weapons, and their pale-faced inexperienced bravery, formed a protective volunteer army to protect the central shrine of the science of the Galaxy.
Foundation and Empire
Isaac Asimov
PART ONE
1.
He was two thousand years from home, lonely as only the ancient can be lonely, sick at heart.
“Matey,” he called to the lout murdering the guitar at the next table, “lend us your axe for a mo?”
The fellow gave him a contemptuous glance, smacked his fingers clumsily against the strings. Catsize leaned forward on his timber table-top, expectant, undeterred. One of the young women at the other table glanced back over her shoulder.
“You play?”
“Bit.” He shrugged. “You know.”
“My gran made this with his own bare hands,” the lout said resentfully. He placed the guitar on the table in front of him. Red and green glistened from the veneer, caught the scratches in its polish.
“It’s a beauty,” Catsize agreed. He left his arms folded. “You play it real good, zinger.”
The fellow’s lips twisted. “Yeah, well, it’s a hobby of mine. The fuckin’ imperials don’t like it, see?”
Catsize was impressed, widening his eyes in the dim light of the swig bar. “You know any...seditious songs?”
Now all of them were looking at him, hard and suspicious. He gazed from one to the other, mild, slightly dopey, and saw them relax.
“Give him a go, Scums.”
“Bit of a laugh, anyway.”
The big fellow hesitated, then abruptly shrugged and thrust the instrument across the gap between them. “Treat it with respect, zotter. My gran—”
“Made it, yeah.” Catsize hefted it. Not too bad, balance was okay. He tightened the strings. Clear notes rang like ice.
“Sing us one of those songs. You know,” the interested woman said.
“Well, okay.” With a last quaff from his jar, Catsize sounded a run of notes that turned every head in the bar. “This is a real old one, I’m told. From some place so far away you need to take a hundred Aorist trips to get here.” He sang, then, in his cracked, angelic voice:
“’Twas brillig, and the slithy toves
“Did gyre and gimble in the wabe;
“All mimsy were the borogoves—”
When he came up for air, exultant and flushed with the joy of it, they clicked their fingers, and someone on the far side of the bar hooted in approval.
“Cool, man.” The lout was impressed. “Was that about...?” Scums lowered his voice, looked around furtively. “Kurd?”
Catsize gave him a knowing look.
“What’s it mean, man?” the woman asked. She left her bench at the other table, came to sit beside him.
“It’s Creole,” he told her. “Man probably shouldn’t, you know....”
“No,” she said, nodding, then shook her head. “No.”
“Sing us something else, zinger.”
“Aw.”
“Go on.”
“My throat’s dry.”
“Get the guy a drink, Marty.”
Catsize leaned back, the large bulk of the antique instrument fitting against his body like a lover.
“This is a dude from Old Earth. Yeats.” He closed his eyes and sang:
Under the passing stars
Foam of the sky
Lives on this lonely face—
As he drew to the end of the ancient ballad, tears leaked from his meshed lashes.
Finally he handed back the guitar, head ringing, fingers numb. He went to the lavatory out back, under the white fragrance of some mutant vegetable from earth, the scent of salt and kelp, listening to the sound of the ocean beyond the pub’s high walls, and when he came out into the night the woman was waiting for him. She took his arm and drew him into deeper shadow. Voices played like mantras within the bar, enriched with bursts of laughter. He allowed himself to follow her into shadow. She kissed him, deeply, like a besotted girl, placing his right hand on her full breast. For the first time in years he felt aroused. She pulled away, then.
“They want you back, Commander.”
He sighed. She was beautiful, but they were all beautiful now.
“We’ve been looking for you for a very long time.”
He found a waist-high garbage container, hopped up on it, the painted metal chilly under his buttocks, and pulled the woman close to him. Into her ear he said, “Chomsky is closed.”
“Yes. Interdicted. But we won’t stay closed forever, Commander.”
“Open the gates again and the Imperials will be all over us like swarming rats.”
“Not if those of us on the outside do our jobs.”
“The Revolution, ah yes.” Catsize sighed. A perfumed Newstralian wind blew across the buzz garden, and the sea hushed and retreated. The woman leaned back against him, solid, alive, yes, still somehow alive.
“You are sardonic, sir.” Her voice came crisp through the haze of her long hair. She turned her face sideways, to him, allowing any spy who chanced to be watching them to assume a kiss. “But yes, the revolution. We need you back with us.”
Two thousand years blew through his small body like stale incinerator smoke.
“I find it cold out here, my dear. My poor old bones, you know.” Catsize kept his hands on her for balance and for the memory of it, pushed himself down off the trash container. His feet crunched in sand. She was a good head taller, her hair in his lips. “I’m expecting some friends. It was pleasant to meet you.”
“Sir—”
“Tell them I fought the good fight. Tell them I’m retired.” In the half light, Catsize rubbed his aching eyes with the heels of his hands, then smiled up at her. “No, nobody would believe that. Tell them I have my own way of doing things.”
The woman’s mouth twisted. “Commander, I’m disappointed. We’ve been searching for you for more than century. Am I supposed to report that you’ve become nothing better than an...adventurist?”
“Tell them that I wish them well, as always.” He reached up, drew her
