Edri stopped, and coughed, and started over, and Trehearne thought that Orthis listened.
"I have clung to life this much longer to write down for the first time all my formulae, complete and simplified so that they can be understood and used. In them lies the freedom of the stars. I, the first of the star-born, was rejected by the greed and fear of the planet-born. But it will not always be so.
"I shall not see what comes. My ship has already flown too far, I have little fuel, and I am old. Therefore I have set the airlock control and in a few minutes it will open. A swift death, and better than a slow one as the air-pumps fail. After that, I shall wait. What I dreamed will never be forgotten. Some day there will come others who believe as I have always believed, that the stars are for all men."
Edri fell silent. And Quorn said, "He watched the Galaxy for a thousand years, and waited."
Trehearne forced himself to move, to break the spell. "Unless we hurry, it will not have done him any good." He reached out and took the box and shut it, and thrust it into Edri's hands. "Come on. Edri, do you hear me? Come on! We haven't got much time."
Edri looked at the box, and then at Orthis, who had had a thousand years of time. Then he turned and went out, and Quorn went after him, and Trehearne, down the dark corridor and out of the silent ship. Trehearne looked up at the flaming river of stars in the sky and thought what a mighty dream the first of the star-born men had carried with him into the long night.
A sudden panic of haste came over him. Orthis had given them this trust literally with his own hand. If they failed now because they were too slow, too worn out now, at the last, to do what needed to be done.... He began to run toward the skiff, shouting at the others, urging them on, harrying them until they ran too, staggering over the blasted rock. He pushed them inside, a little crazy now himself, talking incessantly about the need for haste. Quorn took off from the ledge. They did not want to be near the ship of Orthis when they did what they were going to do. He sent the light craft racing across the dead world, searching for a place to land.
"Hurry," said Trehearne. "Got to hurry!"
Quorn cursed him savagely. "I'm doing all I can. Shut up and listen. Both of you. Keep your pressure suits on and your helmets ready."
Trehearne stopped talking. He sat, holding his hands tight between his knees, shaking all over. Edri was bent over the notebook from the metal box, reading.