Brent marched from one bus stop to another, gradually becoming more agitated. Viki tagged along silently, for once not making any suggestions; Brent got put down often enough that he rarely asserted any sort of knowledge. It hurt when he finally spoke up—even to a little sister—and then turned out to be wrong. After the third false start, Brent hunkered down close to the ground. For a moment, Viki thought maybe he was just going to wait for a bus to come along—a thoroughly unpleasant possibility to Viki. They'd been out for more than an hour and they hadn't even seen a local jitney. Maybe she would have to stick her pointy little hands into the problem....But after a minute, Brent stood up and started across the street. "I bet the Big Dig people didn't get the day off. That's only a mile south of here. There are always buses from there."

Ha.That was just what Viki had been about to suggest. Blessed be patience.

The street was still in morning shadow. This was the deepest part of the winter season at Princeton. Here and there the frost in the darker nooks was so deep that it might have been snow itself. But the section they were walking through now was not gardened. The only plants were unruly weeds and free crawlers. On sweaty, hot days between storms, the place would have been alive with midges and drinkers.

On either side of the street were multistory warehouses. Things weren't so quiet and deserted here. The ground buzzed and thrummed with the sound of unseen diggers. Freight trucks moved in and out of the area. Every few hundred yards, a plot of land was barricaded off from all but the construction crews. Viki tugged at Brent's arms, urging him to crawl under the barricades. "Hey, it's our dad who's the reason for all this. We deserve to see!" Brent would never accept such a rationalization, but his little sister was already past the no-trespassing signs. He had to come along just to protect her.

They crept past tall bundles of reinforcement steel, and piles of masonry. There was something powerful and alien about this place. In the house on the hill, everything was so safe, so orderly. Here...well, she could see endless opportunities for the careless to lacerate a foot, cut an eye. Heck, if you tipped over one of those standing slabs, it would squash you flat. All the possibilities were crystal clear in her mind...and exciting. They carefully made their way to the lip of a caisson, avoiding the eyes of the workman and the various interesting opportunities for fatal accidents.

The railing was two strands of twine.If you don't want to die, don't falloff! Viki and her brother hunkered close to the ground and stuck their heads over the abyss. For a moment, it was too dark to see. The heated air that drifted up carried the smell of burning oil and hot metal. It was a caress and a slap in the head all at once. And the sounds: workers shouting, metal grinding against metal, engines, and a strange hissing. Viki dipped her head, letting all her eyes adjust to the gloom. There was light, but nothing like day or night. She had seen small electric-arc lamps in Daddy's labs. These ones were huge: pencils of light glowing mostly in the ultra and far ultra—colors you never see bright except in the disk of the sun. The color splashed off the hooded workers, spread speckling glints up and down the shaft....There were other less spectacular lights, steadier ones, electric lamps that shone local splotches of tamed color here and there. Still twelve years before the Dark, and they were building a whole city down there. She could see avenues of stone, huge tunnels leading off from the walls of the shaft. And in the tunnels she glimpsed darker holes...ramps to smaller diggings? Buildings and homes and gardens would come later, but already the caves were mostly dug. Looking down, Viki felt an attraction that was new to her, the natural, protective attraction of a deepness. But what these workers were doing was a thousand times grander than any ordinary deepness. If all you wanted to do was sleep frozen through the Dark, you needed just enough space for your sleeping pool and a startup cache. Such already existed in the city deepness beneath the old town center—and had existed there for almost twenty generations. This new construction was tolive in, awake. In some places, where air seal and insulation could be assured, it was built right at ground level. In other areas, it was dug down hundreds of feet, an eerie reverse of the buildings that made Princeton's skyline.

Viki stared and stared, lost in the dream. Until now, it had all been a story at a distance. Little Victory read about it, heard her parents talk about it, heard it on the radio. She knew that as much as anything, it was the reason why so many people hated her family. That, and being oophase, were the reasons they weren't supposed to go out alone. Dad might talk and talk about evolution in action and how important it was for small children to be allowed to take chances, how if that didn't happen then genius could not develop in the survivors. The trouble was, he didn't mean it. Every time Viki tried to take on something a little risky, Dad got all paternal and the project became a padded security blanket.

Viki realized she was chuckling low in her chest.

"What?" said Brent.

"Nothing. I was just thinking that today we are getting to see what things are really like—Daddy or no."

Brent's aspect shifted into embarrassment. Of all her brothers and sisters, he was the one who took rules the most literally and felt the worst about bending them. "I think we should leave now. There are workers on the surface, getting closer. Besides, how long does the snow last?"

Grumble. Viki backed out and followed her brother through the maze of wonderfully massive things that filled the construction yard. At the moment, even the prospect of snowdrifts was not an irresistible attraction.

The first real surprise of the day came when they finally reached an in-use express stop: Standing a little apart from the crowd were Jirlib and Gokna. No wonder she hadn't been able to find them this morning. They had snuck off without her! Viki sidled across the plaza toward them, trying to look not the least perturbed. Gokna was grinning her usual one-upness. Jirlib had the grace to look embarrassed. Along with Brent he was the oldest, and should have had the sense to prevent this outing. The four of them drifted a few yards away from the stares and stuck their heads together.

Buzz, mumble. Miss One-Upness: "What took you so long? Had trouble sneaking past Downing's Detainers?" Viki: "I didn't thinkyou would even dare try. We've done lots already this morning." Miss One-Upness: "Like what?" Viki: "Like we checked out the New Underground." Miss One-Upness: "Well—"

Jirlib: "Shut up the both of you. Neither of you should be out here."

"But we're radio celebrities, Jirlib." Gokna preened. "People love us."

Jirlib moved a little closer and lowered his voice. "Quit it. For every three who like ‘The Children's Hour,' there are three that it worries—and four more are trads who still hate your guts."

The children's radio hour had been more fun than anything Viki had ever done, but it hadn't been the same since Honored Pedure. Now that their age was public, it was like they had to prove something. They had even found some other oophases—but so far none were right for the show. Viki and Gokna hadn't gotten friendly with other cobblies, even the pair that had been their age. They were strange, unfriendly children—almost the stereotype of oophase. Daddy said it was their upbringing, the years in hiding. That was the scariest thing of all, something she only talked about with Gokna, and then only in whispers in the middle of the night. What if the Church was right? Maybe she and Gokna just imagined they had souls.

For a moment, the four of them stood silently, taking Jirlib's point. Then Brent asked, "So why are you out here, Jirlib?" From anyone else it would have been a challenge, but verbal fighting was outside Brent's scope. The question was simple curiosity, an honest request for enlightenment.