“So we’re doomed to keep fighting the darkness…for nothing. To die at our desks, never knowing the futility of it all.“

Hari put a hand on the younger man’s shoulder. “You must forget about this now. Go back to your paper folders and soil reports. The knowledge you fought so hard to acquire, with such ingenuity and courage, will only cause you pain. It’s time to let it go, Horis.”

Antic looked up at Hari bleakly. “You aren’t going to wait until Trantor?”

Hari looked to Daneel, appealing silently for a delay so that Horis might at least converse with them during the voyage back. But his robot friend answered with a terse shake of the head. Antic had proved too resourceful, too ready with fresh tricks up his sleeve.

Sensing this, the Grey Man stood up, straightening his bearing, trying for some dignity. But he could not keep from stuttering.

“W-will it hurt?”

Daneel spoke reassuringly to the human’s eyes.

“Not at all. In fact…it is already done.”

Helped by the two software sims, Joan and Voltaire, they were at last able to find every sabotage bug that Zorma’s group had planted aboard the ship. Lodovic shouted enthusiastically when the engines came back on, proclaiming his sense of triumph with a strut around the control room, exactly like a jubilant human male.

Dors felt emotional patterns surge through her own simulation subroutines. Despite her ongoing sense of urgency, it had been oddly pleasant working side by side with Trema, sharing theories and insights, trying one solution after another. She enjoyed his swaggering victory display-which was not all that different from the way Hari used to act, whenever he made some breakthrough in the models of psychohistory.

“I am so sorry to interrupt this celebration,“ commented Joan of Arc, her slender boyish figure appearing in the central holo screen. In the background, Dors could see a male form wearing archaic doublets and hose-the simulation known as Voltaire-listening intently to a pair of headphones, as if trying to pick up something faint with distance.

“You asked us to monitor any transmissions coming from Earth. Voltaire now reports picking up a message using code patterns characteristic of the Second Foundation. It appears to be from Wanda Seldon, informing her compatriots on Trantor that she has successfully recovered her grandfather. The plot to kidnap him is foiled. They will be departing Earth within a few hours, taking Hari straight home.“

Dors looked at Lodovic, who exhaled a long sigh.

“Well then, I guess that’s it. All this rushing about, and we hardly made a difference. Seldon is safe, and we never even had to confront Daneel along the way.”

Dors felt genuine relief on both counts. And yet, it was only natural to feel a bit let down.

“I guess it’s just as well. We’re just a couple of highly dressed-up tiktoks.”

Lodovic laughed gently. “Oh, I think we’re more than that. You, at least, are something special, Dors. We should discuss this, at length.”

Dors nodded. It sounded like a good idea. They had much to talk about. And yet, despite mixed feelings, it was easy to tell where her top priority lay.

“I must go to Trantor now, you understand.”

“And I agree. You have strong obligations, and I wouldn’t think of interfering. But perhaps we can meet when matters there have been resolved?”

This time it was her turn to offer a soft smile. “It might be arranged. Meanwhile, can I drop you off somewhere along the way?”

“I’ll ride with you as far as Demarchia. There are some things I want to look into there.” Then his voice lowered. “Just be careful on Trantor, will you?”

Dors shook her head. “I doubt anyone would choose to harm me. Besides, I can take care of myself.”

“It’s not harm done by others that I fear. You are vulnerable, Dors. You were designed to be more human than any other robot. Your bond with Hari is intense. Be prepared for a rough time when the end comes. If you need someone to talk to-”

No more had to be said. Silence reigned while she took control of the ship and sent it plunging on the first of many long hyperspace jumps that would bring them to the center of the galaxy. To the place where all roads led, and where she had one great duty left to perform, before her path could truly be called free.

It was promised that I could be with you just before you died, Hari.

That vow she intended, above all else in the universe, to keep.

During his last sunset on Earth, Hari Seldon watched gamma rays excite scintillations above Old Chicago. Ionized curtains glowed and rippled like polar auroras, only here the driving energy came not from a distant sun, but the ground itself. He thought he could almost see patterns in the luminous sheets-like the clever living artwork in the imperial gardens that day when Horis Antic offered him a data wafer filled with tempting clues. Then, as Hari watched, all semblance of organized structure vanished from the eerie horizon. Now the glow reminded him instead of Shoufeen Woods, where order had been banished and chaos was king.

Preparations for departure were complete. In a little while, Hari would board Wanda’s ship for the return to Trantor and his former life-hated by the men and women he was exiling to Terminus, feared by the present set of imperial rulers. and revered by a small cabal of psychics and mathists who felt certain they knew the future course of history.

Daneel would stay behind to settle matters with the Earthling inhabitants. There were arrangements to make. The cracked sarcophagus had to be buried so others could not misuse the fateful rift in the space-time continuum.

From his vantage point atop a pile of rubble, Hari could hear the voice of Horis Antic jabbering with excitement as he packed away his collection of soil types, acquired during this visit to a strange world. There could even be a scientific paper or two, something to brighten up his career profile, though nothing would erase the stigma associated with anyone who worked with dirt.

In any event, the fellow seemed happy. Daneel had done his job well.

Feeling tremors in his legs, Hari sat down again in the suspensor chair that Wanda had provided. He was needing it more, now that the rejuvenation treatments were wearing off. Soon he would be a frail old cripple again.

Soon I will be dead.

Seated, he could lean back, gazing toward the zenith where Earth’s radiation glow surrendered to a glitter of starlight-constellations that his ancestors no doubt knew by heart. Those stellar patterns had certainly changed in twenty thousand years, however, and he pondered how the sky might have looked if R. Gornon Vlimt had his way, sending Hari through time to a galaxy five hundred years older. Five hundred years more experienced with sorrow.

There were footsteps on the rubble path, too surefooted to be human. After a long pause, Daneel Olivaw asked, “What do you see up there, old friend?”

Hari felt a tautness in his throat.

“The future.”

“Indeed. Do you have a good view?”

Hari chuckled.

“A comfortable chair…a high place to look from… and of course, my equations. Oh yes, Daneel. I can see quite a bit from here.”

“And you are not disappointed? About missing a trip into that future?”

“Not very much. It might have been interesting. But you had reasons for preventing it, and I understand them. I probablywould have meddled.” Hari laughed again. “Besides, you’ll need a man who never makes mistakes, and I am anything but that.”

“Do you have any special regrets?”

“Just one. I can see it right now.” Hari gestured skyward, a bit to the left of zenith, but he wasn’t pointing to a constellation, rather, at a cluster of psychohistorical terms that floated in his sky, more real at this moment than the glittering stars.