"Is true, father," said Brute eagerly. "Some things kill Adam, they not kill Brute." "You lie!" cried Adam again, turning on him. "Why do you lie, Brute?" "No lie," insisted Brute. "You know, is true." "Lie! Lie!" shouted Adam. "Adam is bigger and stronger! What do you say can kill Adam that does not kill Brute?" "This," replied Brute calmly. With an unhurried lunge, he picked up a heavy knife from Goat's desk. In a single easy movement, he turned and slashed Adam's throat neatly. Choking and gurgling, Adam sank to his knees, bright blood spouting from his neck, while Goat stood frozen in horror. Adam fell prone, he kicked and threshed convulsively like a beheaded chicken, then twitched and lay still in a spreading pool of blood. Brute calmly wiped the knife on his naked thigh and laid it back on the desk. "Adam dead," he said without emotion. "Brute not lie." Dismayed fury erupted through Goat's veins and a red haze swept over his eyes. "You idiot!" he squawked. "So that won't kill you?" Goaded beyond endurance, Goat seized the knife and swung it as hard as he could against Brute's neck. It thunked like an ax biting into a tree trunk, biting halfway through the flesh. Brute recoiled at the impact, tearing the handle from Goat's feeble hands and leaving the knife blade stuck in his throat. Brute staggered momentarily. Then he reached up and jerked the knife away. Blood spurted through his severed throat. Brute clapped a hand to the wound, tightly. For a moment, blood oozed through his fingers. Then, pale but steady, Brute dropped his hand. The wound had closed! Its edges already were sealed, leaving a raw, red scar that no longer bled. "Brute not lie," said Brute, the words forced out with some difficulty. "It not kill Brute." Stunned by astonishment and disbelief, Goat stared at him, his mouth moving soundlessly. "Go away," he whispered hoarsely at last. "Go out of here, monster!" Obediently, Brute shambled out of the study. As he passed through the door, Goat regained his voice and called after him: "Tell the children to come and take away Adam's body." * * * * * Kilometers away, Maya Cara Nome and S. Nuwell Eli rode a groundcar that moved swiftly across the interminable waves of the red sand. It swayed through hollows and jounced over multiple ridges, Nuwell steering it with some difficulty. In the steely sky, the small sun moved downward, its brightness unimpaired by the occasional thin clouds which moved before it. The sun touched the western horizon, seemed to hesitate, dropped with breathtaking suddenness, and the stars immediately began to appear in the deepening twilight sky. They stopped and had a compact meal, heated in the groundcar's short-wave cooker. Then Nuwell switched on the headlights and they went on again.