Nemesis

‘We left fourteen years ago. Why aren't they already here?’

‘Perhaps they quail at the thought of a two-year flight. They know that Rotor attempted it, but they don't know that we succeeded at it. They may think that our wreckage is strewn through space all the way from the Sun to Nemesis.’

‘We didn't lack the courage to attempt it.’

‘Sure we did. Do you think that Rotor would have made the attempt if we hadn't had Pitt? It was Pitt who drove the rest of us, and I doubt that there's another Pitt anywhere in the Settlements, or on Earth for that matter. You know I don't like Pitt. I disapprove of his methods, of his morals, or the lack of them, of his deviousness, of his cold-blooded ability to send a girl like Marlene to what he clearly hopes will be her destruction, and yet if we go by results, he may go down in history as a great man.’

‘As a great leader,’ said Insigna. ‘You are a great man, Siever. There's a clear difference.’

There was silence again, till Genarr said softly, ‘I keep waiting for them to come here after us. That's my biggest fear, and it seems to strengthen when the interloper shines down upon me. It's fourteen years now since we left the Solar System. What have they been doing in these fourteen years? Have you ever wondered about that, Eugenia?’

‘Never,’ said Insigna, half-asleep. ‘My worries are more immediate.’