiling and out of his reach.
He ran up the nearest wall and came racing toward me. But I had recovered by then and regained my footing. I feigned lack of full coordination until he was upon me.
I swept his feet. I kicked him in the stomach twice before he curled into a ball, caught me behind the knees, took me over backwards and rolled over me, trying for my larynx with his forearm. I caught the arm, though, and took him off to my right, following and trying for a choke. I overextended my left arm, however, and he continued turning, locking it straight against him and breaking it at the elbow with a strike he managed by bringing his right foot up, out, around, and in.
I attacked his eyes with my right hand and was able to free myself, spring into the air, somersault, and land below. Moments later, he followed, raining blows upon me. I knew that I couldn't hold up much longer.
... So I didn't even bother defending against the death grip he was reaching to apply. I simply transferred into the emptied body of Pietro, the artist.
He saw me rise, farther back in the tunnel. "Now that's a low trick, to use a man's own clones against him," he said.
I smiled.
He threw Lars at me and followed with a rush. I retreated, past the place of clones, farther than I'd ever been into the Hellhole. I felt a powerful tugging at my back and determined not to move another inch in that direction. I threw myself flat, and in a moment Lars passed over me like a bullet.
The dark shape gone, I rose again. Eryx approached, arms outstretched, and was almost upon me.
At the last possible instant I teleported eighteen inches to my left, turning as I did, so that I was able to deliver a stunning blow to the back of his neck as he went by. Glancing back, I saw nothing.
I walked past the heaped bodies toward the front. As I approached, Glory asked, "His clones? How could they be his clones? You're the only one they—"
"His face had been damaged and rebuilt," I said. "But he and I were brothers. Twins."
EIGHT · SINGULAR ENCOUNTER
I made my way forward then until I stood directly in front of Adam.
"That, Magfaser," I said, "is why I wanted to talk. It would have saved us both a lot of pain and wasted time. Now I see why you need a nursemaid. You still act like a kid."
"Sorry," he said, "but the circumstantial evidence was strong."
I slapped him across the face, hard, and heard Glory gasp.
He made no move to defend himself. He just nodded and said "Sorry" again.
I turned to my Alf body, saw that it was still breathing.
"Today seems to be the day when everything happens," I said. "Tomorrow you'll be out of business. I wanted my memory today so I could help to make things turn out right."
"I appreciate that," he said.
"Then let's not waste any more time. Summon a medical unit and get yourself put back together. Then there will be a lot of things I'll need to know."