“If it is a door,” Iranaputra murmured as they started back across the floor of the empty chamber. “Booby traps. We must have tripped some ancient security device.”

“Wouldn’t think anything like that would still be working down here,” Follingston-Heath commented. “Obviously that is an assumption we can no longer make.” He eyed Hawkins expectantly but that worthy was, for the moment at least, subdued.

“Then there may be other things still in working order, you should excuse my pointing it out.” Gelmann was studying the opposite wall. “Including doors. But we need to go carefully.”

“Even if this room is now vacuum-sealed, it’s big enough that we should have ample air for a little while longer,” Shimoda remarked. Hawkins made a face at him.

“Thank you for that reassuring observation, Kahei.” He glanced sourly at Ksarusix. “Hey, you! You got any suggestions?”

“Me? I’m just a lowly kitchen tool. You expect ideas from me? Analytical cogitation ain’t my department. Peas and napkins are. Besides, I don’t mind being trapped down here. I’ve fulfilled my higher function. Found what I was supposed to look for.”

“If we do not find a way out of here, then no one, human or machine, will know of your success,” Iranaputra told it. “‘A discovery not shared is a discovery not made.’ Mahabharata, Eighth Book, Chapter …”

“Spare us,” Hawkins growled unhappily.

An hour spent carefully inspecting the thin lines that ran along the floor and up the wall located nothing resembling a switch, handle, or more sophisticated control, at which point even Follingston-Heath’s eternal optimism was starting to suffer. He sat down, leaning his angular, still muscular frame against the immutable wall.

“When they start looking for us, maybe they’ll find the tunnel, we should be so lucky.” Gelmann tried to sound hopeful.

“They’ll certainly check the woods around the Village,” Shimoda agreed, “but even with the brush pulled away from the entrance, the cave is still hard to see. It took a robot to find it in the first place.”

“Damn straight,” murmured Ksarusix.

“Maybe they will use other robots.” Iranaputra perked up at the thought. “The police have such specialty units. They are always having to chase down lost tourists.”

“Right,” said Hawkins. “Why, in a month or two, I’m sure they’ll stumble right into us. Five dehydrated, desiccated, grateful corpses.”

“Don’t be morbid, Wallace.” Gelmann was hopeful. “If they use the machines like Victor says, they could just as soon find us tomorrow.”

“They’d better.” Hawkins nodded in the direction of Ksarusix. “We only packed a picnic lunch and a few snacks, and none of us is as physically durable as we used to be.”

“Speak for yourself, old boy,” Follingston-Heath murmured haughtily.

Eyes slightly wild, Hawkins scrambled to his feet, his light waving around as he rose. “I’ll do better than that. I’ll shut up. I’ll even leave. I’ve had all I want of this place.”

“Wallace, dear …,” Gelmann began.

“You hear me?” Head thrown back, Hawkins turned a slow unsteady circle as he bawled loudly at the ceiling. “I’m leaving! Right now!” If he expected a dramatic riposte, he was disappointed. The silent, perfectly smooth walls did not reply.

“Wallace!” Gelmann confronted him. “Come back over here and sit down. You’ll strain your throat. You’re also wasting your light.”

“Come to think of it, we all are.” Follingston-Heath promptly switched off the beam he carried. “We should try to conserve what battery power remains to us, don’t you know.”

One by one they turned off their lights. Only Hawkins demurred. Turning away from the worried Gelmann, he started back across the chamber, the cone of light that projected from his hand shrinking with distance. A little while later they were able to hear him cursing the far wall, his words mixed with a dull thumping, as though he was kicking something.

“Open up.” The words drifted forlornly across the floor. “I’ve had enough of this. I’m coming out.” This continued for some fifteen minutes, after which the thumping and cursing ceased and the light came bobbing back toward them.

“No luck.” Hawkins sounded thoroughly dispirited, drained of the antagonistic energy that always kept him going. He switched off his light, leaving them in utter blackness.

A couple of minutes passed in mutual silent introspection before he added, “Not to alarm anybody, but I think there’s something coming through the door.”

In the temperate artificial night Gelmann turned to her right. “Not to accuse you, Wallace, but the door isn’t opening.”

“Did I say it was? I said there’s something coming through it.”

A blue nimbus was drifting slowly into the room, pale as ghost sky. It was hard to tell as it coalesced whether it was composed of pure gas or a mixture of gas and tiny particles. Surrounded by its pale blue aurora, the nucleus of the lambent sphere was about the size of a human head. There was no distinct line of demarcation between the central core and the rest of the object. The middle portion defined itself because it was a slightly deeper, more coherent blue. It sifted through the wall like oil oozing through water.

Once completely inside, it hovered ten meters above the floor, emitting enough light to illuminate the five elderly humans below. As they looked on, it elongated into an ellipse. Including the faint blue halo, it was now about the same size as the serving robot.

Follingston-Heath, who had the sharpest vision of any of them (augmented, to be sure, by his monocle), thought he could discern deep within the object a crystalline inner structure fashioned of some fine transparent material like glass or spun sugar. He couldn’t be sure because it was difficult to look directly at the intensely bright object for any length of time.

A moment later the ellipse began to descend, heading directly toward them.

Instinctively they clustered together, their backs against the unyielding wall. Gelmann switched on her beam, and her companions did likewise. It did nothing to slow the advance of the ellipse.

“Everyone keep calm. I’m sure it doesn’t mean us any harm, I should be as positive as my mother.”

“I agree, Mina.” From his position behind her, Hawkins gave her a gentle nudge forward. “You go and confirm that.”

Trust into the forefront, an uncertain Gelmann lifted her flashlight and turned the beam directly on the advancing ellipse. The dense blueness soaked up the light, which neither passed through it nor further illuminated anything within. Nor did it cause the object to halt, speed up, or otherwise react.

By this time it had advanced to within a couple of meters, pressing them back against the wall. Sensing her friends crowded behind her, Gelmann felt the need to do something. So she reverted to what she knew best: talking.

“That’s quite close enough.” She wrestled with the quaver in her voice. “We’re responsible people and we won’t stand for this kind of intimidation.”

To everyone’s considerable surprise and immense relief, the object’s forward motion ceased. If anyone could by spoken word alone induce a floating blue ellipse composed of radiant alien energy to halt in its tracks, Hawkins knew, it would be Mina Gelmann. He’d once seen her send a whole troop of obnoxiously inquisitive schoolchildren, together with their supercilious monitors, fleeing from Wing D in panic.

Gelmann lowered her light, sucking up courage from her initial success. “That’s better. You should only keep your distance.” The ellipse maintained its position, hovering silently above the floor.

Follingston-Heath edged off to one side. “I don’t see any wires, jets, nothing. I wonder what keeps it airborne?”

“See what else you can make it do, Mina.” Shimoda moved up to stand alongside her.

“I’m not sure I made it do anything,” she replied. “It might’ve stopped of its own accord.” She cleared her throat and directed her voice to the object. “Okay, we’ve seen you. You can leave now. Go away.” Her fingers fluttered. “Shoo!” The blue ellipse did not budge.

“So much for verbal command,” Hawkins mumbled.

Follingston-Heath was now well off to one side. “At least it’s not coming at us anymore, old chap.”

“So what do we do now?” Iranaputra wondered aloud.

“There ain’t a damn thing you can do.” Ksarusix’s tinny artificial voice was thick with triumph. “What more evidence do you need? First the city, then this. Clear proof of the existence of a nonhuman technology far in advance of your feeble efforts.”

Follingston-Heath was inclined to agree. “No pre-diasporic military science possessed anything like this.”

“I wonder at its purpose.” Shimoda timidly moved a little nearer to the ellipse. “It’s kind of pretty. Surely it’s more than just a mobile light.”

“Here now, old thing.” Emboldened by his friend’s approach, Follingston-Heath advanced on the object. “Are you just a bit of drifting decoration?” He glanced at his companions. “At least we can be assured of one thing: it is quite incapable of communication.”