Brendan snorted. "There's no parallel. We weren't the end product. We were just one more link in the chain, and we had to be taught all about the dome, because the hundred-odd of us were going to constitute its next population. We had to be taught about the air control system, the food distribution, the power plant--and the things it takes to keep this place functioning as well as it can. We had to each learn our job from the specialist who had it before us. "But the next generation isn't going to need that. That's obvious. This is what we've all been working for. To free them. Ten generations ago, the first of us set out to free them. "And that's what I'm going to do, Falconer. That's my job, and nobody here could do it, but me, in my way." "They're our children too!" "All right, then, be proud of them. Tomorrow they go outside, and there'll be men out on the face of this world at last. Your flesh, your blood, and they'll take this world away from the storms and the animals. That's what we've spent all this time for. That's what generations of us have huddled in here for, hanging on for this day. What more do you want?" "Some of the kids are going to die," one of the other men growled. "No matter how well they're equipped to handle things outside, no matter how much has been done to get them ready. We don't expect miracles from you, Brendan. But we want to make sure you've done the best possible. We can't just twiddle our thumbs." "You want work to do? There's plenty. Shut up and listen to what's going on outside." * * * * * The gnawing filled their heads. Brendan grinned coldly. And the chipping sound, which had slowed a little, began a rapid pace again. "They just changed shifts," Brendan said. "One of them got tired and a fresh one took over." "They'll never get through to us in the time they've got left," Falconer said. "No?" Brendan turned on him in rage. "How do you know? Maybe they've stopped using flint. Maybe they've got hold of something like diamonds. What about the ones that just use their teeth? Maybe they're breeding for tusks that concrete won't wear down. Think we've got a patent on that idea? Think because we do it in a semi-automatic nursery, blind evolution can't do it out in that wet hell outside?" Lusic--the oldest one of them there, with sparse fur and lighter jaws, with a round skull that lacked both a sagittal crest and a bone shelf over the eyes--spoke for the first time.