"Then that sounds like the works."
"It is. Guy Maynard, we wish you the best of luck. We are all sorry that you must leave, but it is best that way. Sooner or later you would become homesick for the things you knew on Terra. Ertene will not last in your memory, we have been careful not to let you indulge in anything that will leave memories either pleasant or unpleasant, and forgetting is easy when the subject was uneventful. Farewell, Guy Maynard."
"Good-bye. And if you ever decide whether your way is at all questionable, have someone look me up. I'll be around Sol."
Terokar laughed. "And if you find that Sol changes her way of living, you may see if you can find us!"
Charalas smiled: "No need. They will not. This is farewell forever, Guy. Good luck."
It was little more than an hour later that Guy Maynard, inoculated with all kinds of shots, was lifted into the sky in a heavy spaceship and on the way for a predetermined section of the Solar sky.
They left him, a couple of weeks later.
And Guy Maynard was headed for Terra in a broken lifeship saved from the derelict of the Mardinex. He thought of Ertene briefly, and then put the thought from him. He would never see Ertene again.
But the things he had in his mind would make Ertene's influence everlasting over an unknown Terra. That alone made the contact worth while.