by Larry Niven
“Keep out of this,” Sylvia said. “We’re discussing you, not inviting contributions.”
“Always after my bod, never my mind.”
“Something like that. Can I change the subject?”
“Please!”
The four of them faced each other, and suddenly, as if with a single sigh, they came together in a group hug.
“I still can’t quite believe we’re safe.”
“Maybe that’s good,” Cadmann said seriously. “Maybe we’re only safe as long as we’re a little afraid.”
“Beowulf killed Grendel after all,” Carlos laughed, trying to lighten the mood. “Of course, the dragon got Beowulf in the end . . . ”
Sylvia glared at him. “You have no sense of timing.”
“That’s not what you said—” She hit him with her elbow. “Ouch. Anyway, that story’s already been written. This one we create as we go. Come on. Let’s go down to dinner. Hey, amigo—I think that leg might be enough of a handicap. Race?”
Cadmann bent into a sprinter’s crouch. “Loser cleans samlon. With his teeth.” Cadmann took advantage of Carlos’s burst of laughter to dash off.
“Hey—”
Sylvia and Mary Ann watched the two friends sprinting through the deactivated minefield, shoulder to shoulder as they hit the hill.
“They look so strong,” Sylvia said softly. “Sometimes it’s hard to believe how fragile life is. How precious.”
Who knows what we’ll find on the mainland . . . ?
Beowulf killed Grendel after all.
“Beowulf was killed by the dragon,” Mary Ann murmured.
“What?”
A moment’s chill went through her, and she wanted to cry out, to call him back, to end his thoughts of a new quest, a new frontier. “Why can’t he stay here? Haven’t we paid enough?”
Through her tears she watched him. Tall and strong, the gray more pronounced in his hair now. Her heart nearly broke.
She felt Sylvia’s touch on her arm. “Love, what will be will be. We all came to die here. What matters is how we live.”
Mary Ann picked Jessica up and held her in the air, kissed her soundly. Together she and Sylvia followed the men they loved up to the house.
It was too late for any of them to change.
And perhaps, just perhaps, there was no dragon after all.
