Earl was on Tynar with Branchard of the ship Topheir. The Cyclan had somehow learned he had been on Paiyar with the Aihult
and then had gone to Chard. They predicted that he would be on Tynas and had agents waiting for him. He fought and killed some of the agents aat a tavern but knew there would be more. Earl had Branchard search for the most derilect ship he could find (the Styast) and Earl chartered it. Fearing betrayal by the morally debatable captain Eglantine, he refused to give the course to the navigator until they were in space. There was an aging minstrel, Arbush, who seemed to know something of the legends of Earth and who was indebted to Eglantine.
The Cyclan had just chosen the elderly Nequal as “cyber prime.” Nequal though busy plotting galactic domination for the Cyclan was faced with the new and extremely threatening problem of insanity in some of the older disembodied brains in vaults at Cyclan headquarters. Cyclan medical teams thought the problem might be due to the long lack of sensory deprivation. Since brains could be connected to bodies using the symbiote stolen by Brask and given to Earl by Kalin, the Cyclan had decided that the task of recovering the symbiote sequence from Earl should be given top priority.
In a magnificent self-contained and completely isolated city on the cold northern icecap of the planet Camollard, Eloise, originally a tavern dancer from Lamack, and Adara, her lover and best friend among the native Instone people, waited to hear which of they or their fellow Instone residents would be “converted” ie taken in one of the periodic “knellings” for Camsolaer to use as neural raw material for the monitor robots that cared for and managed Instone. Eloise and Adara were both spared but the experience left Adara, who though native to Instone, had come to long for a different life through his association and love for Eloise, a stranger stranded in Instone, was sickened by the experience, once considered a matter of course. Eloise responded to the accumulated stress and trepidation by increased emotional instability which attracted the attention of the psychiatric monitor robots. Realizing her danger she calmed herself and assumed a cooperative attitude. Instone was a city where human residents were forced to work at monotonous jobs and behave in moderation until their turn to be converted. All was controlled by the ancient supercomputer Camsolaer.
Eglantine knew there was a price on Earl’s head and Earl had anticipated this. Using quick-time –speeding his movements to 40 times normal – he stole and destroyed crucial components of the subspace radio. Eglantine discovered this and with his navigator and engineer – Arbush had tried to warn Earl – captured Earl. Earl attacked and killed the captain. Just at that moment, the ship hit a warp (the excessive and unpredictable gravitational and electromagnetic field flows and eddies caused by supernova ejecta impacting far distant nebulae. Resembles “the nexus” Star Trek TNG – Tubb was years ahead) The warp hurtled the Styast through a singularity and they emerged far across the galaxy near the Elmirha Dust Cloud. The ship crashed on Camollard and all but Earl and Arbush were killed. Earl and Arbush walked south and almost encountered the indigenous Krim when a battle erupted between the Krim and robots. Earl noted heat distortion some kilometres away and realizing it could be a city, they headed for it. The city was in a great ice bowl. Earl and Arbush tried to descend but fell and were saved by robot monitors alerted by Eloise who had, days before, seen the ship go down.
Earl awoke to find himself healed of his wounds from the crash and exposure. Arbush had been better off and had already been given a residence and job by Camlosaer.
Eloise sought out Earl and immediately became infatuated with him, to Adara’s great distress. Earl sensing this and not wanting an enemy obtained what information he could from Eloise but didn’t become close to her. Before the next Knelling, it became clear that Earl would be the “prime,” the first one converted. He used the violence of the pre-knelling (people killing each other to lower the number that would need to be taken and improve their odds.) to go beneath the city and damage Camsolaer. He questioned Camsolaer at a terminal, learned it had never heard of the Cyclan but had no time to inquire about Earth. Adara, Arbush and Eloise, after setting fires to confuse the monitors, had attacked a storage unit for anti-grav rafts and weapons. Using these they fled south. They were just able to outrun the monitor robots sent in pursuit though in the last battle Adara was killed saving Earl.
Eloise again sought Earl’s affection and he acquiesced only until he would leave from the space field at Breen. After many cold, hungry days on the ice (their rafts had failed), they fell in with a tribe of Krim and met a trader who arranged transport to Breen. There Earl left Arbush and Eloise, encouraging them (dancer and minstrel) to stick together on some pleasant world where they could at last rest from their travels. He then embarked, far from where the Cyclan believed him to be and far from the area of the galaxy Earth must be on his lonely search for his home.