“But I—you—aren’t you coming?”
“My work is finished,” Vardin told him. “For now.”
“For now?”
“I am a guardian. When I am needed again—” She shrugged her slim blue shoulders.
“But Margot will never be content now,” Ramsey protested. “Not when she’s come so close.”
[p 125]
“She’ll understand. Just as you understand. You’ll be good for each other, Ramsey, you and the girl. She’s had only her fierce pride and her dreams of power. She has room for love. She needs love.”
“But you—”
“I? I am nothing. I am the end-product of an equation our ancestors found a million years ago. An equation to give them god-like power. Instead it made them savages and I have had to watch their slow climb back to the stars. An equation, Ramsey. Almost an equation of doom. Now go.”
Vardin flickered, became insubstantial. Her body seemed to melt into the gray mists.
The gleaming walls were gone. The black box was gone. Vardin was gone.