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Realization of this incredible fact wiped the maudlin pity from his mind and replaced it with fear. Had his mind snapped in the strain of the last match? These thoughts weren't his. Self-pity hadn't made him a Winner why was he feeling it now? Anvhar was his universe how could he even imagine it as a tag-end planet at the outer limb of creation?
Many attempts were made to develop some form of stable society and social relationship. Again, little record exists of these early trials, other than the fact of their culmination in the Twenties. To understand the Twenties, you have to understand the unusual orbit that Anvhar tracks around its sun, 70 Ophiuchi.
The normal Anvharian education is an excellent one, and participation in the Twenties has given you a general and advanced education second to none in the galaxy. It would be a complete waste of your entire life if you now took all this training and wasted it on some rustic farm." "You give me very little credit. I plan to teach " "Forget Anvhar!" Ihjel cut him off with a chop of his hand.
"Take two swallows, no more," he said, holding the open canteen to her mouth. "Just summer change, that's all. It happens to us every year on Anvhar only not that violently, of course. In the winter our bodies store a layer of fat under the skin for insulation, and sweating almost ceases completely. There are a lot of internal changes too. When the weather warms up the process is reversed.
"I know it all as a biologist but I am so awfully tired of being a biologist, and top of my class and a mental match for any man. When I think about you, I do it as a woman, and can't admit any of this. I need someone, Brion, and I needed you so much because I loved you." She paused and wiped her eyes. "You're going home, aren't you? Back to Anvhar. When?"
"I can't wait too long," he said, unhappily. "Aside from my personal wants, I find myself remembering that I'm a part of Anvhar. When you think of the number of people who suffered and died or adapted so that I could be sitting here now ... well, it's a little frightening. I suppose it doesn't make sense logically that I should feel indebted to them. But I do.
Like everyone else on Anvhar, you're a scientific humanist, with your faith firmly planted in the Twenties. You accept both of these noble institutions without an instant's thought. All of you haven't a single thought for the past, for the untold billions who led the bad life as mankind slowly built up the good life for you to lead.
In summer I looked after a drumtum herd, but after slaughtering my time was my own all winter. I did a lot of skiing, and used to work for the Twenties. Sometimes I would go visiting. Then again, people would drop in on me houses are few and far between on Anvhar. We don't even have locks on our doors. You accept and give hospitality without qualification. Whoever comes.
The fatigue, mixed with the tranquilizers and other drugs, had softened his contact with reality. His thoughts kept echoing back and forth in his mind, unable to escape. What had Ihjel meant? What was that nonsense about Anvhar? Anvhar was that way because well, it just was. It had come about naturally. Or had it? The planet had a very simple history.
Its detector unit, hovering impatiently just outside of Brion's stasis field, darted down and settled on his bare forearm. The doctor back on Anvhar had given the medical section of the ship's brain a complete briefing. A quick check of a dozen factors of Brion's metabolism was compared to the expected norm.
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