Data from all across the Galaxy poured into the gigantic holdings here. But after twenty thousand years the new material was a drop in the ocean. These days the bulk of the work was classification — there were whole hierarchies of indices here, Maruc said — and maintenance. There was a constant danger of physical degradation — one function of the rock of Olympus was to shield electronically stored data from damage by cosmic rays — and data items were continually transcribed from one medium to another. With each transcription, elaborate checks were made from multiple comparison copies to ensure no errors were introduced.

She said, “You can see we would have plenty of work to keep us busy even if not a single new item of data ever came in. Because our main task is to fight entropy itself. The Archive is here for the long term.”

“Marvelous, marvelous,” Nilis said.

The community was the result of generations of specialism, she said: you were born to be a librarian, you grew up in cadres of librarians, your seed would go on to produce more librarians, for millennia after millennia. Maruc stood straight, and her eyes shone within their nests of wrinkles. “We, the community of the Archive, have devoted generations past to this project, and we dedicate future generations too. We are proud of what we do. We believe our project is in the best traditions of the Druz Doctrines.”

“Oh, my eyes, no doubt about that,” said Nilis. He still looked thrilled to be here, Pirius thought, like a glutton let loose in a food store. “But let me set you a test…” He outlined his requirements quickly.

Maruc raised a hand, and within seconds a runner was at her side. This one was a boy, surely younger than Pirius. His long, thin legs and short body made him look ungainly, as if he might topple over. But after sprinting up he wasn’t even breathing heavily. Maruc told him what she wanted, and he immediately ran off.

Within five minutes, a different runner came to them, accompanying a floating bot. The bot carried a small, battered-looking data desk, just a slab of some shiny black material held invisibly in place, perhaps by an inertial field.

Nilis stood over it, his mouth a round O. “My eyes, my eyes,” he said.

Maruc smiled. “I’m afraid we can’t let you handle it. Any valid spoken command will be accepted, however.”

The floating data desk was so old that its interface protocols were quite alien. But soon Nilis was speaking to the desk, and his words were translated into a strange, distorted version of standard.

Finally a voice spoke from the desk, a stored recording, a clipped, rather stiff voice speaking the same peculiar dialect.

Nilis’s eyes widened further. He said to Pirius, “Do you know what this is? Do you know who this is speaking?”

“No.”

“Hama Druz himself used this very desk, on his return journey from the moon Callisto, where he had gone to hunt jasofts. He used this desk to compose his Doctrines, the very words which have governed our lives ever since. And that voice, cautiously reading out an uncompleted draft — that voice belongs to Hama Druz himself! Listen, listen…”

At last, Pirius heard that clipped and overprecise voice say words so familiar that even the antique dialect could not mask them: “A brief life burns brightly.”

Nilis said, “Madam, thank you. I can’t tell you — all of mankind’s true treasures are here, and you are worthy custodians.”

Maruc observed Nilis’s ecstatic reaction with quiet pride.

His face set, Nilis straightened his battered robe. “But enough indulgence. I have work to do. Madam, if you’ll assist me — Pirius?”

“I’ll be fine,” Pirius said. “I’ll explore a little more.”

Maruc said, “I’ll assign somebody to guide you.”

“Thank you. I’ll wait.”

Eagerly Nilis turned away. Pirius watched Maruc lead him down the corridor.

The second they were out of sight, Pirius turned, strode up to the little man who had shadowed them all day, grabbed him by the front of his tunic, and lifted him up until his head rammed against the low ceiling.

“Tell me who you are, and what you want.”

The little man was sweating, trembling, but he forced a grin. He gasped, “Gladly. If you’ll just, you’ll just…”

Reluctantly Pirius released him. The man dropped to the worn floor of the corridor. He had dropped his data desks; he scrabbled to pick them up. But still he grinned, calculating.

Pirius snapped, “Well?”

“My name is Tek,” he said. “I’m a Retrieval Specialist.”

Pirius thought that over. “A filing clerk.”

“If you want. But we’re all specialists here. The lovely Maruc is an Interface Specialist — she interfaces between us and the rest of humanity. Then there are the runners with their long legs, the archivists and indexers with their bubble brains — don’t tell me you didn’t notice that! Wait until you see the mechanic types who crawl up the big air ducts.” Still clutching his desks, he let one arm trail on the floor and loped about comically.

Pirius had to suppress a laugh.

“All specialists, you see, all of us. But we fit together like the parts of a smoothly running machine.”

“I’ve never met anybody like you, Tek.”

“Nor I you. But then that’s the point — isn’t it, sir?”

“What is?” Pirius stepped forward and loomed over the little man, until he stopped his capering and stood still.

“Do you think there is divergence here? From the human norm. This place is at the heart of the Coalition, but is it Doctrinal?”

“What are you saying?”

“Nothing, nothing. Not if you don’t see it. But look at Maruc, for instance.”

“Maruc?”

“Poor thing. Growing old fast, don’t you think? She’s only a year older than me, just one year. But she looks a decade older. But you see, she can’t last long. That’s the trouble with being her kind of specialist, an interfacer. You have to know a lot — you have to know too much. And so you have to die, and take your poisonous knowledge with you.” His grin widened, nervously.

Pirius understood little of this. “Maybe you know too much,” he said menacingly.

Tek laughed, but Pirius thought he had struck a nerve.

“What do you want, Tek? Why did you follow us?”

“I only want to help you. Whatever you want in here, maybe I can help you find it.” Tek actually winked. “And in return you can help me.”

Pirius bunched his fists. “I could kill you in a second.”

“I daresay you could, I daresay. But this is Sol system, sir, not the Front. And here you need different skills. Subtler skills.” Tek hugged his desks to his chest and backed away. “Here comes your escort.”

Pirius glanced over his shoulder to see another worker approaching.

Tek said, “If you need me—”

“I won’t.”

“ — ask a runner. Just ask. And in the meantime, be nice to Maruc, even though she’s only a drone.”

A drone. That word made Pirius shiver. “Why should I?”

“Because she’s my sister.” Tek laughed again. “But then, who isn’t?” Suddenly he stepped close to Pirius and grabbed his arm. Pirius flinched; Tek’s skin was pale, pocked, and his breath was sour. “Tread carefully, Ensign.”

Pirius pulled his arm away.

Breaking into a run, Tek turned a corner and was gone.

Pirius instructed the runner to find him a private room. There he slept until Nilis called for him.

Nilis seemed unhappy. His air of enthusiasm was gone, and his energy had turned into an anxious anger that showed in the fretful set of his face, the way his big hands plucked at his frayed robe. Interface Specialist Maruc trailed behind him, looking uncertain.

“Commissary? What’s wrong?”

Nilis was distracted, as if he barely saw Pirius. “What a place. What a place!” He mopped sweat from his neck. “You know, in their obsessive toiling, here in this huge subterranean mound of data, the Archivists never throw anything away. And their search engines are remarkably effective. There is so much here, Ensign. So many secrets — so much treasure! And all of it buried under the coffin lid of Hama Druz…”