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Space Trap by Juanita 
Coulson 
CHAPTER ONE 
"Ken! Ken Farrell! So they finally let you come back from the 
boonies, huh?" 
The boisterous greeting startled Ken out of his reverie. He 
blinked, recognizing the man approaching him. Reflexively, Ken 
braced for the familiar punch on his bicep and held out his hand 
to be shaken. -The clock seemed to turn backward as he 
exchanged the usual meaningless insults with Dave Saunders. 
As a matter of fact, Ken had last seen his former classmate in 
this very hallway, shortly after they'd been pronounced spacemen 
by the Academy, slightly over a year ago. They'd shaken hands 
then, too, saying goodbye and wishing each other good luck. 
They'd both been eager and and a bit apprehensive at the 
prospect ahead of them: their apprenticeships. Appropriately 
enough, this place was the traditional jumping-off point for 
newly-commissioned graduates. Decorated with a series of 
plaques and solidopic portrayals of Space Service's most 
illustrious grads, Pioneer Hall's centerpiece was a mock-heroic 
statue christened "Outward Bound." 
"You look great," Dave commented as the two of them leaned 
carelessly against the statue's pedestal. 
"You too. Bio-Sciences treating you okay?" Ken asked politely. 
"No complaints. Hey, I see Survey trimmed you down, huh?"

The tall redhead winked and prodded Ken's beltline. Ken took 
the ribbing good-naturedly; his own big-boned frame didn't fit 
the public image of a spaceman, while Saunders' lean and lanky 
physique did. But public images didn't count for much in Survey 
Service. 
Ken gossiped idly with Saunders, but his attention drifted 
down the hall to the door of the Dispatcher's office. What was 
keeping Captain Zachary so long? Ken had reported back from 
leave in plenty of time and the captain had filed their lift-off 
schedule with Control Central. Just a few final details, Zachary 
had said. If they didn't meet that schedule they'd have to abort 
launch and refile for tomorrow. 
"Well, sometimes we get too wrapped up in our work to eat," 
Ken said, keeping the conversation going despite his worries 
about the deadline. "Sometimes it can be strenuous. But there's 
not a lot of exercise except on final planet checkouts. Survey's a 
soft assignment." 
His classmate lifted an eyebrow skeptically. "Soft? Not the 
way I heard it. You're clearing ground for the pioneers out there 
on the farthest frontier— just like they advertise in the 
recruitment tapes." 
Ken laughed and said, "So that's why you chickened out and 
transferred to Bio-Sciences? You shouldn't believe everything you 
hear. Survey's been a good deal." 
"Even if it means working for Iron Man Zachary? I'll give you 
points, Ken; you sure had guts, signing apprentice with him." 
Saunders lowered his voice and inquired confidentially, "Is he 
really as tough as they say?" 
One of the nearby solidopic cubes drew Ken's eye. The display 
was a three-dimensional portrait of Survey's first graduating 
class—all the famous names, many of them now legends: Chao Li, 
Greschovski, Noland Eads, R.C. Zachary___ 
He was tempted to build on the myth, but honesty won out. 
"Most of R.C.'s temper is bluff, Dave. A lot more bark than bite. 
Oh, he demands top performance. But I appreciate that. In

Survey we're in the survival business; there's no margin for 
mistakes. And R.C. Zachary's the best damned pilot in Survey." 
"At least since Eads quit and dropped out of sight," Saunders 
reminded him. 
"Maybe." Unwilling to concede the point, Ken argued, "I've 
watched R.C. touch down on planets you'd think nobody could 
approach. He doesn't jostle the most delicate mapping gear. 
That kind of skill is crucial out there in the Deep." 
"I'll say," Saunders murmured, envious. "Must be 
fantastic—spacing out on the fringes." 
"We're a long, long way from home," Ken said. "If we get into 
trouble it's months before anyone spots the signal for help. That's 
why I'm glad to be Zachary's second." 
"Mmm, but I remember him from the training sessions when 
he guest-lectured," Saunders whistled and shook his head. "Can't 
be fun cooped up with a hermit like that, and for months on 
end." 
"We get along fine," Ken replied offhandedly. He checked the 
Dispatcher's door again, his impatience growing. R.C. should 
have finished his briefing by now. He explained to Saunders, 
"We use sleep-suspend getting out to the frontier so it doesn't 
seem so long between planetfalls." 
"Great invention!" and Saunders launched into an 
enthusiastic endorsement of the suspended animation 
technique. 
Ken listened with half an ear. The latest technology wasn't 
much use if your captain couldn't even meet the lift-ship 
deadline. Where the hell was Zachary, the paragon Ken had just 
praised so highly? Surely R.C. wouldn't be wasting time in casual 
conversation with the Dispatcher. 
R.C. was a "stickler" for routine. Ken mentally reviewed his 
just-completed assignment—twelve planets second-surveyed and 
certified ready for colonization. There had been no problem at

all; it had been a textbook tour. In those months Ken had learned 
a lot, including affectionate respect for his superior officer. 
"… once they get the transcender perfected we can make our 
space warp jumps in one hundredth the time," Saunders was 
saying. "Imagine! People used to travel at less than light-speed!" 
"Time marches on," Ken cliched, then brightened. The door to 
the Dispatcher's office finally slid open. Warily, Saunders 
followed Ken's gaze. Ken's disclaimers apparently hadn't 
convinced his former classmate that R.C. Zachary wasn't an ogre. 
As Cap-tain Zachary strode out into the corridor, Ken tugged his 
uniform tunic into a neater line and said, "Captain, you 
remember Dave Saunders, from the cadet tour___" 
Zachary's acknowledgment was barely civil. His brow was 
drawn in an ominous frown and his lips thinned. "Glad to meet 
you, Saunders," he said, sounding quite the reverse. "Let's move, 
Farrell." Without breaking stride, he swept past the two younger 
men, arms swinging and jaw thrust forward. 
Under his breath Saunders muttered. "Yeah, you sure have 
got a creampuff of a commander, Farrell." 
"He isn't usually like that," Ken said, chagrined. 
Captain Zachary halted at the corridor junction and glared 
back at Ken. "You coming, Farrell? We've got a ship to launch." 
Ken bit off a retort. Zachary hadn't spoken to him in that tone 
for months, not since early in Ken's first duty-tour. He wasn't a 
raw recruit any more, and he thought he had earned Zachary's 
friendship on that assignment. Furthermore, it was Zachary who 
had caused the delay. 
But he was the captain. 
Ken threw Saunders a rueful parting glance and hurried in 
Zachary's wake. By the time they'd reached the shuttle ramp, 
Ken was walking alongside Zachary. He tugged at his blond 
thatch impatiently, trying to achieve last minute neatness, then 
asked, "Was there some trouble with the new assignment,

Captain?" Zachary eyed him narrowly. Ken risked elaborating. "I 
mean, it seemed to take quite a while." 
They stepped onto the slide belt that would carry them out to 
the ship's berth. R.C. studied the backs of his hands for several 
long minutes and Ken was afraid the man would ignore the 
question. But at last Zachary's mood eased and he said casually, 
"Just talking over old times." 
"I see." Ken wanted to take the explanation at face value. It 
would explain Zachary's snappishness; the man hated idle 
chit-chat. If the Dispatcher had cornered Zachary for a rehash of 
past history, it would have left R.C. in a very bad mood. 
The slide belt bumped them off at Berth Ten. Suddenly, there 
was no time for further questions. There were hatches to close, a 
hundred and one last minute checks to make and finally, 
clearance from the Terminal to code. 
Any friction with Captain Zachary seemed unimportant now. 
Ken's pulse quickened. This was where the real living began; 
those months in space on his first assignment had proved heady, 
addictive. He had felt out of place and somewhat bored here on 
Earth, marking time until he could lift ship for the deep again. 
In a few moments they would receive permission to launch. 
After rocketing out of Earth's orbit, out of the solar system, the 
ship would head for the stars. A distant sector of space, visited 
only once before by a ship from Initial Survey, was their 
destination. 
Out there, Ken felt he belonged. In the unknown. 
CHAPTER TWO 
Ken shook his head and tried to refocus. The ghostly vision 
had faded from his console. An instant before, large, black eyes 
filled with silent pleading were superimposed on Ken's mapping 
screen. 
Was he hallucinating? A pair of disembodied eyes on board a

two-man Survey ship? It didn't make any sense. Bewildered, Ken 
tried to clear his head of unwelcome fantasies. This wasn't the 
time or the place for wool-gathering. 
"I said, do you have an update on that surface feature?" He 
realized R.C. had been speaking to him, becoming irritable when 
there was no reply. 
Sheepishly, Ken punched a readout from his mapping 
computer. Ever since they had come out of sleep-suspend and 
started approach to this solar system, the captain had been 
tense. But now Zachary had a real cause to be annoyed. If he 
learned his apprentice had been neglecting duty staring at a pair 
of imaginary eyes… ! 
An electronic stream of data flowed toward the pilot's board. 
As R.C. studied the information, Ken attempted to make amends 
for his lapse. "The scan-ners read it as a constant, Captain. It's 
strictly a surface effect, not a weather pattern. Some permanent 
detail, but I can't tell exactly what it is, yet. We're still too far out 
from the planet. The features are blurred." 
"You're supposed to unblur them," R.C. reminded him. 
Ken stared at the back of the captain's helmet, concerned. 
R.C. was living up to his reputation. Until recently, Ken hadn't 
regretted the choice to serve under Zachary. He had been 
brusque but scrupulously fair—quite different from the image he 
was presenting now. 
Ken cued his mapping computer once more, ordering the 
circuits to investigate the problem of the blurred area below. 
Orbital entry was coming up; there was no time for nasty 
surprises. If that surface anomaly presented any risk, they had 
better discover it now. Survival in Survey Service depended on 
caution and efficiency, and following the rules had saved Ken's 
life several times during the previous duty assignment. He 
intended to keep that score perfect. 
He stared in amazement at R.C. whose burly hands were 
flying across the pilot's board, programming a retrofire. This 
early? Furthermore, this planetfall wasn't on the schedule, at

least not on Ken's tape. He hadn't argued when Zachary had 
inserted planet NE 592 into the navigational computers: an 
extra survey stop was the captain's privilege. But R.C. was such a 
demon for regulations; this unplanned diversion to a world far 
off their route just didn't "scan." 
The formation on Ken's mapper didn't scan either. 
"Got anything new?" R.C. demanded abruptly. 
"No. Not really. A dimension—fifty kilometers circumference 
at the widest point on that blurred area. It's peculiar—the 
computer says it should be coming into sharp focus by now." Ken 
projected the Initial Survey map beside the present view of the 
planet's surface on his mapping screen. "See, it doesn't tally with 
the old chart. That's a permanent feature down there, but it 
wasn't here twenty years ago when Eads made the first flyby." 
R.C. turned to look intently at Ken. Behind the pilot's 
faceplate dust-colored eyebrows rose. 
"See for yourself, Captain," Ken argued. He fed the new data 
to R.C.'s boards. Let the old man draw his own conclusions. 
Ken admired that original map. Noland Eads had done some 
precise work two decades ago, and with crude, now obsolete 
equipment. Eads was the A-One' frontiersman of Survey. He and 
Zachary were the only members of that original graduating class 
still living, and Ken had ample proof of Zachary's skill. It must 
have been exciting, back in those days when Survey was a 
reckless, seat-of-the-pants operation. Ken nursed his own 
dreams. Someday he hoped to walk in the same boots Noland 
Eads had worn—not a mere apprentice for Secondary Survey, 
but piloting the first ship to touch down on unexplored planets. 
Ken leaned forward, peering closely at Eads' Initial Survey 
map. He did some hasty computation. Eads had made the first 
map approximately nineteen point eight years ago. That meant 
planet NE 592 wasn't due for Secondary Survey for at least 
another 
. ten years. So R.C. really had bent the rules, shooting them

off-schedule to this planetary system. Why? Ken had always 
trusted R.C. implicitly, but vague nagging doubts began to assail 
him. 
That planet down there was bending rules, too. A blurred 
surface feature loomed up where none had existed when Eads 
made the first survey. What were those illusionary eyes that had 
danced across Ken's mapping screen? 
He stared at a critical reading on his second-pilot's board. 
Gravity fluctuation. 
A chill snaked up Ken's spine. R.C. was punching a retrofire 
program in fast, and early in the sequence. Something was going 
wrong. 
Nervously, Ken pounded a gloved fist into his thigh, then 
flexed his fingers. He told himself to relax. He'd ridden through 
some tight landings before. Iron Man Zachary never damaged a 
ship or lost a man. 
But was the R.C. Zachary now piloting the ship the same 
pioneer who had built the perfect record? Normally Zachary 
wouldn't schedule a planetfall ten years ahead of due-date. The 
Survey ship didn't belong here, just as that blurred area didn't 
belong there. 
Was there any connection between the two facts? Startled at 
the possibility, Ken sat up straight, scrutinizing the mapping 
screen. Planet NE 592, Typical Class M: A melange of blues and 
greens and browns. It was a world of drifting clouds and polar 
ice caps. Except for that blurred spot marring its surface, there 
was nothing out of the ordinary. This operation should be 
routine. R.C. would put them in orbit and Ken's mapper cameras 
would chart the planet for a complete Secondary Survey. They 
would land and collect biota samples, check atmospheric 
readings. If everything fitted, the planet would be classified for 
Terran colonization. Ken had performed these same chores a 
dozen times, and Zachary must have catalogued hundreds of 
planets throughout his lengthy career. 
An insistent sound nagged at Ken. It was an unfamiliar

sensation, as those imaginary eyes had been. He traced the 
source of the buzzing. Alarms! 
He gaped disbelievingly. The second-pilot's monitors were 
screaming at him, and in the lower left /hand corner of the small 
screen, a red dot winked on and off rapidly. A rasping blip 
accompanied each flash. 
"Tie in," R.C. ordered tersely. The pilot's words rattled in 
Ken's helmet headphones. 
Ken tripped the automatic belting switch. Bands of safety 
webbing closed snugly about his survival suit. Suddenly he was 
very grateful that R.C. played things by the book. After long 
service, some pilots grew careless, not insisting on all 
precautions when they made orbital entries. 
One of R.C.'s admonitions rang in Ken's memory: "The most 
dangerous time in space is when you're coming out of it—into 
orbit or planetfall. Too many things can go wrong then. Always 
suit up. That's, your insurance." 
"Three… two… one." Captain Zachary counted in unison with 
the computer. 
A long burst crushed Ken back into his couch. Usually a miser 
with fuel, R.C. now spent it lavishly. His apprentice squinted at 
the monitor. That red light was still flashing, unappeased by the 
attempted deceleration. 
They were in trouble. The reality of the danger twisted at Ken. 
Amid dreams of being a space pioneer, a new Columbus or 
Magellan, it was too easy to forget that every frontiersman faced 
death more often then he reaped fame and glory. 
Ken had never expected to see that warning light. The ship's 
orbital plotting system screamed "Error!" Their vector was 
wrong, their acceleration much too rapid: a quick ticket to 
oblivion. 
If they hit atmosphere without correcting their course and 
rate of descent, the two-man ship and her crew would be burned

to cinders. Gravity took charge, dragging the craft down into its 
deadly embrace. 
The retros finally cut out, easing the painful pressure on Ken's 
lungs. He forced out a breath, gulped in a fresh one. Glancing 
toward R.C, he wondered how he could best assist the pilot in 
this emergency. 
The ship had adequate fuel reserves and there were no 
computer malfunctions. Why was this happening? Why were 
they falling inexorably toward planet NE 592, a man-made 
meteor about to take its death-dive? 
"Captain?" Ken hadn't intended to speak. It had slipped out, 
the start of a request for orders. 
Zachary grunted and looked around, smiling wanly. "We'll 
make it. You buckled in tight?" 
"Yessir." That social form hadn't been used for a century, but 
Ken felt like calling Zachary "sir," more than willing to nourish 
any and all respect for the man's skill. 
"Here we go again," R.C. muttered. Ken read the ominous 
figures rippling up on the second-pilot's monitor and braced 
himself. The retros kicked back in another long burst. 
R.C. was on the manual override, prodigal with fuel, burning 
it off in great reverse comet-tails. The g-forces reddened Ken's 
vision for a few seconds. 
And when he could see clearly, he glanced at his mapping 
screen. 
With a start, he stared closely. It was unbelievable —eyes, a 
heart-shaped face, and two delicate hands. The image was 
crystal-clear for a moment. She held up her hands, partially 
framing the face. Slim, tapering fingers, Ken noticed, hypnotized 
by his hallucination. Her glittering eyes had no apparent division 
point between iris and pupil. They were as black as space, and as 
unfathomable. Her skin was palely iridescent with a greenish 
tinge. Unearthly, and un-human.

Go… back! 
There was no sound, and her lips didn't move. The impression 
"Go back" bypassed his senses and penetrated directly into his 
brain. This warning was without tangible form, yet more 
frightening than the flashing alarms on the ship's boards. Fear 
and a strong implication of terrible danger accompanied the 
anguished plea to "go back." 
The woman's hands moved in an unmistakable gesture, 
making thrusting motions, symbolically pushing him away from 
her. She was telling him to leave this planet! 
What was this apparition? There weren't any women within 
dozens of light-years of NE 592. Perhaps she was a sweet 
memory out of Ken's own past? But he'd never met anyone 
remotely resembling this exquisite creature with the jewel-like 
skin. 
With the retrofiring pounding at him, Ken tried to speak but 
couldn't utter a sound. He could form an answer only in his 
mind: "We're trying! You don't know how much!" 
The retros cut out, and there was an instant of eerie silence. 
Then the image of the woman was gone as if it had never been. 
Was he conjuring phantoms? , 
A new light flickered on the pilot's monitor. Ken swallowed a 
surge of nausea. Not only hadn't the retros done the job, the rate 
of acceleration was increasing. Soon there'd be a third light. 
That was critical. If a fourth winked on, R.C. and Ken wouldn't 
be in any condition to react to it; if they were fortunate they'd be 
unconscious from the heat of atmospheric friction. God spare 
them the agony of feeling themselves burn to death. 
R.C. was talking to himself, almost inaudibly. Ken heard the 
pilot spit, "Damn you, Noland." Then Zachary sighed heavily, 
steeling himself for an ordeal. He swiveled his command chair 
and eyed Ken. "We've got problems," he said simply. 
Ken nodded. "Okay. What's my job?"

The barest hint of a smile tugged at R.C.'s thin mouth. "You 
might try praying. I'm riding the solar packs to give us one more 
really good retrofire. And I think you'd better send a Mayday." 
Hastily, Ken unlocked the security panel and punched the 
S.O.S. package. That should take care of the automatic sequence, 
no matter how busy the pilot and his apprentice got. Ken 
recalled his earlier pain and steeled himself for the firing of the 
whole retro package. Neither one of them would be able to 
breathe. Ken glanced at the security panel, startled. "She's not 
functioning, Captain." He pounded relays, tripped cross-circuits, 
playing symphonies on the board to release the Mayday signal. "I 
don't get it… she's got to work!" His angry frustration shook the 
helmet speakers. 
R.C. winced, closed his eyes, Then he tapped the pilot's 
console indicatively. "That blurred spot is a dampening field. It's 
eating everything, including us, if it gets the chance." His set jaw 
almost bumped his faceplate. "We won't have any reserves when 
I'm through, but we're getting down there in one piece." 
"Landing?" Ken dared to hope out loud. 
"We have no chance of pulling her free, not on this vector and 
at this speed. We'll have to ride her down all the way. It's safer 
here than trying the lifeboat," R.C. said firmly, daring anyone to 
dispute his decision. 
Ken had no intention of doing so. But would the computers 
and the laws of physics be as cooperative? 
He tightened the safety webbing another notch and 
double-checked his suit's integrity. The planet*s surface seemed 
to race up out of his mapping screen now. They were terrifyingly 
close, roaring past orbital altitude. Digits worked across the. 
screens so fast Ken couldn't read them. 
Ken took a last baleful stare at the mapping screen, at the 
blurred area that threatened them. A trap, sucking their ship 
into its gravitic maw. 
Something else, to the west of the blur, loomed up. Ken

couldn't quite make out details, but it almost looked like 
structures of some kind. And something metallic lay close by. 
Impossible. The planet was totally uninhabited, a virgin, 
primitive world. 
"Coming up." R.C.'s breath whistled through the speakers. 
"Ten seconds to retro. Mark." 
Ken silently counted down with the pilot. Ten seconds to 
retro, or to the end of everything? 
Three… two… one… fire! 
Fire exploded in Ken's throat and behind his eyes. Pressure, 
grinding at his temples, his veins throbbing in protest at the 
assault of g-forces. He gasped, then regretted it; his lungs 
screamed for fresh air but he had no strength left to suck it in. 
"Full… emergency," Zachary breathed out. 
The mapping screen jittered, froze its last image, and winked 
out, dark and useless. The retros were yanking the plugs on every 
auxiliary power flow, draining the ship to its dregs. 
Ken's hand crept slowly toward his second-pilot's board. Every 
centimeter he gained was a tremendous struggle. His arm 
seemed to weigh tons; sweat beaded his brow from the effort. 
Somehow, he touched the lifeboat coupling circuitry. The rate of 
descent was still fatal. 
What good is a lifeboat if you're smeared all over an alien 
landscape? 
He nudged the coupler and connected the lifeboat's 
power-pack directly into the main retros. They gained another 
few seconds of precious power to fight the gravity trap in that 
blurred area. 
It might be just enough to keep them alive. 
The ship was yawing, unstable, bucking against R.C.'s frantic 
override program. That invisible monster lurking in the blurred

area wouldn't be defeated easily. 
All the way down, Zachary had promised. 
Ken felt as if lead were pouring down on his eyelids. Then a 
response shuddered deep within the little ship. 
Would there be enough power? And would it be in time? 
There was no possibility for a normal, vertical touchdown. 
The best they could hope for was a crash slide, if their rate of 
descent permitted it. Ken blinked and squinted at the board. The 
angle was flattening! Not much, but some. 
Unable to speak, he winged encouragement at the pilot. 
Maybe good thoughts would help. R.C. mustn't black out, not 
this close to victory. 
A piercing scream menaced Ken's eardrums. Atmosphere, 
heavy enough to heat the ship's hull, screeched as it raced over 
the Survey craft's skin. 
The friction would heat the metal cherry red, then white hot, 
then____ 
"Hold on… damn… you," R.C. gritted to the machine under his 
fingertips. 
How could there be anything left in the retros? R.C. coaxed 
another iota of power out of them. Tongues of fire roared ahead 
of the ship, a fiery glide path for the tortured ship. 
Steering, lifeboat, standard retros—all the power the ship 
had—was expertly balanced by R.C. Zachary. Ken's own words 
came home to him. Well, he'd said he wanted to ride backup to 
the best pilot in Survey. 
The ship, a silvery porpoise diving out of space into an 
unfriendly element, raced toward the smear of the planet's 
surface. 
"We've got to take it… now!" R.C. said, his voice a shrill

crescendo. 
The rending, toothpopping jolt of contact followed! 
The ship tumbled through all her axes. Objects broke loose 
from restraints and flew about the cabin, metal and plastic 
confetti, whose sharp edges were capable of cutting through a 
survival suit. 
Only the dim glow of the command console remained to light 
the nightmarish scene. Ken's stomach churned, and his mouth 
filled with the sour, burning taste of vomit. 
He was smashed from one side of his couch to the other, flung 
against the safety webbing and crushed into the couch's 
unyielding frame. 
A seemingly unending, topsy-turvy roll. No 
Academy course could have prepared him for this. Human 
reflexes couldn't cope with so much gravitational chaos. 
The little Survey ship bounced and rolled across the planet's 
surface, until suddenly an excruciating pain above Ken's right 
ear overwhelmed him. A red-white, shocking brilliance filled his 
mind's eye. 
Then… nothing. 
CHAPTER THREE 
"Ken! Ken!" 
Words reached out at him from far away. The sounds echoed 
down a painful tunnel, gouging at a throbbing ache to the right 
of his awareness. 
"Ken!" 
It was louder now, and more painful; stabbing at him through 
the darkness.

He flailed out blindly, trying to stop the pain. His hands were 
caught and held fast. Slowly, consciousness seeped into Ken's 
stirring senses. He touched cloth. Uniform fatigues? 
Opening his eyes, he winced as light struck his dilated pupils. 
Gradually, his vision cleared and focussed on the figure bending 
over him: R.C. Relief broke the pilot's normally solemn 
expression. "Welcome back to the land of the living." 
"We… made it?" Ken whispered incredulously. His own voice 
startled him. He spoke like a man given a reprieve from certain 
death. 
"So it would seem," R.C. released Ken's hands and 
straightened up. "Though for a while I wasn't too sure you were 
still with me. How do you feel? Any broken bones? Can you move 
your arms and legs?" 
Ken licked the residue of his stomach's upheaval off his lips. 
Gingerly, he tested his limbs. R.C. had unsnapped the safety 
harness and now examined his apprentice for injury, checking 
while Ken wiggled his feet, probed his ribs. "I feel stiff," Ken 
decided, "but that's the worst of it. You okay, Captain?' 
"A full quota of muscle strains and bruises," R.C. said. He 
noticed Ken's shocked stare around the cabin. "I know. It's a 
mess." 
That was a woefully inadequate phrase. Two meters from 
Ken's mapping console, a jagged hole gaped in the Survey ship's 
hull. Sunlight streamed through the opening, illuminating the 
interior. The cabin was littered with wreckage—fragments of 
sensors and monitors, shards of oxygen-regeneration plates, 
government equipment and personal belongings mingled in 
hopeless confusion. Part of the debris dangled limply over that 
rip in the ship's skin. 
Memories of survival training courses rushed into Ken's mind. 
"Environmental integrity," he said worriedly, pointing to the 
hole. 
"The crash gave us a new airlock," R.C. said wryly. "You

checked out the air for us." The pilot nudged what should have 
been Ken's face plate. Only a few pieces of plexi clung to the 
metal guard ring anchoring the helmet. "You got lucky," R.C. 
explained. "Eads' Initial Survey was accurate, and apparently 
there haven't been any radical changes in NE 592's atmosphere 
in the last twenty years. Still one point oh three Earth normal." 
"Where's the rest of my face plate?" Ken said inanely, still 
feeling shaky. 
"Scattered all over the cabin, I presume. I'm surprised none of 
the pieces got in your eyes." R.C. yanked free the toggles holding 
the ruined helmet to the suit. "It wasn't on the flight plan, but 
you played guinea pig. When I woke up, there you were with your 
bare face hanging out, breathing unfiltered air." 
When the helmet came off, Ken explored that throbbing above 
his right ear. His fingers came away sticky with blood. 
Concerned, Captain Zachary looked over the wound and said, 
"It's a cut about four or five centimeters long. Not too deep. Sit 
still while I try to find the medi-kit." 
"I don't think I'd be tracking this well if it was a fractured 
skull," Ken murmured. He turned his head slowly to watch R.C.'s 
hunt through the debris. For a short while, any violent 
movement would probably bring on an attack of vertigo. 
"Here we go." R.C.'s search had unearthed an apparently 
intact medi-kit. The kits were designed to take incredible 
punishment. Anything a human could survive, a medi-kit could 
weather. When R.C. had scanned the miniature medi-comp 
across Ken's wound, he pronounced "Good! The readouts say no 
fracture or concussion." 
As the pilot cleaned the cut and applied an analgesic spray 
dressing, Ken waited patiently. The procedure was moderately 
painful and cleared the remaining cobwebs from his brain. 
Anxiously, Ken asked, "How bad's she damaged?" 
R.C. repacked the medi-kit and looked around the ship's 
cabin. "Bad enough. I haven't been outside yet, but the interior's 
pretty well gone. Damned little is in one piece, let alone

working." 
That sour countenance was revelatory, and Ken sympathized. 
After so many years, Iron Man Zachary had finally lost a ship. 
But R.C.'s second record—of never losing a man—still stood; R.S. 
didn't know how badly the ship was damaged because he'd spent 
his time worrying over his injured apprentice. Ken appreciated 
that, and his admiration for R.C. Zachary as a space pilot grew 
even more. 
Zachary helped his apprentice kick out of the remains of his 
useless space suit. R.C. himself was already down to fatigues, and 
Ken noted a torn suit and dented helmet thrown in a pile in a 
corner. As he rubbed kinks out of his arms and legs, R.C. scuffled 
through the debris to the hole in the bulkhead and peered 
outside. 
"We're parked on a ten or fifteen degree slope," he announced. 
"Must have rammed into a hill. That's probably what stopped 
us."
Ken envied the man's aplomb. R.C. talked as if space wrecks 
on uninhabited planets were an everyday occurrence. "What 
does it look like out there?" 
"Grassland, some pink trees. Basically it looks as Initial 
Survey indicated." R.C. turned to the wrecked cabin and stood, 
arms akimbo. "All right. I suppose we'd better see what we have 
left." 
A logical decision, but where would they start? Ken stood up, 
and nearly sat down again. His body trembled, unaccustomed to 
planetary gravity after a month in deep space. R.C. eyed him 
thoughtfully and poked through the medi-kit. He dug out 
medication for them both—endurets of gravity compensation 
drugs. That would tide them over until they adjusted to the 
planetary gravity system. 
"If you don't feel up to—" R.C. began. 
"I'm fine," Ken responded, squaring his shoulders. The pilot 
was twenty-five years older than him; head cut or not, Ken was

determined the old man would not show him up. While the pilot 
checked the main monitors, Ken went over the communications 
console, trying to pinpoint the failure in the Mayday system. A 
brief run-through told him the worst. "Power readings are dead. 
Even the auxiliaries." 
"And the lifeboat pack," R.C. added. Ken regarded the Captain 
warily, anticipating a reprimand. But R.C. nodded approval. 
"Right thing to do, and at the right time. Good try, Ken. That 
extra boost gave me the maneuvering power I needed. Without it 
we'd be smeared all over the landscape." 
Ken started to reply with thanks of his own, but R.C. had gone 
back to the main problem. "See if you can spot a power panel; 
any part big enough to regenerate will do." 
"It looks like they're all in a hundred pieces," Ken commented, 
but he joined the search. 
Sunlight poured cheerily through the tear in the hull. The 
golden radiance of a Class-G star and a warm Earthlike 
atmosphere made this a good world for Terran colonists. But a 
pioneering colony ship would come with her own supplies, to 
build and sustain its people for years. Being stranded out here on 
the far frontiers in nothing larger than a Secondary Survey ship 
was quite a different proposition, and not an encouraging one. 
The grim urgency of their situation struck Ken. The little ship 
was a deep-spacer, not designed to support its crew on an 
uninhabited planet. They had to get communications operating 
and send out a Mayday, now. 
"Here's one," said R.C. triumphantly. He dug under a mound 
of broken plexi and clutched the end of the power panel. Ken 
tramped across the clutter to aid him. "Can you lift that end? 
Let's get it over to the imput boards." 
The plexi sheet wasn't whole. Several large chunks were bitten 
out of the sides. But as R.C. had said, any panel big enough to 
hold a regeneration charge would serve. It would provide enough 
juice to power the Mayday circuits.

Wrestling the panel to the bulkhead took the men longer than 
they had anticipated. For several moments, they sat on the 
remains of storage lockers, sucking in air. "It's going to take us a 
while," Ken panted. 
R.C. paced himself cannily like the veteran he was. Finally he 
peered critically at the imput panel. "All right. Let's get to work." 
Installing the panel drained more of their energy. The tension, 
the crash, all had taken their toll. But by the time they'd finished, 
Ken was enjoying the effects of the medicine; his muscles were 
responding almost normally again. 
He gazed dubiously at the results of their labor, knowing that 
R.C. must be wondering the same thing he was. Nothing had 
behaved right since they'd spotted that peculiar blurred area, 
including the circuitry that should have beamed the Mayday out 
into space. What else had the strange blurred area affected? 
"If we could cross-check___" R.C. muttered, slapping the 
panel. He stirred the crystalline readouts to momentary, 
fluttering life, then they died. 
"The longer we wait the more chance a linkage will go," Ken 
said, quoting from the manuals. The pilot nodded, not 
commenting on the obvious. "That S.O.S. acted like something 
smothered it before it left the antenna." 
"I know." R.C.'s expression puzzled Ken. There was no 
despair—Zachary wasn't a quitter—but there was anger in those 
hazel eyes. Was it something his apprentice had done, or not 
done? No, most likely R.C. was cursing the bad luck that had 
caused the crash. 
What other nasty surprises lay in store for them on NE 592? 
"We must have communications," R.C. said heavily. 
Recalling all the earlier problems, Ken stared at the power 
panel. He wished he could see behind the circuitry and examine 
the integrateds for damage. But the engineers had designed this 
ship with every safety feature: non-flammable, non-toxic

materials, the latest equipment, and all the interlocks 
imaginable. Either something would work, or it was broken. 
There could be no halfway point. 
"It'll work," Ken said, bucking up his flagging confidence. 
"It has to," the captain underlined. Without communications, 
they were a speck in an endless void. 
They set all the safeties and checked and double-checked the 
interlocks. 
The pilot slammed the last grounding lock into place and the 
two men stared at their work: a jury-rig. 
"I'll try it," Ken volunteered, but not from heroics. Suspense 
aside, he wanted to find out the worst at once. 
R.C. nodded, sitting by the panel. Ken kicked through debris 
to the pilot's console. His own was junk, but Zachary's unit was 
merely bent out of true. 
He played a series of harmonics, tuning the systems, 
brightening when they came to life. "It's working," he 
announced. "So far." 
The responses were a little shaky, but the console was 
responding normally. Give it a few minutes to perk on all cells… 
As he reached for the master com controls Ken paused, 
staring at that gaping hole in the ship's side. Odd. He could have 
sworn someone was standing there, watching him. It was a very 
uncomfortable sensation that raised hair on the back of his neck. 
He looked over his shoulder, but the opening in the hull was 
empty. Nothing was visible but pale blue sky and clouds beyond. 
Ken's stomach tightened with an atavistic instinct he couldn't 
name. 
"What's the matter?" R.C. queried. "You all right?" 
"Yes, just a little dizzy for a second." Ken fingered the slippery

spray bandage on his wound. "It's gone now." 
R.C. looked unconvinced, but didn't ask any more questions. 
Forced to lie to cover his own hallucinations, Ken felt 
embarrassed. But blaming his momentary hesitation on the 
wound meant he didn't have to tell R.C. that he was seeing 
phantoms. 
But for a second Ken had known there was someone standing 
in the jagged opening in the hull. Someone was looking at him. 
He had seen the face on his mapping screen twice, before the 
planet, or that blurry area, had dragged them down into a trap. 
No, -he couldn't tell R.C. The pilot had enough problems 
without worrying about Ken's hallucinations. 
Ken shook off his illusions and calmed himself by focusing on 
the com board. It had to be done exactly right, but there was 
certainly no harm in ' superstition. He crossed his fingers on 
both hands and reached for the "on" switch. 
Tingling fire shot up Ken's arm and sparks erupted from both 
the console and the wall. 
Held in the vibrating grip of electric impulses, he couldn't 
move. Somewhere in the back of his consciousness, Ken heard 
R.C. pounding at the imput panel and swearing, trying 
desperately to trip the non-functioning breakers. 
Abruptly, the tingling stopped, releasing Ken's hand. He 
groaned and slumped forward over the darkened com board. 
"Let's see," R.C. demanded gruffly. He'd crossed the cabin in a 
hurry, cradling Ken's hand in his own, looking for burns. 
"It didn't… last long enough," Ken gasped. The tension eased 
out of him, allowing him to think and speak. 
"Are you sure? It seemed to take forever to get those 
interlocks to trip." R.C. manipulated Ken's fingers, assuring 
himself there was no serious damage.

Again Ken felt that strange, peering-over-his-shoulder 
sensation. A powerful psychic urge made him turn quickly, 
hoping to catch whoever was staring at him. 
The hole in the ship's side was empty, as it should have been. 
No one standing there, neither animal, nor jewel-skinned 
woman. R.C. gripped his shoulder and asked gently, "What's the 
matter?" 
"Nothing." 
R.C. looked at the rip in the bulkhead, unconvinced. "Then 
what did you think you saw?" 
"I'm not sure," Ken stalled. The sting in his fingertips and his 
anxiety combined to stimulate both his nerve ends and his 
courage. Maybe he should tell the captain about his 
hallucination and solicit an opinion. But Ken's preternaturally 
sharpened senses sounded an alert. "Do you smell something, 
Captain?" 
R.C. stiffened, picking up the same ominous odor. An acrid 
scent took Ken's breath away, growing stronger by the 
millisecond. "What in blazes?" the pilot exclaimed. 
Circuitry simmered inside the bulkheads! Smoke seeped from 
relay covers and began to fill the cabin. 
"It can't do that!" R.C. argued, a man betrayed by his own 
equipment. "It can't. The non-flammable cut-offs—" 
Ken recalled the blurry area and the other things that had 
gone wrong. Whatever the cause, the crisis was very real. 
Adrenaline shot through his veins, erasing all pain and fatigue. 
They would suffocate if they didn't get out! "Captain, let's talk 
about it later!" 
"Right! Go!" 
By now they were both coughing, eyes filling with tears as 
their mucous membranes protested. There was one logical quick 
way out, through that rip in the hull. Ken didn't know what lay

beyond, but he was past caring. 
He and R.C. crowded into the jagged opening, clinging to the 
sharp metal edges peeled back in the crash. Through 
tear-blurred eyes, Ken saw a purplish-green meadow a couple of 
meters below. Was there time to gauge his jump? 
Explosions rocked the ship's interior, and Ken sailed forward 
and down, blown clear. He relaxed, curling into a ball, ready to 
take the shock. As he landed on the grass and rolled, the impact 
knocked his little remaining breath away. 
Another roar overhead signalled a much bigger explosion. 
As Ken slithered to a stop, belly-down in the grass, he flung 
his hands over his head. Debris pattered onto his back and 
buttocks and legs. Gradually the noise and the shower of 
wreckage died. 
Warily, Ken gazed about. He was sprawled on thick purplish 
grass, and amazingly, he was unhurt. "Captain?" 
"Over here," the pilot muttered, disgruntled. The older man 
sat up and dusted shards of plexi off his fatigues. Then he and 
Ken looked at the ship. 
She'd plowed the grasslands for dozens of kilometers during 
her dangerous, unplanned landing. A deep gouge in the planet's 
surface stretched to the horizon, finally coming to a stop here, 
nose first in an earthen embankment. Canted at a fifteen-degree 
angle, with her battered and drained power package supporting 
her at the base of the slope, the two-man ship formed a ramp of 
metal on the natural landscape. The tear in the hull was only one 
of the injuries she'd suffered; sensors, power linkage, lifeboat 
section, everything was wrecked. Survey ships weren't built to 
take that kind of impact. The gallant little ship was dead. 
"It's a good thing we got out when we did," R.C. said, 
pointing. Fumes boiled out of the jagged opening in the cabin 
wall and drifted through big gaps in the hull. 
Ken tried to think of something comforting to say as R.C.

studied the ruins of his ship; but Ken's own thoughts were pretty 
grim. That was a big galaxy out there, and Earth had opened 
only a tiny wedge into an immense universe. Survey Ship Two 
4004 was lost and not likely to attract anyone's attention for a 
long while. Considerable bureaucracy governed billions of 
humans on dozens of colony worlds. A Mayday was the only 
possible thing that might have earned R.C. and Ken a prompt 
rescue. 
They hadn't been able to send one. Fate—or planet NE 
592—hadn't let them. 
Maybe it hadn't let them repair the communications system, 
either. R.C. was right; there was no reason for the circuitry to fry 
in the bulkheads. There was no way it could have! Yet it had 
happened. Ken could guess what the ship's interior looked like 
now! It seemed they were utterly stranded, totally without 
supplies. 
In a year, Earth Central's master computer might spit out a 
tape on ship 4004. Check: present location of Survey Ship, R.C. 
Zachary, Comm. There would be leisurely cross-checks by bored 
programmers, demands that the computer trot through its files 
again to be sure. In Central Processing, that tedious procedure 
would take a month, minimum. If the computer finally 
confirmed that Survey Ship Two 4004 was indeed overdue, 
there'd be a routine hailing call followed by a lengthy wait for the 
missing ship to respond on sub-space frequencies, for the gulf of 
space to be spanned by electronic appeals. 
But Survey Ship Two 4004 wasn't going to answer. Her 
communications system and the ship itself were a mess of 
stinking rubble. 
It might take a year-and-a-half or two years to untangle all 
the red tape. Then somebody in authority would issue a standard 
order to Patrol: "Investigate 
missing Survey Ship. Last reported bound for…" Such an 
order would be low priority, buried amid demands for 
peace-keeping on Earth's frontier worlds and the need to collar 
interstellar lawbreakers.

Well, Ken had known all this when he signed on. This was the 
frontier. The challenges were heady, but so were the risks 
involved. 
R.C. tore up a blade of the purplish grass surrounding them. 
He snapped it tautly between his fingers and said, "Like it or not, 
Ken—we're going to be the first colonists on planet NE 592." 
CHAPTER FOUR 
There it was again. It had become more and more difficult to 
ignore. Ken paused while sorting through the meager pile of 
medical supplies he had salvaged from the lifeboat bay. Someone 
was touching his hands and sorting through the supplies with 
him, curiously examining spray bandage and a medicomp 
scanner. 
But he saw nothing. 
Dammit! He could almost hear someone breathing, almost 
detect a warm, live body next to his. There was a delicate, 
flowering fragrance too, competing with the lingering fumes of 
the shipwreck. The scent, at least, could be explained rationally; 
a copse of pink-leaved willowy trees grew on the slope nearby. 
Perhaps the trees exuded a pleasant odor. 
But the other sensory impressions were unnerving and 
growing ever stronger. Again Ken turned to look, knowing he'd 
see nothing. R.C. was braving the fumes, poking about in the 
litter outside the ship's lifeboat bay, trying to salvage something 
from their disaster. Ken knelt in purplish grass fifty meters from 
the ship. He and the Captain had picked this spot as a likely 
salvage dump and a possible campsite while they got their 
bearings. The vegetation was soft and lush, indicative of the 
moderate year-round climate Noland Eads promised for planet 
NE 592. There was not a whisper of breeze—no logical reason 
why Ken should imagine he felt hands touching him or breathing 
close beside him. 
He sat back on his heels, shivering. Was he cracking up? If he 
hadn't suffered the same hallucination a couple of times while

the ship was still in space, he might blame these recurring 
hallucinations on his head wound. 
"Why don't you show yourself?" Ken begged, then cursed his 
imagination. Who was he talking to? That jewel-skinned woman 
was a fantasy, the distorted recreation of some woman he'd met 
during leave. 
"Did I hear you say something just now?" R.C. had come back 
from the ship in time to overhear Ken's remark. 
"Just talking to myself," Ken replied, hoping he wasn't as 
red-faced as he should be. 
R.C. scmatted down and added a few more things to the 
salvage pile. There wasn't much to work with: an incomplete 
medi-kit, scraps of clothing, a few heavy tools. Ken opened the 
medi-kit and shook out another gravity compensation gel. The 
medicine was working well, fortunately. Without it, both men 
would spend too much time lying around feeling weak when they 
ought to be constructing a shelter. 
"We'd better make everything last as long as possible," R.C. 
warned. "I couldn't save anything out of the food section. We've 
got a few concentrates, and that's it." 
Ken nodded soberly and restored the gravity medication to 
the kit. Because they were wary of further explosions, they had 
established the salvage dump some distance from the ship out in 
the grassland, near the pink trees. The site was well outside the 
range of flying debris. Each had chanced several hunting trips 
back to the ship, neither staying long, because of the fumes 
clogging the ship's interior. 
When he looked up, he noticed R.C. staring about them, and 
not toward the ship. Looking for what? "What is it, Captain?" 
Ken asked hesitantly. "Eads said there weren't any dangerous 
wild animals on the planet." 
"No." R.C. was narrow-eyed and edgy, standing up to survey 
the landscape beyond their makeshift camp. A rivulet of clear 
water bubbled past the trees and along a dip in the rolling

grassland. "Can you make anything out of that?" 
Ken saw what had attracted the pilot's attention— a peculiarfogbank, 
drifted across the prairie. To the west, it blanketed the 
horizon completely. Like the grass, the fog was purplish in color, 
a pale, not-quite-translucent veil. "Natural phenomenon?" Ken 
said uncertainly, and R.C. shook his head in strong 
disagreement. The apprentice squinted at the fog again, then 
speculated, "That must be the blurred area we saw from space." 
"How did you determine that?" R.C. demanded. "You know 
where we landed?" 
"I have a rough fix," Ken went on. "I had an esti-mated 
distance and vector compute before the mapper froze." 
"All right. Are you going to produce the golden egg or sit on it 
until it hatches?" R.C. growled with waspish humor. 
Smirking, Ken gave in and said, "We're northeast of the blurry 
area. Can't be more than a couple of kilometers off the 
perimeter. It's almost as if we were pulled here." 
His own words silenced him, and he and R.C. stared at each 
other for several long minutes. Finally R.C. said it for them. "I 
think we were. Believe me, Ken, I've fought ships through a lot of 
tough problems over the years, but nothing compares to that. 
Something in there is creating one hell of a gravitic force, an 
unnatural one." 
He didn't continue. He didn't need to. Ken was thinking along 
the same track—if the blurred area and the powerful gravitic 
force had been present on NE 592 twenty years ago, there 
wouldn't have been an Initial Survey report from Noland Eads. 
Eads would never have returned from his mission. He would 
have crashed on this planet, just as R.C. and Ken had. 
The pilot sighed heavily, accepting what they couldn't change. 
"When we're better organized, we'll have to investigate that fog 
and see what's in it. For the moment, since you calculated where 
we landed, did you also consider the daylight problem? How 
much have we got left to work in before nightfall?"

Ken did some hasty mental calibrating. "Let's see, 
terminator's approximately… hmm… give us six or seven hours, 
maximum." 
"All right." R.C. tightened the belt cinching his fatigues. His 
clothing was torn here and there as was Ken's. In a few months 
they'd likely be wearing native materials and pelts. The pilot 
pursed his lips, then said decisively, "Let's try to rig a shelter 
here for the night. Give the wreck a chance to air out. Maybe by 
morning those fumes will be gone." 
Ken did not voice his worry that the ship might succumb to 
another mysterious explosion by morning. 
The men used the hand tools they'd salvaged as clumsy axes, 
hacking at the pink-leaved saplings nearby. Later, when the 
wreck cooled, they might be able to cannibalize panelling and 
plastics for construction use. Now they were limited to a slightly 
charred metallic tarp and whatever they could find for tent poles. 
The trees provided a handy lumber yard, if they were willing to 
work. 
It seemed to Ken that the pilot was attacking the saplings 
with unnecessary vigor. The older man ought to nurse his 
strength, give the gravity compensation medicine time to do its 
job. Instead R.C. chopped and hewed like a lumberjack, venting 
his spleen on the slender tree trunks—a man sublimating anger. 
In a way, that had been true of R.C. ever since they'd left 
Earth. Ken recalled the unusual surliness of the man in the Hall 
of Pioneers outside Central Dispatching. R.C. had snarled at 
Dave Saunders and 
Ken, though the apprentice hadn't earned a reprimand. 
A bad mood had been eating at R.C. Zachary ever since they 
had lifted ship and headed for planet NE 592: a world that 
wasn't on the regular schedule for Secondary Survey. 
Carefully, busily trimming small twigs off a felled sapling, Ken 
said, "Captain, if you don't mind my asking, why did we come 
here?"

R.C. halted his spanner wrench in mid-swing. He'd been 
mauling a willow to untidy shreds. Now he gaped at Ken and 
growled, "What?" 
Ken scanned the fog-draped horizon, the empty prairie. They 
were alone, and they were going to stay that way a long time. 
Formalities be damned. He might be a mere apprentice, but 
right now he deserved some straight answers. "This planet 
wasn't on our assignment sheet," he said levelly. 
Breathing hard, R.C. rested the spanner and leaned on it. 
Encouraging. Zachary's temper had never been violent, but just 
the same Ken was glad the pilot wasn't in a ready position to 
swing at his apprentice's head. Outrageous questions sometimes 
got outrageous answers. "You questioning the assignment?" R.C. 
was using his well-honed commander's voice. 
'The assignment wasn't on the regular sheet," Ken insisted, 
hammering the point. He leaned the pole he'd trimmed against 
some furry bushes and dusted his hands, considering how best to 
phrase things. "According to the data banks, Eads surveyed this 
planet nineteen point eight years ago. It's not due for Secondary 
Survey for quite a while. There must be hundreds of planets 
ahead of this on the priority list. So why did we come to NE 592 
in the first place?" 
The crash landing had left a network of bruises on R.C.'s face 
and hands. Right now those bruises looked very dark against a 
space-pale skin. "You're asking a lot of questions, mister," he 
said, without pique. A stalling technique, one Ken had grown 
used to. 
Ken's irritation rose to a simmer and he flared, "After what's 
happened don't you think I'm entitled to—" 
He gawked disbelievingly. Over R.C.'s shoulder he saw the 
woman! She had the same face that had appeared on his 
mapping screen! 
Standing just beyond the copse of pink willows, she was 
looking intently at him.

Not a ghostly image, this time, she was slender and delicate, 
no taller than R.C.'s shoulder. Her clothes were the same color as 
the pink-leaved willows. In fact they draped and flowed across 
her breasts and thighs as naturally as the leaves themselves, as if 
she wore garments fashioned of living material. Her hair was 
sleek, close to her head, a green-black iridescence, shimmering 
in the sunlight. 
Was he seeing a holographic picture? The woman moved 
slightly, her pink dress stirring as if in a breeze. The same breeze 
wafted across the spot where the men stood and tugged at Ken's 
torn fatigues. 
She was real. Her skin looked soft, glowing, an opalescent 
jewel stretched over bones and muscle. Incredibly alien and 
beautiful! She was no hallucination. Ken knew that if he could 
touch her, he would feel warm flesh between his fingers. 
The breeze ripened to a wind, tossing the willowy branches 
and dashing dust into Ken's eyes. He flinched, nibbed at his 
eyelids. When he looked again, the woman was gone, and R.C. 
was staring at the spot where she'd been. 
"Did you see her?" Ken said softly, afraid to ask. He had to 
know. Had his hallucinations taken on life or was he going out of 
his mind? 
He was prepared for scorn or concern. R.C. might wonder if 
the head wound was bothering his apprentice. But the pilot's 
reaction was quite different. "What should I have seen, Ken? 
What have you been seeing?" 
"Is it that obvious?" Ken chuckled weakly. "I think I'm going 
crazy." 
"I doubt it." R.C. wasn't humoring him; he looked solemn, 
troubled. 
Relieved to have a listener, Ken began at the beginning—when 
he'd first seen the jewel-skinned woman, out in space. He 
concluded by saying, "And I saw her again over by those trees 
just now. Only she seemed real this time—three-dimensional, a

living woman. Then—" 
"She disappeared." No skepticism in R.C.'s remark. He 
studied the place where Ken had seen the woman. 
"It's probably that crack on the head," Ken apologized. 
"No, I don't think you're imagining this woman," R.C. said 
curtly. His sandy brown hair was tousled, and his jaw thrust 
forward, making him resemble a human bulldog. He softly 
pounded the business end of the spanner into his palm. "If you 
are, I'm imagining things too." 
"You saw her?" Ken exclaimed. 
"No, but I've seen something… someone else." Ken gawked at 
the pilot. This was a possibility that hadn't occurred to him. R.C. 
nodded and said, "A man. Funny skin, like you described. 
Glistening, shot through with threads of colors." 
"A man," Ken repeated, trying to absorb this totally 
unexpected information. 
"Not as pretty as what you saw," R.C. said wryly, his mouth 
quirking. "I saw him for just a split second. Almost to the instant 
we first impacted. I blamed what I saw on shock. We hit hard, 
admittedly, but now I'm not so sure. The image wasn't on my 
screen. It was floating in air, looking straight at me. 
Mean-looking individual, though it's risky to judge alien 
emotions by human expressions." 
Ken had never met any anthropoid aliens, but he knew that as 
a member of Survey's first class, Captain Zachary had. He had 
encountered several humanoid races during Earth's early push 
out into the galaxy— races which were now mostly extract, 
victims of culture shock and poorly conceived initial contacts 
with Terra. But these had been mainly primitive, apelike beings, 
barely humanoid. 
"Aliens," Ken said, thinking hard. "Intelligent ones and 
telepathic."

The captain's hazel eyes sparkled, and he didn't dispute 
anything Ken said. 
They both had memorized Noland Eads' Initial Survey tape. If 
Eads certified NE 592 as uninhabited by higher life forms, that 
was that. Before he had resigned and dropped out of sight, Eads 
had been the best damned frontier Surveyman the service ever 
had. 
NE 592 had been checked out by an expert. There were no 
higher life forms, no dangerous predators; the climate was 
moderate, the atmosphere and soil samples nominal. Eads had 
left the usual monitoring devices on the planet. For thirty years, 
they would run automatically, watching for ecological anomalies 
or other untoward factors. When the planet's schedule came up 
for Secondary Survey a re-check would be taken, and if 
everything proved out, the world would enter Central's books as 
ready for colonization. 
"Where could they have come from?" Ken blurted. "These 
aliens couldn't have been here when Eads made his Initial 
Survey." 
"They're telepaths," R.C. reminded him. 
"Oh, come on, Captain!" Ken said, choking on an incredulous 
laugh. "I read about those telepathic birds on MT5. And I believe 
the Capellans can do a few low-level telepathic tricks, like 
making dice jump or guessing which way a bird or game animal 
will move. But, teleporting across space? We're ten light-years 
from the nearest solar system." 
"How can we know what they can do?" R.C. said harshly. 
"These are unknown aliens." 
"Dammit, we didn't ask to land here," Ken said angrily. Then 
he glanced at R.C, remembering the line of questioning that had 
triggered the pilot's temper. Shakily, Ken went on, "Did we?" 
R.C. shook his head, refusing a direct reply. "I 
never fought a comparable gravity pull in my life."

"The planet reached out and grabbed us," Ken said. He put 
their mutual suspicion into words. "That blurry patch has 
something to do with it." R.C. stared toward the purple fog, and 
Ken turned to follow his gaze. 
He froze, stunned. The woman stepped out from behind the 
willows. Her slender body swayed, her clothing blown in the 
breeze. 
Hardly aware he was moving, Ken loped past R.C. He wanted 
some answers, from R.C. and from the alien woman. She had 
taken the first step toward him. He could do no less than go half 
way. 
"Ken, wait!" R.C. roared after him, but Ken's mind blanked 
out the cry. 
As he neared the woman, his fascination grew. Her hair was a 
jade and ebony rainbow, glinting in the sun, her skin as 
many-layered as pearl. 
"Ken! Ken!" R.C. was panting in his wake, desperation in his 
voice. 
"She's not going to get away from me this time!" Ken vowed. 
A flicker of doubt crossed the woman's piquant, heart-shaped 
face. Perhaps Ken's headlong rush frightened her. Too late he 
slowed his pace. She had panicked and started to run away. 
"I won't hurt you," Ken shouted. He caught her in his arms as 
the woman half-stumbled and nearly fell. Ken held her tightly 
but gently, afraid of bruising her. 
In the back of his mind a persistent alarm jangled and 
shrieked. It was all terribly wrong. Something about the 
landscape was hazy. 
It was the fog! Moving out from the horizon, it swept toward 
him, a tidal wave of purplish mist. 
The woman hadn't screamed, but she gazed up at him with

terror lurking in her eyes. Deep-set, beautiful black eyes. 
The woman's struggles abated slightly, but she continued to 
push at Ken's chest with her slender fingers. Ken recognized the 
same frantic gesture she'd made warning him to veer off when he 
was in space. She had been warning him to go away from the 
planet. 
Again Ken got the distinct impression that he could hear her 
speaking a warning directly into his brain, though her lips didn't 
move. 
"Ken," and R.C. panted to a stop at the apprentice's side. 
"She's real!" Ken exulted, revelling in the warm body he held. 
"Not a hallucination." 
"We're too far away from the ship," R.C. said, and the captain 
pointed to the encroaching purple mist. 
Ken's viscera squirmed, in instinctive rebellion against the 
abnormal. The landscape boiled with swirling, threatening mist. 
He sensed its danger without quite understanding why. 
R.C. plucked at Ken's sleeve. "Let's get back." 
"Not without her," Ken replied, refusing to release the woman. 
"All right. But remember, my 'hallucination' wasn't nearly as 
attractive as yours, Ken." R.C. glowered at the mist. 
"Come with us," Ken said gently, trying to pull the woman 
along with him. If he could persuade her to come willingly, there 
would be some way of communicating. 
Suddenly, she spoke, but fearfully, as if speaking aloud were 
difficult, or forbidden. "Sk'lee," she said, urgency in her voice. 
"Sorry. I don't understand." Ken smiled encouragingly. He 
tried to project soothing thoughts at her, hoping she would 
comprehend. If she was a telepath she must be able to tune in on 
his brainwaves.

He was shaken by a violent chill, as a purplish eddy of mist 
spiralled up out of the grassland, looming above him. 
Long-dormant fears slipped from Ken's subconscious as in a 
scene from a child's nightmare. He fought unthinking panic, 
facing something totally outside human experience. 
Without warning, six men suddenly materialized. Smoke 
gathered itself into tangible, humanoid shapes. Six tall men, 
jewel-skinned and black eyed, circled Ken and R.C. and the 
woman. 
"Not just telepathic!" R.C. yelled. "They can tele-port 
themselves!" 
"She didn't," Ken said frantically, turning this way and that, 
trying to see an opening in the closing circle of alien men. 
"We've got to run for it!" R.C. insisted. The woman thrust her 
hands hard against Ken's chest, seconding that idea. 
"Okay!" sighed Ken. There would be time enough later to 
re-establish a friendship! 
Dodging this way and that, Ken and R.C. did their best 
broken-field galloping, trying to avoid the hands that clutched at 
them. One of those hands snagged Ken's torn fatigues, throwing 
him backwards. Ken lashed out with fists and feet, aiming where 
it would do the most damage. But the man's powerful grip and 
agility made it difficult for Ken to escape or counterattack. 
Finally, Ken feinted and launched a murderous kick at the alien's 
groin. He didn't connect, but apparently the threat was strong 
enough to catch the stern alien off guard. His grasp on Ken's 
fatigues loosened and the apprentice tore free, leaving a sleeve 
behind him. 
Ken raced to the site where he had been cutting saplings, 
grabbing up the tool he had used as an axe. Ready to fend off 
attack, he spun on his heel. 
The purple mist engulfed him, swallowing grass and trees and 
sky. Ken blinked, his orientation gone. Fog nibbled at the pink 
fronds of the willows now. Another few seconds and he'd be

completely blind, wrapped in purple mist. 
To his left R.C. was swinging the spanner wrench wildly, 
striking at phantoms. 
Ken followed suit, slinging his makeshift axe in wide arcs. 
How could he hit what he couldn't see? If the alien men could 
teleport themselves from one location to another, they could 
teleport out of the path of the Earthmen's weapons. 
"What the—?" R.C. doubled over, on his knees, clutching his 
midriff. He was gasping, as if he'd been punched hard in the 
belly. 
And the spanner wrench leaped out of R.C.'s hands and sailed 
through the foggy air—straight for Ken's head! 
A woman screamed as Ken dropped to the grass, and the 
heavy wrench swished through the hazy air where his head had 
been moments earlier. On all fours, Ken shouted desperately, 
"Captain? Where are you? You okay?" 
"Here! Head for my voice!" 
Ken scrambled forward, praying the mist didn't confuse 
sound as well as sight. But he couldn't locate the source of R.C.'s 
voice. Rising to a crouch, he groped his way through the mist, 
his hands disappearing into the fog before his face. 
Other, infrequently used senses came to the fore, aiding his 
crippled sight and warning him. Suddenly he could read 
emotions, strong feelings, all around him, But these became 
tangled into a web of sensual distortion. Waves of concern 
lapped at his mind, and at someone else's. 
Don't hurt. 
_ The woman's thoughts and feelings became tangible to him, 
and Ken could understand them! He felt her tense with fear for 
his sake and perceived a mental image of the woman standing 
near him, her arms upraised as if to fend off a crushing blow.

Don't hurt! 
If she was pleading for the humans' lives, Ken hoped she had 
some influence with the stern alien leader. 
"R.C.?" he pleaded. Another mind's-eye image hit him with 
shocking clarity—the pilot, stretched out on the purple grass. 
Was the man unconscious, or dead? 
Standing over R.C. was that same tall alien male. Maybe you 
shouldn't judge alien expressions by human standards, but the 
man's fury frightened him. Ken recoiled from so much hatred 
concentrated in one countenance. 
But still the woman stood between Ken and R.C. and the 
anger of the alien male. 
"Help R.C, if you can," Ken pleaded into the purple 
nothingness. She wouldn't understand Terran, of course. But she 
might sense his emotions. The aliens held all the cards in this 
deadly game, and Ken would have to learn to play by their rules. 
He felt like an infant, competing with merciless mental giants. 
"We're not your enemies," Ken explained. How could he get 
the idea across to them? 
A hand touched his arm. Not an illusion this time. Small, 
feminine fingers probed his face and head, examining the spray 
bandage on Ken's wound. He winced, a wave of nausea seizing 
him in reaction to the pain and his loss of orientation. 
Clinging to consciousness, Ken whispered, "Don't hurt R.C. 
We don't mean you any harm." 
For a few seconds, the mist rolled away. The alien woman was 
beside him, her slender arms about Ken's waist. Her black eyes 
and pretty face mirrored her anxiety and pity. It had not been an 
illusion. R.C. was lying on the ground, with the tallest of the 
aliens standing over him. Now the stern alien stepped across 
R.C.'s prostrate form and walked purposefully toward Ken. 
The woman glanced at him apprehensively. The alien carried

no visible weapon but Ken took no comfort from that fact. A 
skilled telepath who could manipulate a mysterious fog and 
create confusion in human minds would not need conventional 
weapons. 
Ken inhaled a sweet, unusual scent. Despite his pain and his 
dread of what might lie in store for him, he was very aware of 
her close fragrance. 
No! 
Telepathic negatives, flung back and forth. Was he 
eavesdropping as they conversed mentally? 
As the big alien male stood in front of him, his visage 
relentless and his body tensed with fury, Ken recalled R.C.'s 
description of him. Conflict must be avoided if at all possible. 
The alien was taller than Ken, lean and muscular, with a bony 
face. His full lips were untouched by the slightest suggestion of a 
smile. 
He seemed clad in moss, a dark green material that wasn't a 
material. Like the woman's clothes, his appeared to be living 
fabric, part of the planet's natural abundance. Was it possible 
they could reshape plants to their own uses? 
"No!" 
This time the woman had spoken aloud! The language wasn't 
Terran, yet Ken understood her. The sound was sharp and 
gutteral, out of keeping with the woman's soft voice. 
The big male responded in the same harsh grating language. 
Ken couldn't follow the floods of alien words, but he 
understood the general drift of the argument. The woman was 
appealing to the tall male's better nature. 
Did he have one? 
"Briv, fytyina…" Ken listened quietly as the woman played 
devil's advocate against her own species.

Briv. Was that his name? It suited him: short and unsweet 
and very pointed. 
Briv was unmoved by the woman's plea. Brusquely, he swept 
out a long arm and brushed her aside. Ken had expected a 
telepath to be less physical, but these telepaths had proved to be 
violent ever since they had first appeared out of nothing and 
attacked the two Surveymen. 
As Briv stared balefully at him, Ken felt an imaginary block of 
ice encasing his heart. He locked stares with him, and a powerful 
image hammered its way into Ken's brain, forcing itself upon his 
mind: a drama performed on an alien stage, without words or 
captions. But its meaning was as unmistakable as Briv's rough 
rejection of the little female. 
He visualized one of the jewel-skinned aliens, soaked in blood, 
lying on a white surface. The blood seeped from his mouth and 
from a hideous wound in the chest. Ken understood that the 
alien was dead, and that he had died violently. The wounds 
appeared chillingly familiar, like something Ken had seen on a 
training tape. 
It was a needier! A Patrol weapon banned to civilians, too 
cruel and inhumane for hunting purposes. The weapon was 
designed for war. Ken's stomach tightened. A needier was a 
Terran weapon. As if in response to his thought, another figure 
moved onto the stage of that telepathic drama unfolding in his 
brain. A man, features oddly indistinct, moved to confront the 
alien who would later lie dead. 
In the Terran's hand was a silvery object—a needier. Ken had 
guessed right. He witnessed the meeting: as the alien turned to 
flee, the needier flashed, striking the unarmed victim. 
Then the terrible images evaporated and his mind was his 
own once more. He was staring at Briv, thrown back into present 
reality. Briv pointed at Ken accusingly and began to speak. The 
syllables meant nothing to him, but the meaning with its 
inherent accusation was clear. Borne along on strong emotions 
and a few final images were anger, grief, shock, incredulous 
disbelief, and the fierce demand for revenge.

One of the woman's people had been killed by a Terran, and 
with an outlawed weapon. The implications of that chilled Ken. 
Briv concluded his tirade with a snarled, emphatic, 
"Gr'shaak!" 
Bloody images and furious emotions pounded at Ken, 
combining into a staggering whole. In the eyes of the aliens, Ken 
and R.C. were one and the same with the faceless, needier-armed 
Terran. There was no debate. Briv had declared the hapless 
Surveymen murderers. 
CHAPTER FIVE 
Ken couldn't concentrate; his thoughts were scattered and 
disorganized. Either the psychic assault or the shock of the crash 
landing had wearied and weakened him. He tried to brace 
himself to fight back, but the aliens refused to allow it on his 
terms. Ken was outnumbered and certainly outclassed 
tele-pathically. He was no match for Briv and his troops. 
What were the best survival techniques to employ when a 
man was really up against superior odds? In this case, Ken 
decided to cooperate, on a minimal basis. He wouldn't crawl, but 
he was in no position to stage a rally, either. 
He had to communicate with them, somehow. Collecting his 
battered senses, he formed a countering image in his mind, 
hoping Briv would read it and understand. Ken painted his own 
reaction to the alien's murder—revulsion, horror, a wish to see 
the murderer punished. 
The unaccustomed effort exhausted him. His knees buckled as 
he released the image and returned to the real world. They had 
to see that the two Surveymen were not conspirators of the 
unknown Terran killer! 
The fog was closing in again, and Briv's expression, veiled by 
mist, seemed as unfriendly as ever. It looked as though Ken had 
failed. He was tempted to sink into lethargy, let them do what 
they would with him. The alien men circled him, grabbing Ken's

arms. He toyed with the idea of making himself a dead weight, 
forcing them to drag him. Why should he make it easy for them? 
But their grip wasn't cruel. Firm, but not painful. They were 
supporting him as well as preventing him from escaping. Could 
they sense that the Earthman was on the verge of collapse? 
The mist filled his nostrils like a narcotic, but Ken stubbornly 
held onto his thread of awareness. He had to keep track of what 
happened and where they went, in case an opportunity for 
escape arose. 
He was being "walked" like a drunk, forward into the thickest 
part of the purple mist. West. Southwest. Yes, that "felt" right to 
Ken. He had to keep directions straight. 
Stumbling along, he opened his mind, and Ken could 
eavesdrop on the aliens' emotions. Right now, those signalled 
impatience and urgency. 
"R.C.?" Ken called. Unless heavy breathing and the shuffle of 
feet constituted a reply, there was no response. Maybe they were 
dragging R.C. along with them too. If they hadn't killed the pilot. 
There was no real reason why they should have. Apparently they 
were taking live captives today. 
The fog seeped in his throat and lungs, and Ken coughed 
spasmodically. His pants were soaked through and the fatigues 
chafed along the tops of his boots. Wet grass. It seemed to be a 
world of all-pervading dampness. 
How long would this voyage go on? It was impossible to judge 
how far they had come. Vision and hearing helped not at all. 
A momentary lurch turned Ken's stomach, and for a few beats 
of his pulse, his feet weren't touching the ground. He couldn't 
feel… anything! Not even the aliens' hands gripped his arms. 
The sensation jolted him, badly. Another pulse beat later, 
everything was as before—aliens marching him along through 
the mist, all the sounds and tactile information Ken expected.

It happened again! It was like stepping in and out of the real 
world and back again. The process was repeated several times. 
He would grow weary, mesmerized by the fog and invisibility, his 
alertness melting into semi-consciousness. Then a jerk in the pit 
of his stomach would signal absolute nothingness; and then… 
normalcy again. 
Jumps. The idea came out of nowhere, suddenly. They were 
jumping forward in space, telepathically. The aliens transported 
their human captives by tele-kinetic skills of some kind! Ken had 
read about such things in fiction, but never dreamed he'd be 
fortunate enough to ride an alien brainwave. Fortunate! He was 
a man without a choice in the matter. 
They had stopped. Ken carefully shook his head to clear the 
fog from his thoughts. The cut on his head was tender. 
The terrain had changed. The swish of grass and the scrape of 
feet were replaced by the echo of rock sliding across rock: a 
brittle, resonant noise. 
After more clambering on the rocky surface, Ken was thrust 
forward. Something white loomed out of the fog ahead of him: a 
wall. A massive chunk of sheered limestone rose up. Abutting it 
was some artificial substance. It felt like plastic to the touch, but 
it undulated as Ken leaned into it. 
Simultaneously the hands that had been supporting and 
restraining him let go. Ken toppled against the limestone and 
plastic wall. 
He squirmed around, bracing himself against the rock. The 
fog had disappeared and so had the aliens. He was alone in a 
chamber built of rock and rippling white material. 
A prison cell. There were no doors or windows; ». there was 
no entrance of any kind that Ken could see. 
Ken slowly slid down until he was sitting, his back propped 
against the limestone. He surveyed his quar- . ters: a rough 
hexagon about three meters across with no furniture of any kind. 
Maybe the aliens created their own out of their thoughts and

assumed any prisoners would do the same. They wouldn't realize 
that human creative powers were limited to a somewhat more 
solid technology. 
He caressed the undulating white wall. It seemed alive, yet not 
alive. For all he could tell, it might be mist, bleached and 
reformed, something the aliens reshaped at will. Did that make 
it a manufactured substance? He was a member of Survey, and 
this was the product of a previously unknown culture. That 
meant it was Ken's job to explore and note. 
Exploring and examining would keep his thoughts off 
unpleasant possibilities. But all his sophisticated equipment 
designed for examining new objects and cultures lay back in the 
wrecked ship, wherever it was. 
Ken sniffed the white material, wet a fingertip and touched 
the wall, then gingerly tasted. Although it lacked the distinctive 
chalky texture associated with Terran plastics, it was strongly 
reminiscent of that substance. 
Briv's plastic. That's what it was. Briv was the apparent leader 
of the aliens, and this was an alien material… 
Where was R.C.? In a similar prison cell? Ken's imagination 
conjured up a horrible picture of the captain lying dead on a 
white slab, a sacrifice to atone for the murder of one of the 
aliens. He shoved the nightmare aside. 
He stood up and walked around the room, kicking at the 
walls. No chinks appeared. It was solid. Where the hell was the 
door? Both plastic and rock were slightly warm to the touch, 
approximately matching human body temperature: a nice 
gesture, if it was Ken's comfort they were thinking of. 
His head hurt, and he rubbed his temples rhythmically. There 
seemed to be no way out, or none that a mere human could 
comprehend. Until they chose to release him, he was 
trapped—sealed inside, the rest of the universe, outside. 
Ken sat down again, heaved a sigh, and closed his eyes as he 
leaned back. It was futile to hammer against an unbreakable

wall, so he took the opportunity to rest. 
It seemed no more than a moment, but Ken realized he'd been 
asleep possibly for an hour or more. He was awake instantly, but 
without exhibiting any signs of his wakefulness—a trick he had 
acquired when he was a kid. It was useful now. Ken maintained a 
slow, regular breathing pattern and kept his eyes closed. 
Someone was in the hexagonal room with him. Someone had 
found a door, which meant whoever it was knew the secrets of 
this place: an alien. 
He heard quiet movements, light footsteps, the sound of an 
object being placed on the floor in front of him. Still Ken feigned 
sleep. Then, he was pinched —a playful tweaking of the flesh on 
his forearm. 
Startled, Ken opened his eyes and met those of the little alien 
woman. Her pretty face was devoid of any expression, but her 
eyes sparkled with amusement. She had known he wasn't asleep. 
Of course. He wouldn't be able to conceal it from a telepath. 
She pointed to a spongy bowl at Ken's feet. It was heaped with 
exotic fruits that Ken recognized as some of the varieties from 
Noland Eads' Initial Survey tape. She was offering him the 
harvest of NE 592. 
Eads' tape had assured him that these native fruits were 
edible, non-toxic. Ken selected one and bit into it. It tasted 
succulent, but wasn't going to be very filling. 
The woman studied him intently while he ate. Ken felt like a 
bug under a scientist's microscan. He shrugged aside 
resentment. She was bound to be curious, but he did wonder if 
she was reading his mind as thoroughly as she was studying him 
visually. 
Did he dare seize her as a hostage and attempt to bargain his 
way out of this mess? It was idiocy to consider it. Briv and his 
troops would smash Ken down with a telepathic attack, some 
non-physical weapon a human couldn't even see. No, 
manhandling and brawn would not solve the problem.

She was staring at him, as she had when Ken was in space, 
though the frightful urgency in her manner was gone. There was 
little point in warning him of dangers now. He had already 
stumbled headlong into these, and the situation was 
considerably altered. 
Again he wondered if she was reading his mind. How could he 
express his distaste for that? Images seemed to work. He built a 
mental picture of a fortress and raised it around his own head. It 
was crude, but perhaps she would understand and respect his 
privacy. 
Communication was the barricade separating them. Ken had 
never dealt face to face with a highly intelligent telepathic 
species. No human had until now. He would have to deal with 
the situation as he went along. The Survey ship had carried a 
basic computer-translator—just in case the need arose. But the 
translator was smashed, like everything else in the ship. That left 
Ken deaf and dumb in any conversation. 
He decided to go back to the beginning. He smiled, beaming 
friendly "vibes" at the woman. Still smiling, he pointed to himself 
and said carefully, "Ken Farrell. Ken Far… rell." He waited for 
that to soak in, then pointed to the woman. 
She didn't say anything. Instead she got to her feet and 
walked around him at a leisurely pace. Was she looking for a 
weak spot in his mental armor? He had plenty of those! 
Finally she stopped and knelt down in front of him again, 
waiting expectantly. Ken was frustrated. What was he supposed 
to do? Apparently the aliens followed a particular ritual, and 
she'd done her part in circumnavigating him. Sighing, Ken got 
up, duplicated her circling routine, came back to where he'd 
been, and sat down facing her. 
Still she didn't speak or offer any communication that Ken 
could understand. He tried a new tack. "R.C.? Where is he?" He 
painted a mind's-eye image of the captain, including every 
physical detail he could recall. 
The woman's expression brightened dramatically. She held

out her tiny hands, palms upward and said, "R.C." She moved 
her head in a peculiar angular motion, chin jerking toward her 
right shoulder. A nod of assent? 
Ken beefed up the mental image of the captain he had 
constructed and replied with his own version of an agreeing nod. 
"R.C. What have you done with him?" 
She frowned and narrowed her black eyes. Then inspiration 
struck her and she reached out, touching Ken's forehead briefly. 
As her arm dropped back into her lap, an answering impression 
filled Ken's mind. Not the clumsy image of Captain Zachary he 
had created, but the woman's vivid picture of the man. Ken 
seemed to observe his captain's present activity. He saw Zachary 
unhurt, in a rock and plastic chamber much like Ken's own. The 
Survey pilot was exploring his surroundings, stubbornly poking 
at the unyielding walls. 
That was exactly what R.C. would be doing in this situation. It 
seemed logical, believable. But could Ken believe that what he 
saw was true? The woman could be putting fantasies into his 
head, a telepathic placebo to lull rebellion. 
Ken remembered one of his courses at the Academy—what to 
do when captured, what your -captors might do. He recalled too 
many unpleasant options there. One of the less nasty forms of 
interrogation, though, involved separating two prisoners and 
letting each man stew on his worry and runaway imagination. It 
served to break down a captive's resistance. Sometimes the 
interrogators would put a man off-guard with kindness or let 
him enjoy the company of a pretty female. But generally, each 
man would be left alone with his thoughts. 
The irony of that warning made Ken laugh. He would never be 
alone with his thoughts on this planet! Briv and his troops could 
pick a human's brain clean. 
"Thayenta." She had spoken aloud, but not in the tone she'd 
used when they were engaged in a life and death argument in the 
mist. There was nothing gut-tural about this word. Her long 
lashes fluttered over those black eyes and her lips curved upward 
at the corners.

A smile? Perhaps the aliens didn't smile to indicate 
friendship. But she was copying Ken's facial expressions, 
communicating! She touched her breast, duplicating Ken's 
gesture, and repeated, "Thayenta." 
Ken nearly yelped in triumph. He had broken through. He 
hastily went through the establishing routine he had always 
thought trite when he saw it on tape dramas. But now it made 
sense. He pointed to himself and said his name, then at the 
woman and said, "Thayenta." He repeated the process several 
times. 
He overdid it. Gradually he felt something intruding on this 
linguistic groundbreaking. Amusement. The woman was 
laughing at him, telepathically. 
"Okay," Ken chuckled, dropping the elaborate gestures and 
labored enunciations. "So I'm Ken and you're Thayenta. We've 
got that settled. Thayenta. That's…" How could he compliment 
her on a pretty name? Ken envisioned a flower, mentally calling 
it "Thayenta." 
The woman uttered a tiny sound that was a cross between a 
sneeze and a giggle. Then he sensed her touching him, mind to 
mind. A countering image replaced Ken's lumpy picture of a 
flower. He saw a night scene on an alien world—strange trees 
and oddly shaped boulders drenched in an eerie lunar light. A 
beautiful luminescence shifted slowly across that cool, dark 
landscape as several moons orbited a distant world. The shadow 
of a tree fell on lush, gray-colored grass. He saw a moon shadow, 
as fragile and delicate as a fairy carpet. 
The loveliness of this visual poetry took Ken aback. He hadn't 
anticipated stepping directly into the alien culture or its 
unexpected richness. "Thay-enta. I understand," and Ken let 
himself ride on that night image for a few more seconds. He was 
embarrassed by his ineptness and inability to use her telepathic 
language. "I'm afraid my name doesn't mean anything. Or if it 
does, I don't know what it is." 
She moved a few centimeters closer to him, and Ken longed to 
touch her jewel-like skin once more. A pair of light stabs nudged

each side of his throat as a warning. There was no one else in the 
rock and plastic cell, but he had been told to keep his hands to 
himself. Was it Briv, reminding Ken that there were other aliens, 
possibly watching and listening to everything that happened? 
Thayenta extended her hands, palms up. And suddenly Ken 
knew what was wanted of him. Half dreading another painful 
nudge from Briv, he placed his fingers lightly on Thayenta's, 
barely making contact. But there was no recurrence of the 
stabbing sensation. They had read his mind and knew he would 
behave himself. 
Thayenta was struggling to pronounce an unfamiliar Terran 
word. "Fri… end." 
Ken's jaw dropped. "Yes! Friend. R.C. and I came here in 
friendship." 
Thayenta closed her eyes briefly, and Kent felt her fingertips 
caress his lips, gently coaching him to silence. But she hadn't 
moved! Her fingers were still touching his in that alien 
handshake. 
No, she hadn't touched his lips physically. 
Ken's mind reeled. There were so many new experiences and 
sensations to learn. 
She drew back, releasing his hands. But the telepathic contact 
remained with him, an invisible bond. She cocked her head coyly 
and a tress of her green-black hair tumbled over her high brow. 
Tiny veins of rainbow color threaded under her pale skin, 
transparent ivory shot through with a tracery of bright jewels. 
"Can't you tell me where you came from?" he asked gently, 
trying his damnedest to put his words into thoughts at the same 
time. "This blurry, misty place—what is it? Do you live here? Did 
you make the ship crash? And the way the wiring burned—did 
you do that too? Are you trying to keep us here?" 
Thayenta seemed troubled. Perhaps he was going too fast, 
demanding too much. He felt sympathy and understanding.

Although it was not identical to his own, he sensed a reaching 
out from her alienness to his humanness. 
At times she behaved as if she were unsure, walking on thin 
ice. Was she afraid of being slapped down by Briv? The 
relationships among the aliens were a puzzle to Ken, but he 
began to suspect Thayenta's position among her people was 
low-ranked. Everything she did and thought was being 
scrutinized. 
What would happen if she miscalculated in her job? Would 
Briv punish her? Would Thayenta receive demerits, like a cadet 
at the Academy who'd inadvertently broken the rules? Or would 
the chastisement be telepathic, incomprehensible to humans? 
Abruptly, Thayenta stood up and walked toward one of the 
plastic walls. Ken felt the tug of an invisible leash. She wanted 
him to follow her, and she was pulling the reins. In Thayenta's 
telepathic terms, he was certainly a retardate. 
Ken obeyed. As he neared the wall it dilated, a white 
membrane forming an ovate door. There was no need for 
doorknobs or keys or jailors standing guard. Without telepathy, 
Ken hadn't a chance to operate the alien locks. It was galling to 
be utterly dependent on the alien's whims. 
He followed Thayenta through the ovate door and stepped 
Into another rock and plastic cell. The door sucked closed behind 
them, and no evidence of its existence remained. 
R.C. stood with his back to Ken and the woman, still prodding 
at the jointure of the limestone and plastic walls. Refusing to 
admit defeat, he was looking for a chink. 
"Captain," Ken exclaimed, and Zachary spun around. 
Thayenta dropped the telepathic leash, letting Ken move freely. 
He started toward the pilot, asking, "Are you all right?" Then he 
stopped, reading the man's narrow-eyed suspicion. 
"How do I know you're really here—or that you're really Ken?" 
Zachary demanded. His stare shifted to the woman, then back to 
his apprentice. "You both may be illusions." R.C. waved at the

walls. "Maybe those don't exist. Maybe they're images put in my 
mind to delude me." 
Ken realized the possibility. Was what he saw truly Captain 
Zachary? After a moment Ken lost his skepticism. The aliens 
couldn't have done such a thorough job. Nobody could imitate 
that clipped speech and solemn countenance so perfectly. 
Gradually the tenseness eased out of R.C.'s wiry form as well. His 
face relaxed a bit. He had weighed similar questions and reached 
similar conclusions. But his wariness of Thayenta was 
undiminished. "What's she been doing to you, Ken? 
Brainwashing you?" 
Admittedly R.C. had some experience with tele-paths, but Ken 
trusted his own instincts. "Her name's Thayenta. I've been trying 
to communicate with her. She called me 'friend'. R.C, I don't 
think she's an enemy. Remember I told you she tried to talk to 
me out in space—warn me away from the planet?" 
"Warn you off? Why?" R.C. cut away the fat, going to the 
heart of the problem. "We seem to have crashed in a very 
convenient location—convenient for the aliens. Right next to the 
blurry area, their home territory, obviously." 
Ken replied unhappily, "I don't have the answer to that yet. 
We don't have a lot of words in common." 
R.C. snorted, unimpressed. "Well, don't let the stars get in 
your eyes, Ken. We can't count on anything. These aren't mere 
Capellan Thought-Wings. This is a highly developed telepathic 
race. That's what we're up against. 
"Does it have to be 'up against', Captain?" Ken protested 
softly. "First contact. It's a great opportunity to establish 
peaceful relations with these people." Then he paused, 
remembering. "But maybe we aren't 
their first contact with Terrans. I saw a dead alien; a Terran 
killed him with a needier." 
Morose, R.C. nodded. "Yes, I got the same message, when I 
first woke up in this cell. I felt a lot of anger riding with it. We're

lucky they didn't kill us outright." 
"It wasn't luck," Ken countered. "Thayenta was our defense 
lawyer. It's hard to communicate with her, but in time it will 
work. Sooner or later she'll explain the significance of this blurry 
area and why its gravitic effect made us crash." 
R.C.'s response shook Ken. The man solemnly wagged his head 
and said, "Not necessarily. It might have been… something else." 
For a moment he seemed lost in bleak thoughts. Then he looked 
up and forced a smile at the woman. "Thayenta. That's a pretty 
name." It was a labored attempt at diplomacy, and it didn't 
come easily to the gruff space vet. 
"She really is trying to help us, Captain," Ken vowed. "We've 
got to trust her." 
"Interesting. If she hadn't shown herself to you out by the 
shipwreck we might not have fallen into this trap." 
Defensively, Ken flared, "Trap? We had already fallen into the 
trap when we entered this solar system. We didn't have a prayer 
once that gravity field locked onto us. Once we were down, Briv 
had control over us. We ought to be grateful to Thayenta for 
pleading our case." 
He hesitated, surprised at his bluntness. His response had 
bordered on insubordination. But discipline and formality were 
lax on two-man Survey teams. A rugged, easy-going camaraderie 
went with the job, which kept a man from going mad for lack of 
human sociability. 
To his relief, R.C. took no offense. "You called him Briv. Good. 
Now we've got a name to work with. All right, I'll concede at least 
one point—if the woman hadn't intervened, we might be dead by 
now." 
A series of unwelcome questions persisted in Ken's mind. 
There were too many mysteries—and not all of them concerning 
the aliens. Ken checked off the unanswered questions in his 
mind: a Terran with a needier weapon, a detour to a planet not 
on the Survey schedule; the diversion R.C. had set up, causing

the ship to be in the wrong place at the wrong time. Growing 
impatience with their predicament forced Ken over the protocol 
line again. "You never did answer my question, Captain. Why 
were we coming into orbit around NE 592?" 
Thayenta was troubled, dismayed by impending conflict 
between the two Terrans. Ken felt her concern lap his mind, a 
desire for peace. 
Then the wall nearest him melted. There was no mere ovate 
door this time but a disappearance of the white plastic. It simply 
ceased to exist. 
Ken stared out into a chamber with no discernible 
boundaries. Horizons vanished into space-black shadows; planes 
and angles became lost in stygian darkness. In the center was a 
haven of light, seemingly suspended in a void. A cluster of aliens 
knelt around a glowing transparent dome, a couple of meters in 
diameter. 
Nine aliens—six males and three females. Thay-enta made 
ten. Was this all of them? If it was an alien colony, it was a 
damned small one. 
Another possibility popped into Ken's mind. Maybe the aliens 
weren't colonizers but rather an expeditionary force, an advance 
exploration team for future colonists—as Ken and R.C. were. 
"Council," R.C. said, sotto voce. 
Ken agreed. The aliens formed an inward-facing circle around 
the glowing dome. Their hands were clenched into fists and 
resting on their thighs, their eyes squinted. Were they 
concentrating, putting out telepathic effort? 
Thayenta edged close to him and Ken caught a scent that 
hadn't been there moments before. It was sweetly redolent and 
very strong. An old phrase seemed appropriate—the scent of fear. 
What was the subject of this council? Were they debating the 
humans' fate? Briv knelt at the far side of the circle, and his 
countenance wasn't reassuring. That bony face was taut and the

dark eyes squinted into nothingness. 
Ken put his arm around Thayenta, drawing her close. She was 
trembling. Was she afraid for herself, or for him? It was 
comforting to think she cared about what happened to him—an 
alien, and a member of a species who had apparently murdered 
one of the jewel-skinned people. 
But her concern was probably practical and personal. Briv 
had knocked her aside during that fracas near the ship. He had 
silenced her up as though she were an inconsequential nuisance, 
or an apprentice. That was a situation he could empathize with. 
In some systems, an apprentice was tightly bound by rules and 
regulations. Thayenta had broken the rules and presumed above 
her station, warning the Terrans of danger, and speaking out of 
turn. 
How much had she risked by taking the humans' side? Was it 
a generous impulse that might cost her dearly? For all Ken knew, 
her life might be on the line as a result. And her gesture was 
futile from the first. Once that gravity trap closed on their ship, 
there was nothing Ken or R.C. could do to avoid crashing on the 
planet. Thayenta must have assumed human technology was 
much more formidable than it actually was. 
He was being dragged forward: he and R.C. and Thayenta 
were telepathically hustled into the shadow-framed chamber. 
Ken scruffed his boots along the uneven plastic floor, resisting, 
but to little avail. Too much power pulled at him. 
Briv got to his feet, and the other aliens turned to face the new 
arrivals. All wore masks of flesh; absolutely nothing showed in 
their expressions—neither hatred nor friendship. 
Briv walked around the glowing dome, coming toward the 
humans and Thayenta. He jerked up his left arm and the dome 
disappeared. In its place stood a concretion of scintillating light, 
an iridescent blob, unlike the transparent dome. 
Ken found himself unable to look at it. It hurt his eyes merely 
to catch sidelong glimpses of the bright rainbow-colored object. 
He winced away from a direct stare.

Held in rigid telepathic manacles, Ken was unable to move a 
muscle. He sensed a terrible tension among the aliens and felt 
Thayenta's fear as forcefully as if she'd screamed. 
Briv plucked at the air again, and some of the unbearable 
brightness faded from the brilliant blob of color. Ken could see it 
clearly, though he had to half-shut his eyes. The thing behaved 
like a prism— shattering white light into the spectrum. How it 
did so, and where the source of the white light lay, Ken couldn't 
begin to guess. Despite the prismatic function, the object 
resembled a shapeless lump, its form shifting constantly. 
Then Ken saw that Briv was holding a metallic object, a 
smooth oblong contrivance, roughly ten centimeters long. The 
alien leader's moss green clothing molded itself to his body, 
leaving no margin for pockets. Where had Briv gotten the metal 
object? 
Had he plucked it out of the air, perhaps? 
That made a crazy kind of sense. Briv had grabbed the air, 
causing the lumpish prism to lose some of its glitter. The prism 
must have transmitted the metallic oblong to this chamber from 
somewhere else. An alien matter transmitter! 
But Briv didn't aim the object at the helpless humans. Instead 
he lifted it toward his throat. The green moss of his clothing 
changed form, growing a tendril, a mossy cord on which to hang 
the metal oblong. Ken goggled with admiration. If you need a 
pocket or an extra sleeve just think it into existence. If only 
humans had such abilities! 
Briv spoke. His lips moved, but the words weren't coming 
from his mouth. They issued from the metallic oblong slung 
against his chest, and the words were Terran. Inflectionless, 
mechanical, shimmeringly filtered. 
"You will know and we will know many questions and many 
answers. You are the same as the death-bringers. Then tell us: 
why do you not deserve death for what you have done to our 
brother, Hli?"

CHAPTER SIX 
"A translator!" Ken exclaimed. 
"And beautiful miniaturization." R.C. agreed with his usual 
detachment. 
Ken growled, "Why the hell didn't they use that in the first 
place? Why have we had to flail around like this, trying to guess 
what they're saying?" : "Wait," the captain warned. "Listen. 
We've got to dig for every nuance. Don't miss anything." 
True. One misinterpreted syllable, and the humans might die. 
Loudly, addressing Briv, R.C. said, "We want to know what 
happened, too. Why do you call us the death-bringers? We 
brought you no death. We do not even carry weapons." 
A risky revelation, but probably necessary to gain the aliens' 
trust. The aliens didn't look at each other. All of them stared 
hard at R.C. Ken presumed the translator worked both ways, 
converting human speech into the aliens' own tongue—or into 
their thought patterns. 
"Death-bringers. Your kind," and Briv pointed accusingly at 
the two Surveymen. A corroborating image rammed into Ken's 
mind. Thayenta's telepathic pictures were gentle, flowing softly. 
Briv threw his mental communications like barbed spears. 
Ken saw himself, R.C., and a number of other humans. Except 
for the two Surveymen, the Terrans were indistinguishable, their 
features vague. The clothes were identical. At first the 
cookie-cutter sameness of the people puzzled him. Then an old 
joke cropped up in his mind: "All those aliens look alike to me." 
Briv lumped all humans together with bigoted disdain. 
Then a second telepath intruded into the strange 
conversation. A softer "voice" fleshed out the unknown humans 
somewhat. They didn't acquire individuality—as had Ken and 
R.C. in the images— but they came alive. 
Thayenta piped up. An apprentice timidly worming her way

into a high-level alien conference, she was speaking out of turn, 
again. 
The telepathic picture broadened. The humans were in a 
natural setting, moving about in a valley with purplish grass and 
other flora indigenous to planet NE 592. 
"Humans," he said incredulously. "Here. On this world. 
They've seen other humans right here!" 
It didn't make any sense at all. Or did it? The last images Ken 
had spotted on his mapping screen, just before the ship lost total 
control up there in space, were of structures of some 
kind—buildings. "R.C," Ken said uncertainly. "That doesn't 
surprise you, does it?" 
"We'll talk about it later," the pilot temporized. He 
concentrated on the immediate problem, talking to Briv. "We 
did not know these people were on this planet. I assure you, we 
did not know—" 
Invisible claws raked through Ken's brain. Talons of pain and 
pressure dug into his temples and along the surface of his scalp 
wound. He felt rather than heard R.C. groan under a similar 
assault. It was a massive invasion; the telepaths pawed 
relentlessly through the humans' minds, seeking information. 
Battered by pain, Ken dropped to his knees. Thayenta 
clutched his arm sympathetically, tears spilling from her black 
eyes. The cruel interrogation raged on, about to crack his skull. 
R.C. told them the Surveymen weren't armed. They hadn't 
drawn first blood. Why were they being subjected to this 
torture? 
But maybe other Terrans had killed one of the aliens. Who 
was the human with the needier? Since Briv lumped all humans 
together into the same file and labelled it "Killers," Ken and R.C. 
had to suffer for that crime. 
Fresh pain hit Ken, a deep, emotional wrench that tore a 
phantom limb from his psychic body. Thayenta was staggering

across the vast chamber, her hands out, palms upward in appeal. 
Ken forced a cry past his constricted vocal cords. "Thayenta! 
No!" 
Even as he spoke she was driven downward, falling to the floor 
and writhing. Briv hadn't struck her with his fists. But a 
telepathic blow was just as potent. 
Fury hit Ken in a red flood. Adrenaline charged energy into 
his shaking body enabling him to move. He half-crawled across 
the room to the alien woman and knelt beside her. 
There was no mark on her, but her pain was real. She sobbed 
in agony. 
Enraged, Ken gathered himself to smash fists into Briv's hard 
face. 
Instantly, the pain in his head was gone, leaving a receding 
pool of acid dribbling away from his consciousness. 
"We see. We know." Briv, using the alien translator, deigning 
to speak. And for the first time there was a conciliatory 
expression softening Briv's bony features. 
His peacemaking gesture came almost too late. Ken stomped 
forward, wanting only to avenge the recent telepathic outrages. 
Against that, Ken was inundated with new, warm emotions. Was 
it an apology? A definite shift in mood emanated from Briv and 
the other aliens circled around the bright prism. 
"Ken," R.C. appealed. Ken glanced behind him. Thayenta 
wasn't writhing any more, and the pilot helped her to her feet. 
R.C. too, released from telepathic bondage, was able to move 
now. 
Another voice added its weight to the captain's. Thayenta held 
out a hand, supplicating. "Ken…" Calmness washed over him, 
soothing his rage. The combined alien goodwill campaign was 
effective. Thayenta clinched it with, "Ken, we see," repeating 
Briv's announcement.

Gradually, Ken's lethal fury melted. But he threw Briv one last 
glare. 
The pleasant, apologetic "vibes" continued unabated. Was it 
possible Ken had scored a telling point? 
R.C. was supporting Thayenta. She still looked a little shaken. 
And the pilot's face was pale, testimony to the pain he'd endured. 
"We had not realized this of you," Briv's translator was 
relaying. "You Terrans are very different from our kind." 
Ken got the distinct impression Briv had almost called them 
"death-bringers" again, then changed the description. Another 
concession? Briv didn't appear to be someone who would make 
many of those. 
"What didn't you realize?" R.C. cut in. "That we would fight 
back, if we could? That we didn't kill one of your people? That we 
really didn't know there were other humans on this planet?" 
Briv's dark gaze shifted calculatingly toward R.C. "You did not 
know. Yet you came here to look for them." 
The remark left the Survey pilot very uncomfortable. It was a 
temptation, an opening Ken had to resist manfully. He had some 
questions along exactly those lines himself. But now it was 
necessary to present a united front, to convince Briv the two 
humans agreed on everything. Later, when he and R.C. were 
alone, Ken intended to find out the answers. 
But the likelihood of their ever being alone on a planet they 
shared with ten telepaths was slim. That was an aspect of 
human-alien contact that Ken had never considered before this 
survey. 
Briv and Thayenta looked at each other intently. Ken felt a 
subliminal tingling. Was he picking up more telepathic slopover? 
He might be a sensitive, with a latent talent for detecting such 
communications. There was little opportunity to practise the 
skill among humans.

But the result was a frustrating partial deafness. Ken felt the 
play of emotions back and forth—stern resolution, tolerance, a 
desire for satisfaction in some grim matter, and a willingness to 
compromise. But no details, no specifics came through. 
An odd expression reshaped Briv's hard face. He seemed 
amused, a man listening to a child's humor or a teasing passage 
of music. Then, abruptly, he plucked the translator off his 
clothing. The moss green fabric instantly reshaped itself, 
absorbing the thong it had created. Briv offered the precious 
metallic oblong to Thayenta. 
She didn't smile, but her joy winged its way to Ken, and he 
read her surprise and pleasure in the heightened color of her 
skin and the sparkle in her eyes. She raised the translator to her 
throat, and her pink robes formed a thong suitable for holding 
the object. He noted wryly that her telepathic dress designing 
was done with a woman's touch: the translator was suspended 
from a cord shot through with silvery threads intertwining with 
the leaflike pink. 
The translator reduced language to toneless phonemes, totally 
impersonal. But Thayenta's words meant something still. "We 
did not know you would suffer such pain. Real pain. It is because 
you have no… no shields." 
Of course. If the telepaths could wield mental weapons against 
each other, they must have developed self defenses over the 
millennia. Maybe Thay-enta hadn't been in such agony as she'd 
seemed. The puny humans, on the other hand, were wide open 
for telepathic attack. Their evolution had taken a different turn; 
they relied on speech rather than thought transmission. 
"He attacked you with the pain, too," Ken accused, glaring at 
Briv. 
"That is another matter," Thayenta said, glancing nervously at 
the alien leader. Briv was listening closely. It must be an effort 
for him, this abnormal method of communication. The aliens 
didn't seem to use speech much at all—except for Thayenta. 
R.C. cleared his throat and said loftily, "Then may we assume

you apologize for our ill treatment?" Ken envied the pilot's 
aplomb. The captain spoke as calmly as if they were all seated 
around a conference table. 
Ken felt a bubble of telepathic discussion among the circle of 
aliens. At last they gave instructions to Thayenta. He was 
relieved that she was to act as their spokeswoman. She said, 
"Yes. We are sorry for your pain." She gave certain words 
emphasis by pronouncing them loudly, and the translator 
duplicated her volume. "That is our way to find truth. But we did 
not know your minds were so… fragile." 
Thayenta's statements were broken with awkward pauses as 
she sought for precise phrases. Was she afraid she'd make a 
mistake? Ken knew the feeling. An apprentice is always putting 
his foot in it. Only during this past year, out from under the 
Academy's smothering influence, had Ken himself gained polish 
and confidence, losing his greener mannerisms. Was Thayenta 
fresh out of an alien Academy, still unsure of herself? 
"You look just like the death-bringers," Thayenta explained. 
'"Briv—we assumed you had come to join them, to bring death, 
as they did." 
A little slip of the tongue there? Briv had assumed, and he was 
the leader. But had all of the aliens assumed the Surveymen were 
"death-bringers"? Thayenta had tried to warn Ken away from 
the planet, so her motives at least had to be ambiguous. 
R.C. spoke to the alien leader. "According to our maps, there 
are none of our people on this world save ourselves'; And 
according to our maps you shouldn't be here, either. We are very 
curious to know where you came from." 
Silence. Thayenta looked timorously at Briv, awaiting 
instructions. 
Briv jerked his head in that alien nod, chin toward his right 
shoulder. Permission granted, Thayenta went on, "We are the 
M'Nae. We came here with the Gera-ana. This world is ours. We 
were here before the death-bringers came."

Ken and R.C. glanced at one another. The pilot spoke for them 
both. "In what way did you come to this world? Our people came 
to this world twenty orbits ago." Since there wouldn't be any 
exact cor-relation for Terran "years," he settled on "orbits" 
logically. R.C. went on slowly, "Our people explored this world, 
and there was no one here. Not our people …or the M'Nae." 
Briv tensed and looked sharply at Thayenta, winging an order 
her way silently. She hastily used the translator again. "It is the 
world of the M'Nae. We were here before the death-bringers." 
"Apparently that's their story and we're stuck with it," Ken 
muttered. He stared at the prism of shifting •shapes, the alien 
transmitter. What kind of range did it have? Enough to send the 
M'Nae from one world to another? 
But the theory of matter transmitters demanded a reception 
point—some kind of focussing device—at the terminal. 
R.C. sighed, giving up on his original tack, adopting another. 
"Very well. May we know what happened between you and these 
death-bringers? You showed us an image of one of the M'Nae 
lying dead. And you showed us a human with a weapon. How did 
the death occur? Was there a battle?" 
More telepathic conferring. When it was over, Thayenta said, 
"Hli was our speaker, our dealer with other peoples—should we 
meet any. When we saw the death-bringers come, Hli went to 
them to speak with them. He was to tell them that this is our 
world, and they must leave it to the M'Nae." 
"Ambassador from the M'Nae to the Terrans," Ken speculated 
softly. 
"And an ambassador should be secure from attack," R.C. said. 
Thayenta licked her pale lips, shivering at the memory of what 
had happened. "They would not let Hli speak. They came at him 
with evil. Hli tried to come back to the shadow of the Iontran. 
But before he could, one of the death-bringers killed him." 
Again that bloody image, a recreation of tragedy, erupted in

Ken's mind, underlining Thayenta's narration. The effect wasn't 
dulled by repetition. 
"Iontran," he said when the murderous image faded. "The 
shadow of the Iontran." He wove pieces of the puzzle together. 
There were still many gaps in it, but the holes were filling up. 
That prism, the blurred area they'd seen from space, the purple 
mist; the Iontran could have been any one of those items, or all 
of them together. 
There had been a debate among the M'Nae. Now Briv 
snatched the translator back from Thayenta rudely, saying, "You 
are of the same species as the death-bringers. They will not kill 
you. They will listen to you." 
"… and you want us to carry the message this time," R.C. 
finished for the alien leader. 
The "death-bringers" had already killed the M'Nae 
ambassador in cold blood. What guarantee was there that they 
wouldn't shoot anyone on sight—human or not? 
"Yes! This is M'Nae world. The Gera-ana is now in place. Soon 
our followers will come. The world must be ready for the M'Nae!" 
More of them were coming. That meant more chances for 
fatal clashes between M'Nae and humans. 
Ken pondered the crux of the matter. Who were those other 
humans, the death-bringers? "A shipwreck," he said, the logic 
inescapable. The captain didn't respond. Ken pursued the point. 
"If some humans crashed here, maybe they were dragged down 
by that same gravity force. And maybe they've got a working 
sub-space radio left. But if that's true, why haven't they sent out 
an S.O.S.?" 
"Perhaps they did, and Earth Central hasn't received it yet." 
R.C. said. 'We're a long ways out." 
"Not that far out," Ken argued, unconvinced. R.C. let it lie. 
The variables stretched in all directions. "There's only one way 
we're going to get to the bottom of this. Take the M'Nae up on it.

We'll have to go and talk with these 'death-bringers'." 
"If we can get to them without being killed," R.C. reminded 
him. "At least the M'Nae are willing to let us try." 
Zachary turned to Briv and said formally, "We will present the 
M'Nae claim to these other humans. But how shall we go to 
them? We don't know where we are. You have captured us and 
brought us to this place in the mist. Our ship has been 
destroyed, and all our equipment…" 
Destroyed by telepathic overload? Ken wondered. If Briv could 
bring him and the captain to the ground with those telepathic 
claws and materialize objects out of nothing, he could probably 
burn the supposedly non-flammable, non-explosive wiring inside 
a ship's bulkheads. 
Briv stabbed a ringer at Thayenta. "She will go with you." 
Thayenta jumped. Apparently that physical reac-tion was the 
same for both M'Nae and humans. Ken put himself in her 
shoes—ordered to volunteer for a very dangerous mission. The 
last M'Nae who'd ventured into the territory of these unknown 
humans had ended up dead. 
R.C. wasn't pleased by the assignment. "That won't be 
necessary. If you'll just show us the way, we will arrange to meet 
the Terrans ourselves." 
"She will go with you," Briv said with heavy finality. This 
decision wasn't for the humans' convenience, but for the M'Nae. 
"She is now our speaker, our dealer with other peoples. She will 
find for us the death-bringer who killed Hli." 
As a result of his ambassador's death, Briv was short a 
subordinate so he would appoint a new ambassador: An 
apprentice who liked to talk too much and lowered herself to the 
point of associating with humans. There was a tinge of sadism in 
Briv's order. 
He was sending R.C. and Ken out as Judas goats, and 
Thayenta along as a spy and a cheap sacrifice, if required. They

must go to the humans who had killed the first ambassador, 
pinpoint the murderer, and then deliver the man to the M'Nae. 
Ken had gone through an exquisitely painful sample of Briv's 
punishment technique—a simple search for information. What 
would Briv do to the man who had killed his ambassador? Maybe 
the .human had panicked, seeing an alien on this supposedly 
uninhabited world. 
"We'll have to accept," R.C. whispered, unhappy at the 
prospect. 
"Captain, if the woman is going with us, I can work with her," 
Ken said encouragingly. "She's not vindictive. There will be some 
cooperation going both ways." 
"Maybe you can reach her, Ken, but so can Briv," R.C. said. 
"However, we have no choice." 
The alien leader returned the translator to Thayenta. It 
seemed to constitute the only supplies she was going to get on 
her hazardous assignment. Briv eyed the translator with disgust, 
glad to be rid of it. In his view, it was merely a device to cope 
with an inferior, non-telepathic race, not a useful tool. 
Thayenta pulled her shoulders back and held her head high, 
silently acknowledging her orders and receipt of the translator. 
Then she walked toward Ken and R.C. She looked apprehensive, 
a young woman tackling a large job, one she feared was too big 
for her. 
Without farewell to her people, Thayenta started walking into 
the shadows of the prism-room. Ken and R.C. followed her 
uncertainly. Were they on their way to the "death-bringers" right 
now? 
A few strides farther, the great open space containing the 
prism and the alien conference disappeared, swallowed up in the 
darkness. Ahead of Thayenta a ribbon of light stretched out, 
simultaneously lengthening on their pathway and shrinking to 
the rear. An alien spotlight tracked them as they walked. Ken 
matched Thayenta's pace, staying within that nimbus. He craned

his neck, trying to discern the source of the mysterious light. No 
originating point was apparent—not to the side, front, rear, or 
overhead. 
The ribbon of light simply was a path leading them into 
nowhere. 
Thayenta took the endless stretching and shrinking sourceless 
light for granted. It was part of her world and no more in need of 
explanation than her clothing made from willow leaves, the 
glowing, constantly shape-changing prism-transmitter, the 
plastic that wasn't plastic lining the walls of their dungeons, or 
the doors that appeared and disappeared without use of 
machinery. 
Ken accepted many things from his own culture without 
inquiry. He couldn't build a spaceship or refine metal or 
manufacture the cloth that made up his fatigues, but he didn't 
puzzle over such matters, either. He accepted them and used 
them. 
A little farther on, she held up her hand and the light-path 
suddenly stopped. In the same instant the world expanded as 
though illusionary curtains were being drawn back. A flood of 
natural light fell over the three travellers, and the purplish mist 
was all around them. 
A stream rippled by, half a meter away. R.C. squatted on the 
bank and stirred some floating twigs. "Water," he said, a bit 
disappointed. "Plain, everyday water." He fingered the grass on 
the side of the stream. Typical flora of NE 592. "I think we're 
back in real time and space again." 
Thayenta sidled past Ken and R.C, heading for a white, 
irregularly formed raft of Briv's plastic wedged onto the bank of 
the fog-swathed stream. Thayenta stepped out onto it, then 
looked back at the men, puzzled by their hesitation. "Please step 
onto the carrier. We must travel thirty jarda-ans before we reach 
your people." 
"Terrans," Ken defined for her. Warily, he planted a boot on 
the plastic raft, then hurriedly shifted his full weight on board.

The craft teetered a bit, then stabilized. It wobbled again as R..C. 
jumped onto it, then settled onto the stream's current. 
The current was sluggish, but they made good progress. 
Thayenta was narrow-eyed, concentrating, tuning up some alien 
power for the plastic raft. In a few seconds they were sailing 
along at a speedy clip. 
Although the raft rode smoothly, Ken would have preferred a 
more sedate ride. He presumed Thayenta knew what she was 
doing, but it gave him a queasy feeling to be floating so quickly 
on an uncharted stream without any conception of his 
destination. 
CHAPTER SEVEN 
R.C was watching Thayenta. She stood near the bow of the 
alien raft, gazing ahead into the mist and concentrating very 
hard on her telepathic powering and steering of the wavy sheet 
of plastic. Since her back was to the men, Ken had no difficulty 
guessing what was on R.C.'s mind. 
"I don't believe that's a good idea, Captain," he said politely. 
"I'm not sure you should even think it Briv is probably 
eavesdropping, tuning in on everything." 
"Oh?" R.C. was deceptively blank. "Just what idea were you 
talking about?" 
"Grabbing Thayenta as a hostage." As Ken spoke her name 
the woman turned to look at them briefly. If she understood the 
discussion, she gave no sign of it. She devoted her attention to 
steering the raft. 
"It seemed a viable tactic," R.C. muttered, conceding Ken's 
guess. 
"They'd never let us get away with such a hostile gesture." Ken 
sat down, determined to enjoy the raft cruise as long as it might 
last.

R.C. sighed and slumped down beside his ap-prentice. The 
pilot massaged his eyelids. "Telepaths. That covers a multitude 
of possibilities. There are so many theories, and we have very 
little experience with true races of the creatures." 
"You've dealt with the Capellan Thought-Wings," Ken began. 
Sloughing past experience aside, R.C. said, "That doesn't 
apply at all. It's completely new territory." The older man sighed 
again and smiled wanly. "All the telepathic species I've 
encountered were primitive types. The Capellans are practically 
embryos compared to Briv and Thayenta and the others. No, the 
two of us are starting fresh. Nothing I've dealt with can help us 
here on NE 592, not with the M'Nae." 
The Survey pilot traced an invisible figure one on the raft's 
irregular surface. "One telepathic ability we've confirmed. They 
can force themselves into our minds." 
"But how much did they learn when they did?" Ken argued. 
"Until Briv teleported that translator to the conference, we were 
operating on totally different wavelengths. Language alone is a 
terrific barrier. You said it yourself—we had to catch every 
nuance. So do they." 
"Agreed. They may not know much more about us than we do 
about them." R.C. traced a two beside the invisible one. "All 
right. We've learned they can teleport objects, range and size 
limitations unknown to us as yet. Three—they've got that 
undulative machine with the prismatic effect." 
"Their matter transmitter terminal," Ken offered. R.C. mulled 
that over for a moment, then nodded. 
"How did they get it here?" the older man asked. "I didn't see 
any indications of a space ship technology." 
"Or any other technology, as we know technology," Ken said. 
"We have to assume they teleported the prism here from—" 
"Another planet." R.C. and Ken stared at each other, and the 
pilot cracked out a rare, incredulous grin. "If that's an

explanation, the whole thing's beyond our comprehension." 
Ken leaned forward and spoke earnestly. "Maybe we're beyond 
theirs, Captain. Thayenta projected her image out to me in 
space, warning us to get away before we were trapped in their 
gravity field. She really believed we could pull away. Suppose the 
M'Nae don't realize what Terran technology can— and can't—do, 
how limited we are." 
"Very limited," R.C. agreed sourly. "As far as we're concerned, 
it might as well be non-existent." 
"Unless these 'death-bringers' salvaged some equipment from 
their shipwreck," Ken said. "I wonder what kind of equipment it 
could be? Civilian, or military? The needlers the M'Nae showed 
us in the telepathic images are definitely Patrol weapons. But 
wouldn't we have heard about a Patrol ship missing in this 
vicinity?" 
After a year as Zachary's apprentice, Ken had learned to 
detect the subtle shifts and alterations in the man's seemingly 
inscrutable face. What Ken read now made him press for an 
answer. "You know who these Terrans are, don't you?" 
There was a long silence. Thayenta drove the raft swiftly down 
the stream. Along the banks indigenous fauna—insects, birds 
thrumming songs, skittering rodents—rustled and hopped in the 
purplish grass and pink-leaved willows. They rode through a 
foggy Eden. Not a harsh world, a man could get used to it, if he 
must. 
"Captain," Ken prodded gently, "I'll have to know sometime. 
We're on our way to meet with these Terrans right now. Do I 
have to play junior ambassador when I don't know what my 
government's instructions are?" 
His feeble joke did the trick. R.C. evaded Ken's gaze as he said, 
"I didn't want to keep you in the dark. Orders." 
It fitted. R.C. Zachary, the by-the-book expert. He'd take such 
orders from HQ, even if he didn't like them. Ken let the pilot off 
the hook. "There isn't much point in top secrets now. HQ won't

hear from us for months, unless they automatically track you 
down. Were the orders critical to security?" 
R.C. shook his head, retracing the series of numerals he had 
drawn on the raft. "Not critical. And I'm afraid in some respects 
I made sure we'd be hard to find—not specifying to HQ exactly 
which nooks and crannies I'd take, or in what order." Ken 
gawked, hardly able to accept such deviant behavior, and the 
space veteran looked embarrassed. "I didn't expect things to end 
up this way, but when I took the assignment I never dreamed 
we'd run smack into the M'Nae." 
Ken sucked in a deep breath of the foggy air. "Now that we're 
here, what's the score?" 
"Postulate a gap in the master ship inventory at Earth Central 
Clearing. The computer runs a standard, random check and 
comes up short one old mercantile hauler, a Class-D. It should 
have been safely mothballed in the Proxima asteroids. But it 
wasn't." Some of R.C.'s outrage at the theft was betrayed in his 
tone. 
Ken whistled, earning a glance from Thayenta. He smiled at 
her, and she turned back to her steering, apparently reassured 
that whistling wasn't a Terran alarm. Lowering his voice, Ken 
said, "Stealing a Class-D would take a lot of courage and 
planning. You can't just walk out of a deep-spacer berth with a 
ship under your arm. It would take a crew, fuel—" 
"And connections," R.C. added, his furry brows drawn. 
"Bribery in high places and manipulation of the computer 
inventory. The theft would have gone unnoticed for years if a 
random check hadn't caught it. One missing ship, fuel illegally 
requisitioned—" 
"Let me guess," Ken interrupted. "A five-year food supply, 
building materials, medicines—the manifest you would have for 
a Pioneer Colony." R.C. brightened appreciatively, gesturing for 
Ken to continue. "It follows the pattern. If you steal a ship and 
set about hiding the evidence for years, that means one of two 
things. Either you're ready to start a war, or you're planning to 
get a long way off the beaten path and hide out on the fringes

where the Patrol can't find you." 
R.C. slapped a hand down loudly on Ken's shoulder. Thayenta 
jerked around apprehensively, but her tension melted when she 
saw the captain's broad smile. Very female, she sniffed 
disdainfully at these rough, physical habits. 
"Good!" the pilot exclaimed. 
That one word meant a lot from a man stingy with praise. But 
Ken kept to the point. "Do you know who engineered this 
scheme? You said you had several possible starting shots in the 
investigation. What made you pick NE 592 as a hide-out 
planet?" 
The captain grew introspective. "It had promise. NE 592 was 
damned far out. The patrol wouldn't come here for decades. But 
I hadn't counted on that blurry area, or the M'Nae gravity trap." 
Again, the pilot was evading a direct answer. Who plotted the 
spaceship theft? 
The purplish mist was thinning rapidly. They must be passing 
the outer perimeter of M'Nae territory and re-entering the real 
world of NE 592. The land here was hilly and rocky. The stream's 
current was picking up as they raced between low banks and 
boulder outcroppings. A plume of white mist rose up in the 
distance, and Ken heard a rumble rising to a crescendo. 
"Rapids," he speculated worriedly. 
Thayenta twisted, facing the right bank of the stream. Her 
posture was rigid, her eyes narrowed as she bore down on 
telepathic steering procedures. The raft floated to the right, 
heading for safe, quiet waters, but ever so slowly. 
As one, R.C. and Ken gauged the depth and current of the 
stream. Not trusting Thayenta to defeat the rapids ahead, the 
two men jumped off the raft. 
The water came up to their knees, and wasn't as cold as Ken 
had expected. He and the pilot seized the raft on either side,

hand steering it toward the bank. 
With a startled squeal, Thayenta sat down in an ungraceful 
sprawl. Outraged, she gathered herself, straightening a rumpled 
pink sleeve and her leafy tunic skirt. "Not necessary!" she 
complained, petulant. "Not necessary. I am in control of the 
raft." 
"We just want to guarantee its safety," explained Ken. 
The alien woman clutched the edge of the raft as the men 
guided it toward a backwater. While she'd been completely 
confident using telepathic skills, she obviously didn't trust the 
humans' muscle power. Fair enough, Ken thought, suppressing a 
laugh; he didn't entirely trust telepathy to keep them from 
smashing into the rocks. 
The raft beached among a stand of blue reeds, overhung with 
more of the ubiquitous pink willows. Ken clambered up onto the 
bank, and as Thayenta stood up, he held her about the waist and 
swung her onto dry land. She was still piqued. "You did not need 
to do that…" Then she closed a hand over the translator, muffling 
its operation. A torrent of the M'Nae language battered at the 
men's ears, none of it seemingly complimentary. 
Ken grinned. "Telepath or not, I recognize a woman scorned. 
R.C., I think we hurt her feelings." 
"We might have kept drier if we'd let her do the driving," the 
pilot admitted, brushing broken reeds off his fatigue pants and 
boots. "But I'm just as happy we did things our way, for a 
change." 
It was a blunt reminder of recent events, when Ken and R.C. 
had been puppets at the mercy of the M'Nae. Yes, it had been 
satisfying to wrestle the raft to shore by their own, 
non-telephatic, powers. 
At first Thayenta refused to be mollified. But finally her black 
eyes lost their snappish glare. Shyly, she touched fingertips with 
Ken. She seemed startled when he clasped her hand firmly, 
human fashion.

"We've been moving southwest," R.C. decided, squinting at 
NE 592's star. 
Ken looked back at the purplish mist. "We crashed at one side 
of that blurry area and maybe came out the other. That's about 
fifty kilometers." 
"Part of which constitutes 'thirty jarda-ans'," R.C. added. 
Thayenta pointed along the bank, downstream. "That way," 
she said in Terran, without using the translator. 
"She's really bright, R.C," Ken commented. 'Thayenta 
obviously has a gift for languages. The 'death-bringers' are 
directly downstream. I would ask how far, but we would 
probably get the answer in 'jarda-ans'," he added ruefully. 
Thayenta pursed her lips and resorted to the translator, 
reluctantly. "The death-bringers are many, and they move 
about." Then Ken felt a peculiar sensation —someone was 
tiptoeing through his brain. There was no resemblance to the 
telepathic assault Briv had flung at the Surveymen. Whatever 
Thayenta was hunting for, she gave up. The mental probing 
stopped, and she spoke again in Terran. "Afraid." 
Concerned, Ken said, "Afraid of what? Things will be different 
now. We're with you. We'll straighten this out. It won't be like it 
was when your first ambassador met them." 
He was offering a lot more than he should, making guarantees 
he had little power to carry out. But Thayenta's fear was genuine, 
and Ken wanted very much to reassure her. 
"They probably have guards posted," R.C. remarked, and Ken 
agreed, eyeing Thayenta for confirmation. 
She made a valiant effort to imitate a human nod, not jerking 
her head sideways in the M'Nae style but bringing her chin 
straight down. "Near the place where the death-bringers sleep." 
"A village," Ken speculated. "I think I saw one from space, just 
before we lost our sensors."

"Did you?" R.C. lifted an eyebrow. "They've been busy, haven't 
they? A village. All right. Thayenta, give us plenty of warning 
when we get close to any outposts. We don't want to stumble into 
them blindly." 
They followed Thayenta along the banks, heading 
downstream. There was no path but enough beaten and bare 
patches surfaced amid the grass to give them easy walking. Ken 
spent one thoughtful look on the beached raft before it was left 
behind. Could Thayenta power it upstream? He liked having a 
means of escape handy. 
Quickly memorizing landmarks, Ken tried to frame the 
question for Thayenta. "Could you propel that raft back where 
we came from? I mean, can you move things with your 
mind—like you opened the door to my cell?" 
"Not… not," and she was forced to resort to the translator 
again. "Not as adept as Briv." 
An apprentice. She'd made a big admission, conceding her 
own weakness. Ken remembered that he had never caught 
Thayenta engaging in teleportation. 
She sensed his thoughts before he expressed them, and 
revealed a bit more of herself. "I am kuu-a— student. From the 
Yen people. We do not move things. I am—" and Thayenta 
disgustedly clapped her hand over the translator again. "I am 
speaker." 
"A linguist," Ken guessed, elated. "That explains why she's 
learning Terran so fast." 
"Not fast enough," R.C. groused. "It's like pulling teeth to get 
solid facts." 
"We don't want to get her into trouble with her own people," 
Ken said sharply. "If I was in enemy custody and they were 
pumping me, you'd be very displeased if I told anyone anything." 
"Right," R.C. said ominously.

"She's doing her best to cooperate without betraying the 
M'Nae," Ken insisted. 
"I see that. But you have to see something, Ken," and the pilot 
spoke very seriously. "This could be a full-scale war—" 
Five men leapt out from behind boulders and trees, launching 
themselves at the three travellers. 
They shouted wordlessly, faces contorted, and charged like 
screaming savages, brandishing clubs. 
Ken thrust Thayenta behind him and threw up an arm to fend 
off a cudgel blow. He got hit high and low by two men, but they 
didn't use their clubs. Instead they tackled him, bowling him 
back and over on the purplish grass. 
Ken defended himself desperately, slamming a fist into one 
man's face, gaining himself a few centimeters to wriggle. 
"Quit it, you stupid bastard!" one man protested. "Get her! 
Quick!" 
Ken wrestled with the thug clutching his legs, and the second 
man jumped at Thayenta. 
"Don't!" Ken roared. "You kill her and you're dead." 
His threat had some effect. The man had started to swing the 
club at Thayenta. During his mid-air pause, she shrieked and 
stumbled through the grass, running from him. 
It was no contest. In a couple of strides, the club wielder cut 
off Thayenta's escape easily. But this time he swung a fist instead 
of the club. 
Thayenta's black eyes rolled and she crumpled into a pitiful 
heap at her attacker's feet. 
Enraged, Ken flailed free of his attacker and rushed furiously 
at the man who had struck down Thayenta. 
He didn't make it. Both men dived on him, and a third added

his weight. Ken was solid and in good condition, but numbers 
told. Seething with frustration and fury, he wheeled and 
struggled, but the situation was hopeless. 
R.C., a lightweight and carrying twenty-five extra years, was 
held immobile by the other two thugs. The pilot looked as 
helpless and angered as Ken. 
They were ambushed! They had been snared like raw recruits. 
Why hadn't Thayenta warned them? 
Ken stared anxiously at the woman. She was breathing, but 
unconscious. A dark swelling had started on that jewel-skin, just 
under her right eye. 
"Why the hell did you hit her?" Ken shouted. "She isn't armed. 
What are you cretins using for brains?" 
"Ken." R.C. threw him a veiled warning, shutting ofi Ken's 
tirade. 
Barely in control of his temper, Ken said levelly, "She's an 
ambassador. You might have treated her like one." 
"Ambassador?" and one of the thugs guffawed crudely. But 
the others began having second thoughts. 
"The Chief'U take care of it," they decided, relieved to turn the 
whole matter over to an authority they plainly respected. "Come 
on. Let's get movin' before any more o' those things show." 
"You're not going to leave her here," Ken said menacingly. He 
was in no position to enforce his demand, but he put enough 
cold anger into his voice to win his case. 
The club wielders looked at each other uncertainly. "Okay. 
We'd better take her along." 
One man turned spokesman, weakly apologizing to Ken and 
R.C. "We wasn't sure you guys was Terrans. Sorry for the rough 
stuff. Don't worry about the female. She ain't hurt bad. Look,

we'll take you to see our Chief. He'll get this straightened out." 
"Agreed," R.C. said in a cool tone. He and Ken shook off 
restraining hands and Ken hurried over to Thayenta, feeling her 
pulse. R.C. added, "Only on condition the woman's not 
mistreated further. Get that clear right now." 
They should have laughed at him. The Surveymen were 
weaponless and outnumbered. But R.C. Zachary had earned his 
reputation. That voice of command had been polished for years. 
The ambushers conferred among themselves, more and more 
unsure of their ground. They finally nodded, and one of them 
came to Thayenta, starting to grab her ankles. 
Ken knocked the man aside. "Keep your hands off her. You've 
done enough damage." He gathered the woman in his arms and 
stood up. 
After a momentary hesitation, their captors herded them 
downstream along the same unmarked path the trio had been 
following minutes earlier. 
Ken glanced at Thayenta. What did variations in alien 
coloring indicate? He couldn't tell if she was badly hurt or just 
stunned. Judging by human standards, her pulse had felt light 
and rapid, but perhaps it was normal for a M'Nae. The lump on 
Thayenta's cheek had already ripened into an ugly bruise, and 
Ken vowed that it would be repaid, with interest. 
For now, there was nothing to do but shuffle along in R.C.'s 
wake; one club wielder walked ahead, two flanked the captives, 
and two more brought up the rear. There was no chance to make 
a break for it. 
Thayenta was very light, probably much less than fifty kilos. 
He wouldn't tire easily, carrying her. But Ken had a more urgent 
reason for hoping they reached their destination quickly—there 
might be medical aid there for Thayenta. 
Ken wondered if the men were indicative of the settlement as 
a whole. If so, no wonder the initial clash between humans and 
M'Nae had occurred.

Again he wondered why Thayenta hadn't warned them of the 
ambush. R.C. had specifically asked her to give them plenty of 
time, yet they'd been caught completely off-guard. 
The answer came to him in a flash of intuition. Brute 
reactions. Briv let go of those telepathic claws when Ken had 
gone after him in unthinking rage. Possibly the M'Nae could 
cope with human minds only on a certain level. When a man 
descended to a savage state, or was too stupid to think deeply 
like these club wielders, the M'Nae's telepathic abilities were 
hobbled. 
Thayenta was not able to teleport herself. There were a lot of 
different abilities among the M'Nae, and Ken had no means of 
discerning what they were and what range they had. 
What about Briv? Was he telepathically watching them right 
now? Wouldn't he have stopped this attack—communicated a 
warning to Thayenta—if he could have? Ken thought of Briv's 
bony face and unforgiving manner. How could he guess what 
motivated the M'Nae leader? Briv wasn't operating on human 
moral standards. For all Ken could tell, Briv might be using 
Thayenta and the Surveymen as guinea pigs—throwing them to 
the "death-bringers" to see what would happen. 
The captives and their escort wended their way around a 
clump of pink and purple foliage that jogged away from some 
rapids. The rapids broadened and danced downhill toward 
spectacular falls. 
Suddenly a man stepped out of a hiding place amid the 
willows and approached the group. "What you doing off-station? 
The Chief told you to—" 
"We got something for him." The lead club wielder pointed to 
Ken, R,C, and Thayenta. "A real prize. Better tell him." 
"Right. He's over at this side of the valley, anyway, checking 
on the water wheel." The trail guard plucked at his belt and Ken 
stared in shock. The man was using a small personal 
communicator: standard government issue.

Stolen from a government warehouse? Was it part of a large 
quantity of supplies to stock a stolen Class-D space ship? 
As their captors urged them farther along the trail, the man 
at the way post spoke urgently into the communicator, notifying 
someone ahead of their approach. 
The vegetation thinned and the trees stood farther apart now. 
Ken got a clear view as they came to a turn in the trail, out over a 
grassy valley nestled between two hill ranges. He momentarily 
came to a stop, gawking. 
His glimpse from space had been right on target. A 
half-completed colony settlement was in the process of being 
born. Dwellings and barns and sheds stood surrounded by fields 
where men and women sweated with primitive farm tools, 
planting crops. 
One of the guards tried to hurry Ken forward. He excused his 
stop by lifting Thayenta slightly in his arms to get a better grip 
on her slender body. It gave him a few more seconds to peruse 
the scene below. 
Except for the crude tools and the nature of the log buildings, 
this could have been any pioneer colony. If things had gone on 
schedule, sometime ten years in the future, a Second Survey 
would have approved this world for colonization. 
But it" was here now. Snugly enclosed in the valley, her people 
were busily hacking out their future: an agricultural Eden. 
The price had come high. There was a scar on Eden's face. A 
deep gouge traversed the valley's length, paralleling the creek 
that supplied the village. The gouge shot out the far end of the 
valley, on to the horizon and out of sight. Ken guessed that it was 
an entry gouge, left by a Class-D spaceship scraping an abrasion 
across the planet's skin. The two-man Survey ship had left a 
similar, smaller scratch on NE 592. A Class-D could swallow the 
Survey ship whole. Ken could make a visual estimate of that, 
because the huge interstellar craft had come to rest against the 
valley's back wall, her nose rammed halfway up to the crest.

Ill 
"Move along, now," and a club nudged Ken's shoulder. 
Ken growled an oath and Thayenta stirred, moaning softly, 
before lapsing back into unconsciousness. As Ken started 
forward, the man leading them shouted, "Hold it! Here comes 
The Chief." 
A lanky figure, climbing a footpath beside the falls, hurried 
past a wooden water wheel and an earthen dam. 
R.C. watched the man's approach narrowly. The pilot seemed 
as unfriendly as Briv, contemplating the advance of a human 
enemy. Such undisguised animosity from the veteran pilot 
startled Ken. R.C.'s emotions were showing badly, and he bore no 
resemblance to an "ambassador." 
Ken looked around, hoping the club wielders might be 
relaxing their guard. They were, but that wasn't much comfort. 
They were situated on one narrow, completely blocked trail. 
Three-meters-high boulders were on Ken's right, and a waterfall 
fell to the left. Chances for an escape attempt were poor, to say 
the least. And right now the pilot's full attention was directed 
toward the man coming to meet them. 
"Chief, we caught these—" the spokesman for the club 
wielders began proudly. 
"Yes, yes. Good work. Larribee relayed the message," the 
"Chief" replied, shutting off the braggart's report. The man 
paused at the top of the waterfall path, staring curiously at R.C. 
and Ken and Thayenta. 
As tall and fierce-looking as Briv, he was scarcely even winded 
after that climb. The face, the physique, the posture all were 
achingly familiar to Ken, though he was positive he had never 
met this man in his life. Perhaps it was the clothes—standard 
issue military fatigues with the communicator and needier the 
man wore at his belt. Illegal supplies, to match an illegal colony. 
Ken couldn't quite put his finger on a name, but he had seen

the face many times. Acne scars pitted a craggy jawline; 
protruberant eyes flanked a beak of a nose. He had a lion's share 
of kinky, graying hair. This man's parents had belonged to an old 
school; they hadn't believed in genetic engineering to ensure 
physical attractiveness. The man was every centimeter their 
inheritor. 
"R.C.?" The Chiefs voice was strained with disbelief. "Is it 
really you, R.C.?" 
Zachary and his apprentice were at a disadvantage, but R.C.'s 
manner put them on equal ground with their captors. Zachary 
squared his shoulders and used that commanding tone to 
perfection. Ken could almost touch the man's contempt. "Yes, it's 
me. Did you think we wouldn't find you, Noland?" 
Everything fell into place. In the pictures and soli-dopic 
images Ken had seen, the Chief's face held the look of an 
eagle—as had R.C. Zachary's portrait twenty-five years ago. 
Those two men were contemporaries. Members of the Academy's 
first class, they'd shared an unquenchable drive to reach for the 
stars. They were men who had pioneered Earth's leap out into 
the galaxy. 
Since Ken was a boy, Noland Eads had been one of his idols. It 
was an honored name, emblazoned on plaques, prominently 
featured in textbooks and learning tapes, identified along with 
R.C.'s in Earth Central's "Outward Bound" Pioneer Hall. 
Meeting this hero wasn't at all what Ken had expected. 
CHAPTER EIGHT 
A jovial grin split Eads' homely face as he slapped R.C.'s 
biceps. "I'll be damned! It is you, R.C.! It must be… what? Five 
years? You haven't changed a bit, you old curmudgeon," and he 
playfully prodded the shorter man's ribs. 
Carefully, not attracting undue attention, Ken knelt, 
supporting Thayenta's tiny frame across his knees, propping her 
against his chest. She was a featherweight, but he'd better

conserve as much energy as possible. There was no telling when 
he'd need it in a hurry. 
Zachary wasn't lulled by the effusive greeting. "Noland, I said 
how—" 
The hero of Survey brushed away verbal flies. "Oh, let that be. 
Belongs in the past, R.C. Dead and buried. The important thing 
is, you're here! What brings you boys out this far? Secondary 
Survey, huh? Is this your apprentice?" 
"Ken Farrell," R.C. said flatly. "He doesn't need to be told who 
you are." 
"Hello there, Ken!" Eads' big hand went out and, mesmerized, 
Ken responded. Calluses scraped his palm. This was a man who 
fought nature as he'd fought space. Eads smiled down at him 
paternally. "You've got a good captain, son. But you know that. 
Back in the old days, H.C. and I broke new ground many a time. 
Back when it really was a frontier, before it got so damned soft. 
Right, R.C.? Pity you weren't around then, son. You'd have liked 
it!"
Three men clambered up the trail and spread out behind 
Eads. They stood at parade rest, strung along the hill crest 
between the waterfall and the boulders, effectively blocking any 
escape attempt in that direction. When these men arrived, Ken 
noted a shift in manner in the club wielders. On their mettle now 
that the elite guard was on the scene, they made a half-hearted 
effort to look military. 
The reinforcements were the Praetorians, Noland Eads' 
special troops. Compared to the thugs, the three men looked 
professional and alert, their needlers on their belts. Obviously 
Eads didn't trust anyone but his Praetorians with them. 
Thugs and Praetorians all attended Eads with worshipful 
respect. Ken didn't blame them. He'd long been in awe of Eads 
himself. The man had that particular presence of command. 
Even on tape he had looked the hero, the space frontiersman in 
every way.

Eads glanced at Thayenta in amazement. "You got one of 
them, and alive! A female. That's great, R.C. How you'd pull it 
off?" 
R.C. stepped in before Ken could antagonize their captors. 
"We were lost out in that purple muck. The woman helped us. I 
believe she's lost from her people too, perhaps an outcast. She's 
harmless." 
"Harmless?" Eads' bushy gray eyebrows rose toward his 
hairline. "She's an alien; this planet's lousy with them, R.C. We 
didn't even know they were here till one of them came out of that 
purple mist. There's some kind of gravitic force inside that 
damned stuff." He glared upstream, toward Briv's territory. 
"Deviation," and R.C. flicked a significant warning look at 
Ken, demanding silence. "Yes, that would explain things. We 
were coming into orbit when everything on board went haywire." 
"Yes, yes!" Frenzy shook Noland Eads. "I tell you, the aliens 
did it. They made us crash. We don't know what they've got 
inside there. We can't get at them." Eads lowered his voice and 
spoke confidentially. "I think they're telepaths, R.C. The first one 
came out of that stuff wouldn't even talk. Can you imagine it? He 
sort of projected pictures at us. Pictures! A telepath. Why, he 
could have picked our brains. No telling what else." 
He was whispering in a ludicrous attempt to avoid telepathic 
eavesdropping. Ken started to smile. Then he realized Eads was 
serious. He actually thought he could block out the M'Nae with 
such simple tactics. 
"You said the first one," R.C. probed. "You saw others?" 
Eads nodded vigorously. "They popped out of nowhere, and 
then disappeared just like that! I tell you, it was scary as all hell, 
R.C." 
Ken frowned. Eads hadn't told them everything by a long shot. 
He'd neglected to mention why the aliens had "popped out of 
nowhere." They had been tele-porting out of M'Nae territory to 
rescue the body of their murdered ambassador, killed by Eads or

one of his men. 
"I don't think the girl's in that class," R.C. said, offhand, as 
though bored with the subject. "If she's a telepath, she's a very 
low-level one. And she talks— particularly to my apprentice." He 
winked elaborately at Eads and finished, "the only image she 
projects is that she's got stars in her eyes. You know how kids 
are." 
Surreptitiously, Ken fumbled at the pink and silver cord 
circling Thayenta's throat. He feared it would resist, but the 
alien translator popped loose after a slight tug. Ken slid the 
metal oblong into a slit pocket on the thigh of his fatigues. Eads 
mustn't see the device. Not while so many questions remained 
unanswered, and more cropped up every minute. 
"They're dangerous," Eads argued loudly, smacking a fist into 
a callused palm. "They're responsible for that gravity field in 
there. They made us crash." 
With a show of grudging agreement, Zachary nodded. 
"Hah! I was sure of it. Admit it. It didn't make any difference 
how much retro pack you pulled, did it?" Eads crowed in bitter 
triumph. "Once that alien field got hold of you, down you went." 
"I couldn't break it," R.C. conceded. "We were lucky to get out 
of that crash alive." 
"Yes, yes! Lucky. It's fate, that's what it is, R.C. We were 
meant to be here—both of us," Eads said with startling 
enthusiasm. 
Fate? Ken eyed the huge cargo ship wedged against the 
valley's back wall. Not fate but a damned good pilot got that ship 
down. Like the Survey ship the cargo vessel had strewn her guts 
all along that gouge she had carved across the planet's surface. 
Buckled plates and great rips in the Class-D's hull testified to 
impact force. Ken doubted that everyone on board had lived 
through the crash. It was a miracle so many people were now 
able to work the farm fields and build the huts in the valley—and 
stand guard for Noland Eads.

"I thought she'd finished me a couple of times," and Eads 
became somber for a few moments. "Cost us eighteen good 
people, R.C., that crash." Then he thrust that behind him, talking 
too fast as he relived the crisis. "Pulled the emergency package 
and every auxiliary, the lifeboats, you name it, R.C. I pulled it. 
The whole damned rig, but I got her down. I was meant to. Fate 
meant for us to cheat those aliens, show them we could take 
everything they'd dish out." 
He was the model of a space veteran, zooming hands in the air 
to describe maneuvers, imitating the ship's harrowing slide in. 
But Eads' color was very high, a stammer tripping his tongue 
now and then, his eyes glittering. 
R.C. darted a glance at Ken, then said, "We went through the 
same business on a smaller scale. Looks like you hit easier than 
we did, Noland. There's nothing left of our ship but junk. Even 
communications are gone." 
He put a slight emphasis on that last sentence, and Eads 
caught the import. He relaxed visibly—obviously delighted to 
hear that no Mayday had gone out from the Survey ship. It 
seemed Eads did not want 
Earth Central to discover that there were two ships and 
dozens of humans down on NE 592 with no hope of escape 
without outside help. 
Why would any sane man want to be marooned for 
months—maybe years—alone in a vast universe? 
Any sane man. Did Noland Eads fit that description? By Ken's 
standards the man wasn't acting rationally. He had stolen a ship, 
supplies, and outlawed weapons; he had initiated a colony on a 
planet without any authorization. And Eads was revelling in the 
announcement that Zachary had not been able to send an S.O.S. 
He didn't want to be found. 
Thayenta moved, whimpering, fumbling for the bruise on her 
cheek. Ken gently caught her hand and prevented that. As he 
restrained her Eads cried, "She mustn't wake up. She'll destroy

us! She'll call the rest of those aliens!" 
Protectively, Ken hovered over the woman. "She won't give 
you any trouble," he retorted. Then he recalled R.C.'s "cover 
story." Belligerence was the wrong tack. Ken altered his manner, 
played it callow, though it galled him. "I'll take care of her. She's 
okay. Honest." 
Was he laying it on too thick? He had to play the young fool 
just right and turn Eads' wrath aside. Eads' anger shifted 
momentarily toward Ken, then softened into a Dutch-uncle 
smile. "Believe me, son, she's dangerous. Oh, maybe not the girl. 
But you don't see all the possibilities. There are more of them, 
and they're telepaths. They'll pick your brains just like vultures!" 
Eads spoke more accurately than he realized. Briv indeed had 
telepathic vulture's claws, and knew how to use them. 
Past Eads' shoulder, Ken saw R.C. nod approval of his naive, 
love-struck act. Ken swallowed his pride and pursued that line. 
"I'll vouch for her, sir. I promise she won't give you any trouble. 
Will you, honey?" 
Ken thought hard, desperately sending a warning to the alien 
woman, praying she'd get the message. Thayenta stared up into 
Eads' rugged face and flinched back against Ken. No, Ken 
beamed at her. Don't panic. Play it timid but harmless. She 
must convince Eads she was both. 
Above all Briv and his troops must not teleport out of the mist 
and try to rescue Thayenta. The situation was too tense; there 
were too many needlers. Any clash would result in bloodshed for 
both human and M'Nae, and must be avoided. 
Ken sent his feeble mental appeals wider afield, to someone 
with more authority than Thayenta possessed. Don't do it, Briv. 
Bide your time. Give us a chance to work this out. Please! 
"Sha… shalessa?" Thayenta said in a quavering, little-girl 
voice. It was persuasive, because Thayenta was really scared. 
Wanting to comfort her, he formed a picture—himself, R.C, and 
Thayenta shoulder to shoulder, united against the foe. As a

guide, he added a mini-drama of Thayenta cowering in front of 
Eads, but guarded, wary and observing. 
A yes winged back to him, telepathically. The sound of the 
word, echoed in Ken's skull. She had heard and understood him! 
Now he had to make sure her trust wasn't misplaced. He and 
R.C. had to protect the little alien with their lives if necessary. 
"It's a mistake," he soothed, as much for the onlookers as 
Thayenta. "They won't hurt you anymore, honey." 
"Chief, should we—" 
"It's all right, Greer," Eads dismissed the club wielders. "You 
boys get back to your posts. Keep an eye out for any more of 
'em—and bring 'em to me. I'll take care of this one." 
As they drifted back up the trail Eads gazed intently at 
Thayenta. His taut, wide-eyed stare disturbed Ken. An odd little 
half-smile twisted Eads' mouth. The man was unpredictable. Not 
even R.C. would know what to expect of his former classmate, 
now. 
What should Ken tell Thayenta, telepathically? Warn her to be 
ready for anything? How could he explain that they were dealing 
with a human who was unstable, an outlaw by human legal 
standards? 
Abruptly, Eads took Thayenta's chin in his strong fingers and 
turned her head to catch the sunlight best. He examined her 
closely, and Thayenta bore his rudeness without comment, 
though Ken felt her tremble. 
No, don't call Briv for help. Not … yet! 
"Yes, yes! Definitely one of them," Eads concluded. "I thought 
maybe she might be a member of a third species. Some native I 
hadn't spotted during my Initial Survey. But she's one of the 
invaders. Same peculiar skin and black eyes…" 
"She befriended us," R.C. said firmly, "and helped us after we 
were shipwrecked, lost in that mist. She led us to you and all she

got for it was a beating from one of your men." 
"The boys might have been too hasty," Eads said, smiling 
benignly. He had a lot of charm, almost enough to persuade Ken 
he had jumped to conclusions. But the glitter in those gray eyes 
was much too bright. "You must come down to the village, R.C. I 
insist you enjoy our hospitality, meager though it is. It gets 
damned hot here in the late afternoon, and the little lady must 
be uncomfortable. We'll find something for that bruise. If she 
can't walk—" 
"I can help her," and Ken took Thayenta's arms, lifting her to 
her feet. She swayed slightly and leaned on him. R.C. offered a 
hand, but Ken waved the older man off. 
"Youngsters," and R.C. smirked genially at Eads. "Think they 
can do anything." 
Eads threw an arm across Zachary's shoulder, completely 
accepting this reunion with his old friend. Ken would have been 
happier to see more suspicion and a little honest distrust. Eads 
couldn't have been convinced. Not that easily. 
The elite guards swung aside to let Eads and his "guests" pass, 
then closed in behind them. They followed Ken, R.C, and 
Thayenta down the trail. 
Which one had killed the M'Nae ambassador, or had the killer 
been Eads himself? 
The colonists had cannibalized some of the cargo ship's 
ruined plates. Diverting the natural channel of the falls, these 
formed blades for a crude water wheel. A bulky, old-fashioned 
storage chamber soaked up the slowly generated energy 
produced by the wheel. 
Eads waved expansively, showing off his people's 
workmanship, and pointed to the earthen dam containing a 
small pond. 
"Reservoir. We did it ourselves, R.C. It was a hell of a lot of 
work, but it'll be worth it in the drier season. It makes you feel

proud to do it with your hands, too," Eads said, grinning 
broadly. 
They reached the foot of the trail and walked across the valley 
floor. Ken kept his pace slow, pretending that Thayenta needed a 
little caution, although she was no longer trembling. Fascinated, 
he took in everything he could. 
Groves of pink-leaved willows grew along the stream's banks, 
and the stream widened as it flowed through the valley. A scent 
of freshly-turned earth wafted on the breeze coming from the 
fields. 
The men and women working the fields looked up and waved 
respectfully as Eads passed them. He was their revered leader. 
That was no hollow phrase, for all the people—the goons with the 
clubs, Eads' Praetorian guards, the colonists working the fields— 
looked upon Noland Eads as a demi-god. His word was law in 
this valley. 
The field workers toiled over shallow furrows, breaking clods 
with hand rakes, pulling plows with human labor. Ken stared at 
the sight. Surely they couldn't have lost all their supplies and 
powered equipment in the crash. Could these people have chosen 
to revert to mankind's primitive farming methods? 
"There's food and water at our community center," Eads said, 
gesturing toward the little village. Head-ing toward the stream, 
Ken, R.C., and the alien woman followed him onto a 
well-travelled lane between two of the fields. "Imagine you'd like 
to get in out of this sun for a while. You been travelling far, 
R.C.?" 
"A while," R.C. replied evasively. "It's difficult to judge 
distance when all your instruments are gone." Zachary was a 
good liar when he had to be. 
"Right, right!" Eads wasn't troubled by his classmate's 
evasion. Murmers rippled through the field-workers as they saw 
Thayenta. Eads waved reassuringly to them, calming their fears. 
Noland Eads had everything well in hand.

Ken read the colonists' expression. Thayenta was an alien, a 
telepath. An object of hatred. Noland Eads wasn't the only 
xenophobe here, merely the most prominent. 
He counted heads. Three dozen colonists working the fields, 
perhaps two dozen more busy constructing buildings. There 
might be others on the far side of the village. And Eads had 
posted quite a few guards. 
At this point, the NE 592 population balance favored the 
Terrans, not the M'Nae. But the M'Nae claimed to be here first. 
A few telepaths against dozens of armed and edgy humans. The 
outcome would be anyone's guess. 
Eads clumped over a quaint wooden footbridge spanning the 
stream. Ever the genial host, he pointed out sights along the 
village's "main street." 
"We're just getting started, of course, but she'll be solid as a 
rock when we get through. We've used nothing but native wood 
and materials, R.C," and he indi-cated the log and flagstone 
construction, the window-less buildings. 
Ken and R.C. were intrigued by certain unique qualities of 
this pioneer village. "Did you lose your force tools in the crash?" 
R.C. asked. 
"We didn't bring any!" Eads sneered, and he and his 
Praetorians shared a loud, private joke at the Surveymen's 
expense. Eads went on, "we don't need them. Technology is the 
curse of humanity: it saps us, sucks us dry, makes us soft and 
weak." 
"You've been saying that for years, Noland," R.C. said lightly, 
unimpressed by the sermon. 
"Yes, for years, and nobdy would listen to me. Nobody would 
act on it." Eads stomped to the village's central building and 
scuffed across a hand-planed door sill. The interior looked dark, 
and Ken and R.C. hung back, not eager to enter a cul-de-sac. 
Eads halted on the threshold and grinned wickedly at them. 
"What are you afraid of? Come on!"

What was that old proverb? Walk into my parlor, said the 
spider to the fly. A chill chased up the back of Ken's neck. But 
there was nothing they could do— not against men armed with 
needlers. R.C. followed Eads inside and Ken helped Thayenta 
through the door. The Praetorians brought up the rear. 
The building was a log and stone fortress and housed a single 
large room filled with wooden benches and tables. A great deal of 
labor had gone into its construction. Eads was right. With the 
shutters propped open it was cooler inside. Natural air 
conditioning carried through the odors of grass and plowed 
earth. 
But since the shutters didn't admit much light, the ulterior 
was dark and shadowy. Ken assumed these colonists used 
candles at night, faithful to Eads' back to the primitive 
philosophy. 
"Our community center," Eads explained, exhibiting the 
rough-hewn open beams supporting the roof. "We did it all 
ourselves." 
Their escort remained. Protecting their leader against 
treachery, two Praetorians stood by the door and the other 
circled behind Eads. Obviously they didn't trust the Surveymen. 
"Sit down, sit down!" Eads invited, waving to the benches. 
Ken showed Thayenta what to do. She was childishly delighted, 
and plainly she'd never seen Terran furniture before, which 
explained why the rock and plastic cell at M'Nae headquarters 
was so bare of the amenities. 
Eads shoved a pitcher and cups, a bowl of bread-stuffs and 
fruit across a table toward his uneasy guests. "Here. Have a 
snack, a cup of cool stream water. There are few toxic flora on 
this planet, remember. I checked the place out myself, very 
thoroughly, a while back." He chuckled at his own humor then 
bit noisily into a piece of the fruit, playing king's taster to allay 
their suspicions. 
Ken poured a cup of water for Thayenta, urging her to drink. 
The bruise on her cheek looked bad. If she had suffered any

shock, she ought to take fluids. As the woman sipped, Ken pulled 
a rag off his torn sleeve and dipped a corner in another cupful of 
water, gently daubing at her cheek with the makeshift swab. 
"How much do you remember, R.C.?" Eads sud-denly asked. 
He leaned forward, eagerly awaiting Zachary's answer. 
"Of what? Your theories on modern man's decadence?" R.C. 
parried. "I remember that well—so does everyone else who ever 
served with you. Sometimes it was hard to tell when the theories 
quit and Noland Eads began." R.C. pretended to relax, lolling on 
the bench. "Every time we touched down on an uninhabited 
world, you saw it as a potential new beginning—man on his own 
in combat with the elements." 
"It's true!" Eads brought his fist down hard on the table, 
making the cups dance. His craggy features were contorted, his 
demeanor, demoniacal. 
"No special weapons or tools," R.C. muttered, quoting from 
the past. "How do you explain those needlers? I don't consider 
that meeting nature on her own terms. Or do you expect nature 
to arrive at the head of an army, Noland? You intend to use 
those against wild game?" 
Eads planted a boot on the bench beside R.C. and rested his 
elbows on his knee. When he grinned, the tension in the room 
took a quantum leap. "Maybe. Or maybe they're useful against 
something a lot more sophisticated than wild game." 
"Such as the Patrol when they eventually find you? And they 
will," R.C. said levelly. 
Eads' grin widened into a nasty leer. "I never did answer your 
first question, did I, R.C? Funny. That was always your 
trick—stalling, never quite getting around to a straight answer." 
He broke into a cackle, slapping his thigh with a smack that 
made Thayenta start and nearly drop her cup. Taking it from her 
fingers, Ken replaced it on the table. 
The leader of the marooned colonists began pacing back and 
forth. Eads' great head swivelled, and he never took his eyes off

his old classmate. "Yes, I learned from you, R.C. Many, many 
things. You're a damned good pilot. The best. Just one of your 
specialties I was happy to borrow. But you never would learn 
from me, would you? You wouldn't listen when I told you how 
man was really meant to live out here on the frontier." 
"I listened," R.C. said with apparent sincerity. He took Eads 
aback. 
"Did you? I hope you did, R.C. That means there's a chance." 
Coming to a stop, he licked his lips and confronted Zachary. 
"Then tell me—how close is Earth Central to pinpointing my 
colony world?" 
The atmosphere in the room grew heavy with menace, and 
Thayenta wriggled close to Ken. She sensed it telepathically. All 
the human conversation must be gibberish to her ears, but she 
could read the emotions. 
So could Ken. Violence lurked right under the surface. 
"I'm not sure what you're talking about," R.C. began, 
temporizing. 
Without preamble Eads backhanded the Survey-man, 
sprawling Zachary forcefully back against the bench. 
Fists clenched, Ken rose to lunge to R.C.'s aid, but strong 
fingers bit into his collarbone. Turning, he saw a needier aimed 
at his head. On the other side, the second guard pointed his 
weapon at Thayenta. 
Ken froze, infuriated and helpless! His mind raced through 
possibilities, desperately seeking some plan to save them. 
"Answer me!" Eads screamed at Zachary. "I know all your 
tricks, R.C. I'm not stupid, and I know the Patrol isn't. I need 
time. A year, two years, five. Then we'll own this planet. We'll 
have won it with our bare hands, the way it should be won. It'll 
be too late for Earth Central to uproot us then. I've got 
connections in high places, R.C. When my friends pull the right 
strings, they won't dare send the Patrol in here. NE 592 is ours.

If they try to take it away from us they'll hear the explosion all 
the way back to Earth!" 
He was actually raving, his face red, his eyes bulging. Ken was 
appalled. A living legend like Noland Eads—come to this. Too 
many dangerous and stressful missions out into nothingness had 
caused this breakdown. 
That backhanded blow had split R.C.'s lip. Blood dabbled 
down to his chin. Zachary made no effort to wipe it away. He 
gazed pityingly at Eads, saying nothing. 
Enraged by the silence, Eads grabbed Zachary's fatigues, 
shaking the Surveyman. "Tell me! How much time have we got? 
How much time!" 
With amazing calm, R.C. grasped Eads' wrists. Their eyes met 
in a battle of wills. Then either R.C. broke Eads' steely grip, or 
Eads chose to let go. Ken exhaled slowly as R.C. palped his 
swollen lip. With scorn he mopped the blood off and said, 
"You're up against it now, Noland." 
"What?" Eads raised his hand to strike again, but held it in 
check. 
Ken felt like a coiled spring, his anger poised on a trigger. If 
Eads hit the captain again, could Ken stop himself from leaping 
at the man? 
Unperturbed, Zachary sounded as if he were reading from a 
briefing tape. "They spotted all of it back at Earth Central, 
Noland. The missing Class-D cargo ship. The missing supplies, 
the stolen needlers. And your colonists. Oh, those were obvious, 
too. They stood out like sore thumbs on the missing-persons 
listings. All those kooks and fanatics and drop-outs who'd joined 
the Old-Ways Sect disappeared. 
A spasm of pain shot through Ken's shoulder as the guard's 
grip tightened. R.C.'s crack about "kooks" had scored. It would 
take a shipful of fanatics to follow Noland Eads out to NE 592 in 
this mad, illegal scheme.

"Go on! Go on! What else?" Eads said. Some of the frenzy died 
out of him, replaced by burning curiosity. 
"It didn't take long to put all the pieces together," R.C. went 
on with maddening placidity. "It was plain you had engineered 
the ship theft and manipulated the requisition sheets in order to 
supply this colony. The type of supplies gave you away from the 
start, Noland: hand tools. And you had far too many 'colonists' to 
control. Some of them couldn't resist bragging in letters to their 
friends and relatives— hinting about the great adventure coming 
up, their conversion to the Old-Ways Sect, and Noland Eads' 
philosophy." 
"But Earth Central couldn't know where we were going!" Eads 
shouted in triumph. "They couldn't begin to know that. It's a big 
galaxy. We could have gone anywhere. They won't find us for 
years!" 
"Why not?" R.C. said in that same dispassionate tone. "I did." 
Eads boggled at him, and Ken cast a sidelong glance at his 
guard. Not yet. Their attention was divided, but not sufficiently. 
It was still too risky to break for it. 
"How?" Eads sounded betrayed, a hurt, spoiled brat whose 
secret hiding place was obvious to an adult. 
"You said you learned from me," R.C. said. "The reverse is 
true, whether you believe it or not. Knowing you, it wasn't 
difficult." 
"A stab in the dark! It had to be!" Eads clung to his insistence 
that his plan was foolproof, undetect-able. "It was an accident 
that you came to NE 592." 
R.C. granted him the thinnest of smiles. "Figure it out for 
yourself, Noland." He let the suspense hang for several long 
seconds, and Eads' mania to know ripened. Finally R.C. said, "All 
right. You had to have chosen a primitive world. I ran a 
computer check for water balance, timber, the "proper 
proportion" of predators to prey—proper according to Noland 
Eads' philosophy, which I knew well. I listened to your speeches,

and I don't forget things, Noland. You forget a lot of things. You 
don't con-sider all the possibilities, and sometimes that can be 
fatal." 
The needlers aimed at Ken's and Thayenta's heads drooped 
slightly, and the grip on Ken's shoulder lessened still more. The 
guards were rapt, hypnotized by R.C.'s performance. The odds 
were getting better, but the moment had still not come. The man 
protecting Eads' back was enthralled, but he was three or four 
meters away, safe from easy attack. 
"I don't…" For the first time doubt crossed Eads' homely face. 
He drew back, frowning at R.C. "Earth Central can't know. 
You're just whistling to keep your spirits up." 
A chuckle rumbled in R.C.'s throat. "You're the one with 
problems, not me, Noland. You were beaten before you ever 
lifted ship for this planet." 
"We both know the way Patrol operates," Eads flared. "They're 
not going to act on this immediately —even if you did pinpoint 
NE 592, which I don't believe. You gave them a couple of dozen 
options on my hideaway world. They never will be able to decide 
which one you picked to investigate first, or second, or—" 
"I wasn't speaking of the Patrol," R.C. said somberly. "Earth 
Central doesn't figure into this, now. You're up against a random 
element, one not even Noland Eads predicted. And that element's 
going to finish your colony." 
Eads set his acne-scarred jaw. "Nothing's going to stop us. 
What the hell are you babbling about?" 
"The M'Nae." Zachary dropped the explanation casually. As 
Eads and the guards puzzled over it, R.C. shot a get-ready glance 
in Ken's direction. Like an Academy lecturer bored with his 
material, R.C. went on, "The aliens. The M'Nae. That's what they 
call themselves." 
"That woman," and Eads glowered hatefully at Thayenta. 
"She's unimportant. Only one of many." R.C. shook his head

pityingly. "You're worrying about small fry. It's too late for that. 
The M'Nae got to this planet before you did, Noland. You 
invaded their territory—their territory by prior right. Even by 
Earth's legal standards, their claim is valid, and it pre-dates 
yours. Their colony was here before you crashed. The M'Nae sent 
an ambassador to negotiate with you, and you killed him. They 
send you a second one, and your goons maul her." 
Eads' mouth was open and the guards were nonplussed. R.C. 
rammed the point home. "Killing an ambassador is a very 
serious crime—particularly for a colony established by illegal 
means. An alien ambassador. In every culture we've known, the 
person of an ambassador is inviolate. Noland, you just may have 
triggered an interplanetary and interspecies war-" 
CHAPTER NINE 
Eads acted swiftly. He whirled, drawing his needier, thumbing 
back the intensity control, preparing to fire a deadly lance into 
Thayenta. 
Ken's own reflexes were equally quick, however. He tackled 
the alien woman, knocking her to the floor. "Down! Keep down!" 
He prayed she'd understand. No time to worry about the hidden 
translator, or about sending telepathic images to her! 
R.C. threw himself on Eads, wrestling his former friend for the 
illegal weapon. 
At the same instant Ken swung his arms wide, locking his 
elbows, and the guards to either side were smashed across their 
throats. They doubled over, gagging in pain. 
Ken charged past R.C. and Eads. The third guard was 
wavering, trying to aim his needier but afraid of hitting Eads by 
mistake. Ken drove a boot into the man's solar plexus and sent 
him sprawling. 
The needier! It sailed off into the room's shadows. No chance 
of finding it without a search.

Ken landed a solid punch on the guard's chin, knocking the 
man out for the moment. Then he spun on his heel. 
R.C. was holding his own. The wiry Surveyman lacked Eads' 
height and strength, but desperation and sanity evened the 
struggle. One of the guards was coming to, fumbling for the 
needier he had dropped. 
Ken leapt across overturned benches blocking his path. He 
had to stop that guard before… 
"The woman!" Eads gasped. "Shoot the woman!" 
R.C. forced Eads' weapon hand down. The colony leader 
squeezed the trigger several times, and needier darts set the 
floorboards smoldering. 
"She's their tool! Their eyes! You've got to kill her!" Eads 
ranted. 
A guard was raising his weapon to level at Thay-enta as Ken 
crashed into him. They went down in a pummeling heap. At the 
impact, the needier bounced out of the Praetorian's hand, but he 
was a capable rough-and-tumble fighter. He gave as good as he 
got. Fists and knees and head butts flew fast and furious. 
Ken caught a glimpse of the two older men waltzing around in 
a macabre dance, locked in a life and death battle. "Kill her! Kill 
them all!" 
"Listen to me!" R.C.'s voice was wrenched in gasps by effort. 
"Noland! Listen! There's too many of them! You've got to—" 
Appeal for reason was useless. Eads' twisted mind burned 
with a lust for violence and death. Death for the alien woman 
and her kind, death for anyone who helped the M'Nae. 
Ken dodged a punch and countered with a hard one of his 
own, rattling the Praetorian's head off the floor. Semi-conscious, 
Eads' guard was a sitting duck for the finishing blow. 
Ken snatched up the needier the man had dropped earlier.

The remaining guard, still coughing, was struggling to draw a 
bead on Thayenta. 
Thayenta had huddled beside a bench throughout the melee. 
She was wide-eyed, stunned by the physical behavior of the 
humans. Their motives were an enigma, alien. Ken—a 
friend—had knocked her down and she'd stayed put. 
Ken jumped over a bench and threw a body block into the last 
guard. The two of them reeled back into the log and flagstone 
wall. The Praetorian took the brunt of the shock. Glaze-eyed, he 
slithered to the floor in a limp heap. 
Ken grabbed the man's needier, thrust it in a pocket, and 
hurried toward Thayenta. 
A sizzling noise ripped through the large room. An ugly sound, 
one Ken had previously heard only on tapes. 
R.C. uttered a strangled cry, jerking away from Eads. 
Clutching his left leg, the Surveyman toppled, writhing from the 
agony of a needier hit. 
Ken froze as Eads turned, weapon in hand. 
Then, purposefully, Ken raised his confiscated needier and 
pointed it at Eads' leonine head. "Hold it right there." 
Eads was aiming too—not at Ken, but at Thayenta. 
The deadly tableau held them all immobile for five or six 
heartbeats. 
R.C., muffling a groan, dragged himself along the floor, 
reaching a hand up to Eads. "Noland, don't! Listen to me!" 
A charred patch on R.C.'s fatigues oozed blood. Pain twisted 
at Zachary, but he thrust it aside for a more critical matter. He 
pleaded for understanding. "There's too many of them, Noland. 
A whole planet of them, more coming through all the time. 
Killing the woman won't solve anything. It'll only make it worse!"

Truth, lies, and speculation mingled wildly in a frantic 
attempt to stay Eads' murderous drive. 
Ken's finger rested lightly on the needier trigger. He could 
deal death, but if he did, so might Eads. The man's madness 
made it all a terrible gamble. Even with a needier ray through 
his brain, Eads might pull the trigger. 
While R.C. begged his old friend to see reason, Ken cleared his 
mind. One small section focussed on Eads, on the needier in 
Eads' hand, but the remainder… Ken didn't dare look at 
Thayenta. He mustn't take his eyes from the madman 
confronting him. Yet he could think in Thayenta's direction. 
Telepathy. It wasn't an interesting experiment this time. 
Their lives depended on Ken's ability to project his thoughts to 
the woman. 
He had to create images. Thayenta could not grasp enough of 
his language to permit anything else. 
Ken built mental pictures of Briv and theJM'Nae council in 
the room with the prismatic alien matter transmitter. He 
concentrated on Briv, painting the M'Nae leader's image, hoping 
personal dislike did not cloud the telepathic impression. He 
portrayed Briv in the alien council chamber and simultaneously 
here, invisibly, in the illegal Terran colonist community center. 
Briv was a powerful telepath, able to teleport himself or objects, 
able to claw his way into a human mind. 
If Briv were eavesdropping, observing, watching everything 
that had happened to his ambassador and the two Surveymen… 
Thayenta. Ken projected her image, in vivid and attractive 
detail. Then, though it hurt, he produced a cruel drama—Eads 
firing that needier. Thayenta, in pain, bleeding the same frothy 
pink blood Ken had seen covering the first ambassador's corpse. 
Then, most difficult of all, he imagined Thayenta dead. 
Savagely, he wiped away the tragedy. It mustn't happen! But 
it would if Briv didn't help!

The M'Nae had to become allies. Ken and R.C. were fighting 
not only for their own lives but those of so many others, M'Nae 
and human. 
Briv had to help! And quickly! 
Ken's stare was riveted on Eads, on the needier and a tense 
trigger finger. In a moment, those guards would regain 
consciousness. A colonist might wander by the community 
center and peer inside to see what was happening. Then Eads 
would have more than enough reinforcements to finish his 
bloody work. 
Ken winged another telepathic message toward Thayenta, and 
beyond her, to Briv. Just how strong was Briv? Could he not 
"hear" Ken's communication? Why didn't the M'Nae leader act? 
R.C, somehow finding the strength, had levered himself up to 
his good knee. He continued to hammer at Eads, gently, with 
words. Wounded and weaponless, words were all Zachary 
possessed. 
Miraculously, Eads' expression slowly shifted. A peculiarly 
vacant gaze replaced the bug-eyed frenzy. Shakily, Eads lifted his 
free hand and rubbed his forehead. He looked dizzy, disoriented. 
Suddenly, outside the building, a loud clanging started. An 
alarm bell? Ken tensed at the sound and barely kept himself from 
squeezing the needier trigger. 
Eads appeared deaf to the noise. As if he had fallen into a 
daydream, his gaze was unseeing, un-reacting. 
Or a telepathic trance! 
Briv was reaching out from the M'Nae fortress in the mist. 
"R.C.?" Whispering, careful not to wake Eads from that blank 
stare, Ken said, "I think the M'Nae have come over to our side." 
"I see." The pilot was breathing heavily, using the bench for 
support, gradually pulling himself up onto his right foot. Blood

drenched his pant leg below the left knee. Gritting his teeth, he 
hobbled a few steps, moans escaping him as he jostled the 
wounded limb. 
Still training his "borrowed" needier on Eads, Ken dug in his 
pocket for the M'Nae translator. He held out the metallic oblong 
to Thayenta. "Here. Quick. We've got to be able to communicate 
in a hurry!" 
She got up and ran to him, seizing the translator. ,Her dress 
of living material instantly grew a necklace to support the device 
once more. Thayenta slipped it onto the glittering thong and 
said, "Briv has stopped the death-bringer… for a while. He will 
confuse their minds, for a while." 
"Doesn't he realize what we're up against?" Ken said hoarsely. 
"It can't be for just 'a while'. It has to be permanently. The 
minute Briv lets go, Eads will return to the same madness. He's 
determined to kill all the M'Nae." 
Troubled, her large eyes moist, Thayenta said, "For a while 
Briv is watching. You must… make the death-bringers leave." 
"We can't! Their ship's wrecked, just like ours. Humans can't 
teleport from one planet to another." 
"Ken," R.C. said heavily. "You're right, but we haven't the 
time." 
"Okay!" Ken looked at Thayenta, trying to read a response to 
his explanation. 
"Can… can not," she said, slumping. "For a while." She 
hesitated. Possibly the telepathic message she had received was 
too depressing to repeat. Finally Thayenta blurted, "We must 
help ourselves. Briv will watch, send mist to confuse the 
death-bringers—" 
"But only for a while," Ken finished, repeating the key phrase 
in Briv's strategy. "Thayenta, have him teleport you out of here. 
You can get away. R.C. and I will manage on our own."

Tears brimmed on Thayenta's black eyelashes. She looked 
frightened. "I do not… know how. I am a… student." 
"Dammit, Briv can teleport you out of here!" Ken gazed 
around angrily, addressing the air, the invisible presence of the 
M'Nae leader. "You can't be that cold-blooded. We aren't going 
to betray you. She doesn't need to watch us like a hawk and risk 
getting killed. Get her out of here. Please!" 
There was no reply. Thayenta bit her lip, snuffing back tears. 
Briv was not going to remove Thayenta from the line of fire. 
Briv certainly was no fool. He had seen Eads in motion. And if 
the alien could not see that the colonists' leader was insane, he 
still must understand that these were his enemies, potential 
attackers. Briv was using Thayenta as a spy, readying for that 
attack. 
Did he intend to pit ten M'Nae against d'ozens of colonists 
armed with needlers? 
"Noland," R.C. said mournfully, "what have you done? What 
the hell have you done? An interstellar war. You're totally out of 
your league. Your philosophy's no good. You're going to get 
yourself and all these colonists killed." 
"He can't hear you," Ken said. Ordinarily R.C. would have seen 
that, but pain was muddling his mind. "No! Don't, R.C!" The 
pilot had reached out to touch Eads' arm. At Ken's shout, 
Zachary aborted the gesture, recognizing the danger. 
Ken studied Eads' blank face a few seconds more, then 
lowered his needier. So long as Briv held the man in that 
telepathic trance, the weapon was unnecessary. 
One of the guards mumbled, waking up. Ken applied one last 
jab to the man's jaw. "We'd better get out of here," he suggested. 
"Yes!" Thayenta agreed, urgently tugging at Ken's remaining 
sleeve. "Now!" 
Ken hurried to R.C., slung the captain's arm over his shoulder.

"Come on. You can't reach Eads. Give it up." 
"All right." He leaned heavily on Ken as they lurched toward 
the door. Ken paused on the threshold, assessing the situation 
outside. 
Clouds of purplish mist wafted through the little village and 
across the plowed fields. 
If they used it well, it could serve as a smoke screen for 
Thayenta and the Surveymen. There were some colonists a short 
way down the village main street. They were waving their arms 
with great agitation, arguing about the strange mist. 
Grateful for the delay, Ken asked, "Thayenta, how much time 
before Briv takes back his purple fog?" 
"Two… two valia," she said, then made a small noise Ken 
interpreted as self-disgust, annoyed with herself for her inability 
to convert M'Nae to human terms. 
"Long time?" Ken pleaded. "Or short?" 
She held her hands half a meter apart, and struggled to find a 
word. "In… middle," Thayenta said, looking apologetic. She 
pointed northeast, toward the water wheel and the trail leading 
to the stream. "We go back to M'Nae." 
"We'd never make it," R.C. warned. He sagged, and Ken took a 
firmer purchase on the man's arm. 
Forced to agree, Ken said, "No, not likely. We'll never get 
through unless Briv has incapacitated every single guard along 
the way, Thayenta." 
She caught his meaning and imitated a human's negative 
head shake. "No. They are confused. Only 
Wild-Eyes, the chief death-bringer, is held without thought." 
"Eads," Ken guessed. "Briv's put him in some kind of 
trance—for a while. We're on our own as far as the rest of the

colonists go." 
R.C. was silent, breathing hard, and functioning on courage 
alone. Most of his weight was now carried by Ken. Suddenly Ken 
exclaimed, "The ship! Guards will be watching for us to make a 
break toward the trail—not in the other direction. There must be 
plenty of hiding places in a Class-D cargo carrier. Can you make 
it that far, Captain?" 
Sweat dotted R.C.'s brow. Somewhere he found the strength 
to say, "If I can't, leave me. You and the girl get away. I'll take my 
chances arguing No-land into a truce—" 
"Maybe." Ken wouldn't put any bets on that. But there was no 
time to debate the matter. "Thayenta, see that lane going 
between these two buildings? You go down there and keep out of 
sight. Hurry." 
She answered him with a sweetly encouraging smile. The 
bruise on her cheek only added to her piquant beauty, making 
her look more vulnerable. She ran to the alley between the 
community center and an adjoining stone and log structure. In 
the drifting fog, she seemed to melt into nothing. Camouflaged 
by Briv's smoke screen, Thayenta clung close to walls, as 
inconspicuous as a wraith. 
As the two men struggled to the narrow dirt lane, R.C. 
breathed through his teeth. Ken half dragged the pilot into the 
shadowy alley Thayenta had taken. The woman had reached the 
rear of the building and was on the lookout for guards or 
wandering colonists. 
Briv's mist floated eerily, folding and unfolding itself like a 
living thing. For all Ken knew, it was. There was so much Ken 
and Thayenta could exchange, discovering each other's culture 
and peoples. They were disparate species, but held much in 
common. 
If only Briv would teleport the three of them safely out of the 
colonists' village back to the room with the prism. Ken laughed 
bitterly at his own wish. When he was imprisoned in the M'Nae 
stronghold, he had longed for freedom. Now he wanted to return

to that foggy haven. 
"How's it going?" he asked R.C. gently. The pilot muttered 
that he was doing fine. He wasn't, but they were both trying to 
keep up their courage. "Hang on. It's not too far." 
That was not precisely a lie. But every step of the way would 
seem a kilometer to the injured man. Ken hesitated, wanting to 
give R.C. as much rest as he could. Plainly Zachary was steeling 
himself for the ordeal ahead. 
Briv had to sense, telepathically, that R.C. was in agony, but 
that cold-blooded bastard was indifferent. He studied and 
watched them like bugs impaled on pins. It was an excellent way 
for Briv to learn about humans without becoming too involved, 
but it was tough on his guinea pigs! 
"Thayenta, the big ship, over that way," Ken instructed. "And 
remember to hide in the mist as we go along. Okay?" 
Thayenta nodded and skipped into the mist, heading in the 
general direction of the wrecked Class-D. In her wake, Ken and 
R.C. moved awkwardly. A three-legged race bereft of all humor, 
theirs was a grim struggle to survive. R.C. wheezed heavily from 
his heroic efforts, and several times he almost slipped out of 
Ken's grasp, half-fainting. But each time he rallied, bravely 
hopping along, his bloody leg dragging. 
On the grassy slope, the going became tougher. Ken waded 
through it on a zigzag course, seeking bare ground and keeping 
Thayenta in sight in the purple mist. 
A pile of crumpled metal blocked Ken's path, and he 
laboriously detoured around it. Then there was another pile, and 
another from debris strewn in the wake of the Class-D's death 
slide into the valley. The colonists were collecting the junk, 
sorting it into piles to be salvaged later. They had already built 
the water-wheel from such scrap. They were fanatics, but also 
hardworking and resourceful. If only the colonists and the M'Nae 
could bury their differences. 
"Must… be getting close," R.C. panted.

"Soon," Ken replied. In this fog, he couldn't gauge the distance 
accurately. The ground was rising slowly, gradually angling up 
toward the valley's back wall… 
Yes, there it was! Ahead now, through a gap in the purple 
mist, Ken saw the immense bulk of the wrecked cargo ship. 
More debris and storage dumps blocked their way —little 
pyramids of metal and plastic, much of it charred and fused into 
fantastic shapes by the terrible stresses of the crash. 
Had the cargo ship suffered the same mysterious fire that 
destroyed the survey ship? How badly was she wrecked inside? 
Where would be the best place to hide themselves and avoid 
pursuit? 
Ken searched his memories for a design diagram of a Class-D. 
He wished he had paid closer attention during those ship 
identification lectures back at the Academy. It was a hell of a 
time to need a refresher course! Then it hadn't seemed 
important, but it was essential now. Where were the hatches, 
corridors, all the nooks and crannies that could hide a wounded 
pilot, his apprentice, and an alien woman? 
Although there was some distance yet to go before they'd 
reach her, the ship loomed above them. The forekeel was buried 
meters deep in the valley wall, which meant there was no chance 
to use the forward hatches. She was enmeshed in earth and grass 
and rocks up to the third-level. That would leave port and 
starboard and rear accesses. 
R.C. grunted and gasped with each step as Ken helped the 
pilot along, taking it as slowly as he dared. Pursuers? He hadn't 
heard any… yet. The mist seemed to muffle sound as well as 
cloud vision. 
Hunting a likely entry way, Ken studied the gigantic bulk of 
the Class-D. It could not be too far up the side. R.C. was unable 
to climb with his leg wound. And it could not be too 
obvious—nothing that would attract the attention of Eads and 
his people.

Thayenta scampered back to the two men, and the purple 
mist swirled about the three of them. He heard faint shouts from 
their left. The words were garbled and unintelligible, but the 
tone was angry and excited. 
Maybe somebody had discovered the direction of their escape. 
Thayenta pawed through her meager Terran vocabulary a 
moment, then gave up and made use of her translator. "Where 
do we go, Ken?" 
Ken glanced at R.C. The captain's gaze was dim-eyed and 
unfocussed, his lips lax as breath whistled past a dry throat. 
What was keeping the man conscious? 
The ship was over a kilometer in length. The nearest access to 
Ken was an undamaged rear cargo door which would swing open 
onto the ship's glide tracks. The colonists must have used it to 
unload the cargo and people who had survived the crash. 
He vetoed that. The entry was too wide, too open, too easy to 
spot. 
The distant chase veered westward for a few chilling seconds. 
As Ken stood silently, listening to the shouts, he wished the three 
of them were invisible, not merely shrouded in purple mist. 
"Starrett, you see 'em head for the trail?" 
"Had to be that way." 
"Aw, he couldn't see 'em if they fell on him!" 
"Try the bridge!" 
These were the shouts of men bent on vengeance, of colonists 
fanatically loyal to Noland Eads. It was a lynch mob. 
"Jude, check the south fence…" 
The cries faded, drifting off in several directions, away from 
Ken and R.C. and Thayenta. They had at least a temporary 
reprieve.

"That was close," Ken whispered. "Come on." 
He had to make up his mind quickly. R.C. was too weak to 
stand a lengthy trek around to the ship's starboard side. Ken 
settled on a small hatch, low on the port hull section, that was 
partially opened but battered into a lump. Between the hull and 
the remainder of the seal fitttings a narrow gap was visible. 
Above the hatch a mangled sheet of plating drooped over the 
broken lock forming a metallic curtain that nearly concealed the 
little entryway. In stark sunlight or evening shadows—such as 
now—the sheeting hid the door from all but the closest scrutiny. 
Ken could see it at only one angle and hoped that held true for 
any pursuers as well. 
R.C. groaned softly, nearly unconscious. "Hang on," Ken 
repeated, fighting down his rage at Eads. 
The metal around the small hatch was razor sharp, reshaped 
into jagged teeth by the crash. Ken signalled Thayenta to enter 
first. She slid past the pointed metal, easily bending her slender 
form away from sharp projections. 
Ken risked some noise, kicking at the bent door. It was built 
to take the stresses of deep space travel, but sliding across the 
planet had ruptured the ship's integrity. The hatch gave a few 
centimeters. 
Wary of those cutting edges, Ken edged gingerly into the 
opening, dragging R.C. along with him. 
Metal plucked at Ken's fatigues and snagged the fabric on 
R.C.'s chest, but both men escaped laceration. Another second, 
and they were both inside. 
The hatch led to a tiny storage compartment inside a lifeboat 
auxiliary area. Thayenta was standing in the center of the little 
room, staring around curiously. Her head was cocked, alert. Was 
she guarding against pursuers, or listening to telepathic orders 
from Briv? 
Ken knelt and slid R.C.'s arm off his shoulder. He stretched 
the pilot full length on a table. The wound was as bad as Ken had

feared; the needier had bored through R.C.'s calf muscles, and 
blood drenched his pant leg and covered the boot. 
Ken ripped the cloth back from the wound as gently and 
carefully as possible. Even so, R.C. moaned. Ken started to tear a 
rag off his ruined sleeve to use as a tourniquet. But Thayenta 
stopped him. 
Smiling at the injured pilot, she plucked her fingers at the 
hem of her pink garment. There was no ripping sound, no 
indication of damage to her clothes, but she suddenly had a neat 
roll of fluffy fabric in her hands. Thayenta bent over R.C.'s leg, 
using part of the material to wipe blood gently away from the 
wound. 
"You've got some tricks no nurse ever had," Ken said 
admiringly. He winged a ten-second first aid course to her, 
telepathically. Thayenta offered him a strong strip of the pink 
material. 
As a test, he snapped it, fascinated. Like Thay-enta's clothing, 
the material left… alive. And yet it was fabric, as soft and pliable 
as an old-fashioned piece of gauze. 
"Not…" Thayenta imitated the act of spraying bandage. She 
remembered the medi-kit! And Ken recalled that sensation of 
someone invisible sitting beside him, pawing through the 
medi-kit's contents with him. 
"No, it's not modern medical issue, but it will do," he smiled. 
Ken stripped off R.C.'s belt, made the man as comfortable as 
possible, then set to the painful work of applying a tourniquet. 
As he tightened the pink fabric Thayenta had supplied, R.C. 
grabbed Ken's wrist. Despite his loss of blood, the pilot's grip was 
strong. Putting Zachary in a supine position had lessened shock 
but heightened his awareness and pain. His eyes were very 
bright, and sweat ran down his face. "Never mind about the leg, 
Ken. You've got to—" 
"In a minute," Ken said. "We have to slow down the bleeding." 
Thayenta pillowed R.C.'s head on her lap, stroking his brow, her

fingertips playing gently at his temples. Waves of concern and 
sympathy washed over Ken, and some of the tightness melted out 
of R.C. The woman must be blunting his pain, telepathically. 
Ken finished the tourniquet and examined the results. To his 
relief the flow of blood abated. He used the pink fluff to cover the 
wound itself. There was no way to tell if the bone was broken. 
Thayenta shook her head, again using a Terran gesture. 
"Not… bone. O—kay." 
He grinned back at her. "You have X-ray telepathy too? The 
Terran medical people would love to hire you!" His own 
comment startled him. Yes, that was true. M'Nae medical 
abilities could heal human patients. 
R.C. had not let go of Ken's wrist throughout the first aid, 
hampering his work. Now the pilot's fingers tightened, 
demanding Ken's attention. "You've got to get up top." 
Ken said, "Communications? You think—" 
"Noland… good spaceman. The best," Zachary said weakly. 
"He'd have carried full gear, even for this crazy scheme, just in 
case he needed a Mayday." 
That made sense. "Got it, Captain. Sit tight." 
"Watch for guards," R.C. whispered. 
Ken pried the pilot's hand off his wrist gently, then showed 
him the two confiscated needlers. "Equalizers, Captain. Here," 
and he pressed one close to Zachary's right hand. "I can handle 
it. After all, I've had the top pilot in Survey to learn from." 
"Not the top," R.C. sighed, letting Thayenta soothe him. 
"That's Noland." 
"I don't think so," Ken said, meaning it. "He had a Class-D 
coming into NE 592. A lot more power, a lot of cushion. He 
didn't have to crashland a small two-man Survey ship safely."

R.C. didn't hear him, lulled into semi-consciousness. Ken 
propped a mashed storage locker under the pilot's feet, elevating 
his lower limbs to counter shock. He wished he had some sort of 
blanket to keep Zachary warm. 
Immediately, Thayenta plucked at her clothes, stripping away 
more of the pink-leaved fabric. The remainder flowed out 
tenuously to cover her body. She was reduced to a wisp of 
nothing, and the results were distracting. Ken took her offering 
and tucked it around the injured pilot carefully. 
"You're handy to have around," and he leaned across 
Zachary's limp form and kissed her lightly. Thayenta seemed 
puzzled, but intrigued by the gesture. "Stay with R.C. I'm going 
up higher in the ship to try to contact my people. My home 
world. Do you understand? Does Briv understand?" 
She debated the matter, listening to orders from M'Nae 
headquarters, then nodded. Ken went on, "If you hear anyone, 
hide. Get out of here. Probably, they won't kill R.C," he added 
lamely. Trying to make the argument solid, he added, "After all, 
we're human. But you're in danger, Thayenta." 
Ken stared into empty air, addressing Briv directly. "If I can 
contact my home planet, my people will come and capture Eads. 
They will take him and the other death-bringers away and leave 
this world to the M'Nae. Please don't kill any of the colonists. 
Give me a chance." 
There was no response. Thayenta was expressionless. If Briv 
was in agreement, he wasn't sharing it with his little 
ambassador. 
Ken patted Thayenta's shoulder, then ran out of the 
compartment. Briv had to keep that smoke screen a while longer 
to protect R.C. and Thayenta. 
He chased along corridors and clambered up glide tubes that 
no longer operated. All the mechanical and electronic gear was 
either non-functioning or gutted. Eads' people had cannibalized 
what they could and left the rest for junk. But that shouldn't 
apply to communications. Possibly Eads wouldn't want to call

for help, ever; but surely he would have kept radio equipment 
operating and repaired any damage. No one would deep-space 
without some insurance against unforeseen catastrophe. 
Ken reached the ship's top deck and ran the full length. At the 
control section, he slowed his pace. There were no guards. 
Staring in numb horror, Ken stood in the door to 
Communications. There had been no cannibalizing of 
equipment, here: there was nothing to cannibalize. 
R.C. was wrong. Eads had broken completely with all the 
rules, even those that kept a man alive in deep space. The 
communications room was absolutely clean. Along the 
bulkheads, where consoles should have stood, there was nothing 
but a few faint outlines to show where apparatus had been. The 
stark cleanliness of the spots, the sealed circuitry fixtures all 
pointed to one conclusion. The ship never carried deep space 
com gear! 
This colony couldn't call for help. No matter how bad things 
got, the colony was voiceless. 
There had been radar, a deep-space navigation tool, but after 
the crash, the colonists had ripped out its parts. But there was 
no way Ken could convert such equipment to warp frequencies 
anyway. 
Eads' madness sliced at Ken like a knife. All of them were on 
their own, permanently severed from the communications 
umbilical connecting them with home. 
No reinforcements need be expected, now, or for 
months—years—to come. 
CHAPTER TEN 
"I don't believe it." R.C.'s expression underlined his statement. 
^'Nothing?" 
"It was stripped clean. They must have done that as soon as 
they stole the ship from the Proxima berth," Ken said, reluctant

to break the news and shatter R.C.'s hopes. As the pilot sat up, 
grim-faced, Ken grabbed his shoulders. 
He tried to soften the news with a smile, but that wasn't 
necessary. Obviously R.C. was well aware of their position. "No, 
no, I'm fine," he reassured Ken. "I really do feel much 
better—thanks to the girl. The pain is down to an occasional 
twinge, and she even did something to take the swelling in my lip 
away." 
Thayenta knelt by Zachary's side, looking pleased with herself. 
Ken acknowledged her skill with a nod and replied, "But a 
needier wound is still a serious injury." 
The pilot tentatively wiggled his left foot. "It still hurts, but 
I'm sure I can walk. We got rid of the tourniquet and there's no 
further bleeding. I tell you, 
Ken, if we can get the M'Nae together with some Terran 
doctors…" 
"Right." Ken rummaged in a pocket and dug out a vial of 
old-style concentrates, dropping them into R.C.'s hand. "And 
here's some icing for the cake. I found them up top. The colonists 
hadn't cleaned out all the lockers." 
Zachary nipped open the vial and hungrily popped several of 
the tablets. He made a sour face. "Old. They taste like they've 
been on board since this tub was commissioned." 
"Probably have, but the nutritional value should be intact." 
Ken went to the hatchway and peered out, checking for search 
parties. The view downhill toward the village was clear of purple 
mist now and sundown shadows raked across the valley. There 
was no one in sight. 
Zachary munched a few more tablets before offering some to 
Thayenta. She shook her head, amused. R.C. shrugged and said, 
"Yes, everything has to be 'natural' for Noland. Fits his 
philosophy. Naturally, he'd ignore these concentrates when his 
people stripped this ship. No communications, no force tools. He 
lectured on the natural life all those years, but none of us really

thought he'd carry through on those harebrained ideas." 
The little compartment was almost dark; only a small ray of 
light filtered in from rents in the bulkheads of adjoining 
compartments. R.C. propped himself up and tested his wounded 
leg again, thumping it lightly against the deck. 
Thayenta said nothing. She must have been follow-ing some of 
the conversation, but what? Her lithe form was an elfin shadow 
in the fading light. How much of what Thayenta saw and heard 
was Briv learning as well? And what decisions would the alien 
leader make as a result? 
"Did you tell Eads the truth?" Ken asked. "Is the Patrol likely 
to come hunting for him soon?" 
"No, we can't expect much out of Central." It was too dark to 
see his face now, but Ken heard the regret in R.C.'s voice. "Once 
they Were sure Eads had escaped, not rebelled, the assignment 
became a low priority. I had my own options on a search pattern. 
I was to locate him, if possible, and report back." 
"So they could cart him back to Earth and turn him over to 
the psych people, I suppose. Would they lock him up and pry at 
his brains?" 
"He's dangerous, Ken." 
"Yes, but if he could be salvaged—" 
"A brilliant mind is worse when it vectors off-center than a 
mediocre head is," R.C. quoted from a famous medical journal. 
He sighed, again worked his leg against the deck. 
It was an eerie setting. They were in almost complete 
darkness, discussing the future of man and a complicated 
humanoid species, on the threshold of war. 
Ken stared into the blackness. "Thayenta, why did our ship 
burn, and Ead's ship survive? He was the death bringer, not us." 
She cocked her head to one side. In the faint light from the

corridor Ken saw reflected iridescence out of the dark, two 
rainbow-colored circles: Thayenta's eyes, glowing. "I… we did not 
know he was the death bringer. Not at first." 
Ken was entranced by her catlike gaze, but he forced himself 
back on course. "I see. And by the time we landed, you had 
decided that all humans were death bringers. So thanks to what 
Eads had done to your ambassador, we were attacked." 
"It can't go any further," R.C. growled. "We've got to stop this 
insane collision." 
Bitterly, Ken asked, "How? We have two needlers and a couple 
of days' supply of concentrates. That's our arsenal and food 
supply. Eads has a colony full of supplies. As for Briv…" He 
paused, thinking over the meager information they had collected 
on the M'Nae. "Briv has his telepathy, and something called a 
Gera-ana…" 
Thayenta sucked in her breath, her cat's eyes glittering. 
He had to get through to her. She was the key, the only link 
the Surveymen had. "You saved us, Thayenta. Briv could have 
wiped us out, but you saved us. You tried to warn me away, out 
in space. Then you pleaded our case when we crashed. Help us 
now. We've got to make Briv understand. There can't be war 
between M'Nae and humans. Even if the M'Nae win, a lot of 
them may die." 
"Gera-ana," Thayenta repeated, slowly. 
Ken fed M'Nae pronouncements back at her. "You said: we 
came here with the Gera-ana. I don't know if that means the big 
prism or the black area beyond the stream or the purple mist. 
But it's plainly something very important to the M'Nae. You 
know." 
Ken had made several blind stabs, but Thayenta reacted as if 
he had laid bare the M'Nae's most closely guarded secrets. She 
gulped and said, "Briv—Vrytan. Very powerful. A walker 
between… places. He can be hard. Can break through shields if 
he desires."

"He'd have to be strong," R.C. mused. "It makes sense. The 
M'Nae came here from another world, and Briv's their leader. 
He'd have to be able to cope with anything that might crop 
up—even an encounter with an alien species." 
"The pioneer breed." Ken smiled. It didn't make any 
difference that R.C. couldn't see him. "Just like a couple of men 
named Zachary and Eads. You know, if I think of Briv in that 
light, I just might be able to understand him and reason with 
him." 
"Are you thinking of taking command?" R.C. asked. And after 
a short silence, he said firmly, "Agreed. You'll have to, Ken. This 
leg is better, but not good enough for any hard travelling. If 
anyone gets back to the M'Nae and settles this thing, it'll have to 
be you." 
Ken argued, "If they come to the ship—" 
"I can handle it." That sounded like the gruff and familiar R.C. 
Zachary, undaunted by a leg wound and a space wreck. "I've got 
a needier. And I cut my spaceman's teeth on Class-D cargo ships. 
I know this hulk inside out." 
"She's dead," Ken warned. "No power, no elevators 
operational." 
"I'm more at home in her than anyone out in that village, 
except Noland, and he's not in his right mind." R.C. hesitated, 
then said, "Go on, Ken. It's our best chance. I've got a stomach 
full of concentrates, and thanks to the lady, my leg feels better 
than it ought to. You go to the mountain, since it won't come to 
us."
R.C. was right. Ken was forced to agree that the choice was 
logical. "Are you sure?" he asked, loathe to leave the injured 
pilot. 
"Go on," and R.C. slapped out at Ken, lightly striking the 
younger man's arm. "You've got a war to stop." 
Ken stood up and heard—no, felt—Thayenta get to her feet. "I

go, too," she said. "You must have guide to… to M'Nae. To the 
Gera-ana." She was reading Ken's mind, again, understanding 
his needs before he asked. He didn't resent her telepathic gifts so 
much any more. In fact, Ken began to revel in them. She was his 
ace in the hole, one Noland Eads couldn't hope to match. 
"I would appreciate your help—one more time." Small fingers 
slid into his hand, warm flesh pressing his palm, a sweet 
fragrance filling the little compartment. This was the alien's 
response, not a scent of fear, but of trust. 
"Good luck." In the dark, Ken and R.C. shook hands briefly. 
Both men knew the risks and accepted their share of them. 
Towing Thayenta, Ken fumbled his way out into the dark 
corridor. The woman stumbled and gasped with annoyance, then 
steered him away from colliding with a bulkhead projection. 
"Not quite the blind leading the blind," Ken chuckled. 
"Which way are we going?" Thayenta inquired via the 
translator. 
Ken debated, then said, "Up high in the ship, toward the side 
where the sun sets. You can see in the dark, and I know the 
general construction of this ship; between the two of us we'll 
manage." 
He was right. They teamed up with remarkable ease. 
Thayenta wasn't knowledgeable about compartment order or the 
location of ascent tubes, but she saw perfectly in the stygian guts 
of the cargo craft. Their progress was swifter than Ken had dared 
to hope. Occasionally he murmured, "There should be a corridor 
to the right about here," and felt a confirming tug on his hand by 
Thayenta. 
Finally, they emerged on a level-two deck. Sifting through 
gaps in the hull, the last rays of daylight glimmered. Ken dug 
into his memories of Class-D specs. "Steering computers section. 
This'U do. There must be an access for antenna maintenance 
here." 
The inner hatch was sprung from the crash. Now that his eyes

served him once more, Ken pulled Thayenta along, hurrying 
across a suit locker. The suits were gone. The colonists must have 
taken them for the fabric. But the helmets still hung from their 
hooks. Several had been smashed in the wreck. They dangled 
facelessly, like skulls from the Terran technology that Eads and 
his people wanted to abandon. 
Hydraulics were dead, so Ken had to crank the outer hatch 
manually: there was no sucking sigh as the last milliliters of 
oxygen rushed out into vacuum. But the air outside was fresher 
than the stale atmosphere in the dead ship. 
Ken peered from the hatch warily, but there was no sign of 
search parties. He had guessed well, choosing the starboard side 
and this level. A couple of meters below him the bulge of the 
ship's hull rested snugly against bare earth. The last rays of the 
setting sun sparked a golden radiance across the crest of the hill 
five meters above Ken's vantage point. 
"Wait," he said, before stepping off the airlock's lip. He landed 
on all fours in the soft earth. Conveniently, the crash had 
jammed and loosened the soil, rendering it as pliable as sponge. 
He held up his arms and silently ordered Thayenta to jump. 
Without hesitation, she did. 
Ken caught her easily, and held her a few moments longer 
than necessary. Sometime, there would be time to take things 
slowly. There were so many things he wanted to know about her. 
In the twilight her features were ethereal, more lovely than 
ever, the bruise on her cheek almost un-noticeable. Her nose and 
brow wrinkled charmingly as she puzzled over his behavior. 
They crept along the slope, heading for the valley's back wall. 
For part of the way they went on hands and knees. Dew was 
forming on the purple grass, making footing tricky and slippery. 
Ken was alert, watching for guards. It was impossible to 
predict where Noland Eads might have posted them, but 
perhaps it hadn't seemed necessary to watch the village's back 
door. Eads figured the massive wreck of the ship was protection 
enough against invasion from that direction.

The reverse was true. From this angle the ship's bulk shielded 
them from any lookouts in the village. 
And the valley's back wall was empty, unguarded. Ken helped 
Thayenta up the last meter or so of slope and they ducked under 
the shelter of a forest of pink willows. 
The dying sun hung on the horizon for a last few seconds. 
Thayenta reached up to some low branches. To Ken's wide-eyed 
astonishment, the leaves flowed from the dangling limbs, became 
fabric. They twined and blended with the woman's wisp of 
clothing, replenishing the "cloth" she had donated as blankets 
and bandage for R.C. 
"That's quite a little dress factory you've got there," Ken said 
admiringly. 
Twilight descended, wrapping them in gray and violet. Light 
from NE 592's three moons dappled through the willow leaves, 
drenching the scene with multi-shadowed coolness, a beautiful, 
unreal world. Thayenta seemed to fit into it very well. 
"I… I was cold," Thayenta said, apparently digesting Ken's 
comment. 
"Whatever keeps you comfortable. We've got a long way to go 
tonight," Ken assured her softly. "I'm counting on you to steer 
that raft back upstream. Can you?" 
A pause while her translator converted Terran words to 
M'Nae. But when Thayenta replied she scorned the device, 
speaking directly to Ken, copying his word. "I can." 
"Good girl. Let's go." They started eastward, meandering 
through the lunar light, in and out of friendly, concealing willow 
trees. Ken felt oddly at one with nature, protected by the planet 
itself. 
He almost persuaded himself he was on a lovers' stroll 
through a fantasy land. The grass was slightly damp, the air 
heavy and moist and perfumed with night flowers. Nocturnal 
insects and animals wakened and began a chirping chorus all

about the two fugitives. It was hard to concentrate, in such a 
pleasant environment, hard to remember what must be done, 
the dangers he faced. 
If he were out orbiting NE 592 in a Survey ship, it would all 
be cut and dried. There'd be no night sounds or scents, none of 
this intoxicating beauty. He would think in purely scientific 
terms: the terminator, the surface features, the spectroanalysis. 
Tape it and file it for reference. 
But here, Ken was intensely alive, more aware of his senses 
than he had ever been before. Even facing possible death could 
not mask his heightened awareness of the alien loveliness around 
him and the nearness of Thayenta. 
"If you get tired—" he started to say. 
"I go. Thayenta go okay." She didn't use the translator, so he 
got the full effect of her irritation. 
"Thayenta does indeed go okay," Ken agreed. 
If she was wearied by all this heavy physical activity, she did 
not admit it. Her hand was firm on his, guiding Ken around 
fallen trees and marshy ground, under low hanging limbs. Now 
and then he caught a glimpse of moving lights to the left, down 
in the valley: search parties, still rummaging about. 
Ken telepathically relayed instructions and Thayenta steered a 
wide course clear of the falls and the waterwheel. They cut across 
the circle. Ken drew maps in his head and let the alien woman 
pick his brain, enjoying the silent exchange, beginning to delight 
in the easy flow of information. He wordlessly explained his 
reasoning. Best to come out of the woods well above the rapids, 
right at the place where they had beached the raft. That way 
they could avoid— 
There was a guard. 
Ken pulled Thayenta down beside him in the lush grass and 
detritus of leaves dropped by willows. Fortunately they hadn't yet 
emerged from the woods. He pointed, winging his thoughts to

that figure a few centimeters from his own. Her response came 
back. Yes. I understand. 
Staying under the concealing droop of willow limbs along the 
bank of the stream, they crept upstream. Ken looked back to 
check their position. There was just one guard there, on the 
opposite bank, right where the raft was. 
Frustrating! He hadn't counted on Eads reaching out that far 
to trap the fugitives. Okay. It would mean only a slight delay, if it 
was handled correctly. 
They had come far enough. Ken gingerly stepped into the 
water, making as little splash as he could. The night was muggy, 
and the stream was comfortably cool. Thayenta was right behind 
him, unmindful of her clothes. Well, if she could make fresh 
dresses out of willow leaves any time she chose, he supposed she 
needn't trouble about a little dampness spoiling an outfit. 
The current was sluggish here, well above the rapids. Ken 
waded slowly, glancing back at Thayenta frequently. The water 
was up to her waist, but she was earnestly following him to the 
opposite bank. 
Ken telepathically ordered her to wait, then started back 
along the bank. Careful to make no noise, he let the night 
creatures mask his approach with their cheepings and rustlings 
in the willows. 
The guard was using a torch pole staked down into the stream 
bank. He wasn't lucky enough to have an alien woman with cat 
vision to warn him of dangers. 
Plainly the man had been on duty a long time. He was 
growing bored, inattentive, and eager to change watches and get 
back to the village. He probably assumed all the excitement was 
taking place in the valley and longed to join the search for Eads' 
enemies. The guard idly smacked a club into a cupped palm. 
Ken slipped out from beneath the willows and stood an 
arm's-length from the guard. The man's back was to him.

Balancing lightly on the balls of his feet, Ken tapped the man's 
right shoulder. 
"What the—?" 
As anticipated, the man swung, backhanding the club in a 
wild arc. Ken ducked and drove a one-two punch into the man's 
middle. It took away both the man's fight and the breath he 
might have used to yell for reinforcements. Ken chopped down 
on the man's wrist, jolting the club loose. Then he brought his 
locked fists down on the guard's shoulder blades, collapsing the 
man into the grass. 
There was no further movement. The man breathed deeply, 
evenly, but he was unconscious. 
Well-satisfied, Ken tossed the club into the bushes nearby. 
One guard down, and no need for bloodshed. The man would 
come to with a sore stomach and an aching neck but no serious 
damage was done. 
Ken had been tempted, though. He had recognized the 
face—one of the men who'd jumped his trio that afternoon. But 
he was not the man who'd struck Thayenta. 
Thayenta was crying, like an abandoned kitten. 
He tensed, looked downstream, on the alert. No one had heard 
his struggle with the guard. No one seemed to hear Thayenta. 
Ken hurried to her side, concerned. 
She was crouched at the stream's bank, holding something… a 
piece of white… raft. There were a lot of other pieces of the same 
stuff, scattered along the reeds and under the willows. 
No single piece was larger than Ken's hand. The thing had 
been battered to pieces. Eads' men, venting their spleen, had 
smashed the raft, reducing it to tiny fragments. 
How would he and Thayenta get back to M'Nae headquarters 
now? Without the raft, it would take hours to trek upstream.

Then Thayenta's weeping hit him. These were not a human 
woman's tears. Deeper, they wrenched at Ken as if he himself 
were suffering some terrible, unbearable grief. 
She rocked back and forth, cuddling the broken pieces of the 
raft. Whimpering. "Juissa. Juissa. Lao… lao…" 
Her anguish ripped at Ken. He felt the pain of loss, as real as 
if he shared the horror Thayenta would have felt had she found 
one of her people lying dead beside the river. 
Ken's thought hit him like a physical blow. Dead. The raft was 
dead, and Thayenta was mourning it! How often he had puzzled 
over those M'Nae garments, wall surfaces and rafts, saying to 
himself, "The damned stuff acts like it's alive!" 
It was! 
Thayenta made her garments out of living things. All the 
M'Nae formed garments of natural objects, forming and 
reforming them, but never cutting or destroying. 
They used willows or moss or something that became white 
plastic and undulated and breathed like living tissue. 
In the harsh, wavering light of the torch, Thay-enta's tears 
were diamonds, sparkling on the long lashes framing those 
space-black eyes. She looked up at Ken, and there was mingled 
rage and horror in her piquant face. By now she had learned 
quite a bit of Ken's language. The words that came at him were 
Terran, undiluted by the impersonality of the translator. "Kill! 
Death bringers. They kill! Again!" 
CHAPTER ELEVEN 
This was far more than a woman's grief over a slaughtered 
pet. Ken pulled Thayenta close, soothing her, empathizing with 
her torment. 
She hammered small fists against his chest. Brokenly, she 
sobbed over and over, "Death bringers, death bringers…"

The awful paradox twisted at Ken. There was Eads, whose 
philosophy demanded that man work hand in hand with nature, 
scorning technology, demanding a return to mankind's primitive 
days. On the other hand, the M'Nae—Eads' enemies, by the 
sheerest of accidents—were living hand in hand with nature, 
without any apparent technology, using the very stuff of the 
planet for their clothing and transportation. 
"Thayenta, easy," Ken whispered. Even in this emotional 
turmoil, her cries were soft, unlikely to carry far in this damp air. 
There was no danger that the guards downstream might hear 
her. Ken let her cry it out, angry that she should have such pain, 
wishing he could explain human motives. The men who had 
"killed" the raft hadn't meant to be cruel, hadn't realized it was a 
living object. 
Gradually, her weeping died, and Thayenta pushed away from 
Ken, staring at him with a bright, angry gaze. Fragile, and alien, 
she had never appeared so unhuman. The fury in her face 
startled him. "Kill. They always kill." 
He had to bring the truth to her. "But the M'Nae have killed 
too, Thayenta. They've killed Terrans." 
She gasped, her eyes widening. "M'Nae do not—" 
"Yes, they do, not intentionally, but they do. Some of Eads' 
colonists died when the ship crashed and the ship crashed 
because of the M'Nae," Ken explained as simply as possible. "The 
Gera-ana, the shadow of the Iontran… whatever you call that 
place with the prism kills men. From space it's a blurry area, a 
gigantic gravity vortex, a trap that sucks Terran ships right out 
of space—and kills us. We can't warn our home world. More 
humans will come, searching for us. More humans will 
die—because of the M'Nae." 
Tears dried on her pale cheeks and Thayenta nibbled her lip. 
He was asking much, begging her to span the vast gap 
separating their species. Too often Ken had ignored that gap, 
tempted to think of Thayenta as merely a lovely human woman 
with somewhat strange coloring, forgetting she was an alien, a 
telepath, that her motives might be very different from his.

It was time for truth-facing all around. 
Her fingers caressed his cheek. "Ken… pain. Thayenta pain. 
Ken knows." She reacted to his sympathy for the "dead" raft, 
ready to forgive his species much because of one little emotion. 
"That's right. When you hurt, I hurt. Humans aren't 
necessarily evil, Thayenta. We can learn from our mistakes. Give 
us a chance." Ken bent his head and peered at her closely. 
"Thayenta, I've got to talk to Briv. I've got to make him 
understand. He stopped Eads once without hurting him. If he 
can do it again—" 
"Raft…" She waved helplessly at the broken pieces. 
"Teleportation," Ken insisted. He gripped her shoulders and 
pressed for a confession. "That way's faster, and I think you know 
how it's done. Don't you? I can't read your mind, but I get 
"vibes." You haven't told me the full story, have you?" 
Thayenta looked at him anxiously, and Ken felt her tiptoeing 
through his brain. You think? 
"I think that you're quite capable of teleporting humans, if 
you want to, and maybe yourself as well. Oh, it might take Briv's 
help, but you have the ability. When we were first captured, the 
M'Nae tele-ported R.C. and me. And you…" He stared at her 
intently. "When you first showed up by the shipwreck, I thought 
you'd walked there, out of the mist. Now I'm not sure. If you 
could project your image thousands of kilometers into space, 
what else can you do?" 
She darted a pink tongue between small teeth, licking her lips. 
Ken saw the two of them cagily circling each other, mentally. 
"Thayenta, level with me," he pleaded. "Time is precious. 
Lives are at stake… Terran lives and M'Nae lives." 
And at last she admitted, "It is… difficult. Must… cooperate." 
"R.C. and I weren't cooperating when you tele-ported us," Ken 
argued. "But we weren't in any condition to resist, certainly.

What about your ambassador? Why didn't he teleport to safety?" 
"Too… fast," Thayenta said. "Happened too fast." 
Ken nodded. That made sense. "The M'Nae didn't know about 
needlers, didn't realize Eads and his people were edgy, panicky 
because they were breaking laws. And we don't know much more 
about you, do we?" He took Thayenta's hands. They were cold. 
He gently chafed her skin, attempting to call back warmth. 
"Thayenta, it's got to stop. There must be no more killing on 
either side." 
Her eyes were fathomless. As the torchlight flickered, Ken 
caught glimpses of her pupils shimmering in the blackness. She 
was an alien. Yet they could touch minds and hearts. 
"You can teleport, can't you?" he said softly. 
With obvious shame, Thayenta bowed her head. "I can… 
accept, or not." 
"You mean Briv's been trying to teleport you out of this mess 
all along? And you've resisted him, refused to let him?" Ken 
exclaimed. He was shaken. He hadn't known she possessed that 
much strength. What were her motives? 
She caressed his cheek again. A human gesture, but done with 
a M'Nae grace. "I wanted to stay with Ken." He didn't have any 
words. He was touched and moved and appalled at the risks she 
had taken on his behalf. Now she stood up, abandoning the 
pieces of raft. "I will accept. Now, I must. Briv is not pleased." 
"I'll bet he isn't, and I'm not sure I am, either," Ken said. An 
apprentice in a rigid, telepathic society, she'd disobeyed orders 
because of Ken. It was a serious offense. 
"Must go," and Thayenta pointed upstream. 
"To the place where the mist begins? Why? Can't we teleport 
from here?" Ken asked. There was no answer—more M'Nae 
protocol.

She ran lightly along the bank, Ken following her. He squished 
through reedy low spots and irritably knocked aside low hanging 
willow branches. Ken lengthened his stride to match hers as she 
loped easily through this wet, dark world. 
Only when he began floundering—beyond the light of the 
torch, blind in the night—did Thayenta pause. The clouds parted 
overhead, and the triple shadows of NE 592's moons played 
across her pale face eerily. Purple mist rose from the stream, 
from the banks, floating toward the two of them. 
Here. 
Did she say that, or think it to him? Quite without willing it, 
Ken was slipping more and more into telepathic patterns, 
sending and receiving mental messages. Each time he and 
Thayenta touched minds, it was easier. With some training, he 
might develop into an imitation M'Nae, though he'd probably 
always remain on a quite juvenile level! 
But could he ever learn to develop a telepathic shield? 
He touched her shoulder, orienting himself to that single 
lovely form in this purple mist. 
A wave of vertigo struck Ken, twisting his gut. 
Suddenly, it wasn't dark any more. The world around him 
dissolved into light—a brilliant, confiscating rainbow of light. 
He was in the aliens' council chamber. As if he'd sucked it 
along with him as he'd stepped through a doorway, a few wisps 
of purplish fog wafted about Ken's ankles. It formed the doorway 
from the real world to the M'Nae fortress. 
The prismatic device stood a few meters away, and beside it 
stood Briv. Beyond Briv, the M'Nae waited. Ken tensed. There 
were no longer just ten M'Nae. Now there were at least twenty 
aliens, a semi-circle of jewel-skinned people, spreading out 
behind the constantly shifting prism shape. 
More of them had come through the alien matter transmitter.

At this rate, their numbers would soon match that of Eads' 
colonists. 
Thayenta sidled close to Ken and he inhaled her scent of fear. 
His arm swept protectively about her. Whatever happened, they 
would face it together. 
There had been some changes, and not just in the number of 
M'Nae. Briv was wearing a translator—a twin to Thayenta's. He 
must have transmitted it from the M'Nae home planet. The 
device clung to mossy green threads on the chest of Briv's 
clothing. He crossed the chamber with long, heavy strides. 
"Brace yourself, Thayenta," Ken said softly. "A hell of a lot is 
riding on the next few minutes." 
The alien leader clamped a muffling hand over his translator 
and spewed a stream of M'Nae profanity at Thayenta. She 
trembled and Ken snapped, "Leave her alone. She did the right 
thing. She stuck to her job until she had all the facts. Or do the 
M'Nae really want to kill more and more humans? Do you want 
to drag spaceship after spaceship down by that thing?" Ken 
pointed accusingly at the pulsating prism. 
Briv's baleful stare shifted from Thayenta to Ken. "This world 
is M'Nae." 
Ken thrust Thayenta behind him and advanced to confront 
the alien leader. "As long as we're discussing land rights, it was a 
Terran who first landed on this world, Briv, a man named 
Noland Eads. He was here a long time ago, long before you came 
here with your Gera-ana." 
His counterattack made Briv pause. The aliens flanking the 
prism were silent, expressionless, waiting for the man in charge 
to hand out orders. 
Ken's attitude took a slight directional shift. Briv reminded 
him of R.C. and Eads. He was strong, even ruthless, because he 
had to be, carrying the weight of responsibility for so many lives. 
Now Ken had added more lives, Terran lives, to Briv's burden.

Ken envisioned a massed bank of telepathic claws, waiting to 
rake his mind to ribbons. Yes, Briv could do that, but would he? 
"Try it, and I get mad," Ken said coldly. "Thayenta didn't 
detect those guards along the trail. Their mental level was too 
basic, wasn't it? And when I 
wanted to tear you to pieces, you didn't handle that too well, 
did you?" 
"I controlled the chief death-bringer in his anger." Briv 
dropped the reminder like a bomb. 
Ken tensed, thought har,d. "His rage was distracted by R.C. 
That left him wide open. The man's not in his right mind, 
anyway—" 
"You have your death weapon." 
He had almost forgotten the weight sagging his pocket. Ken 
pulled out the needier, held it on his palm, considering options. 
How could he persuade the M'Nae of his sincerity? He felt waves 
of tension from the aliens watching him. 
Very deliberately, Ken tossed the needier away, skittering it 
across the undulating white floor into the shadows, out of his 
reach. 
The silence in the chamber was awesome. Ken waited, hardly 
daring to breathe. It was a big gamble. He had risked everything 
he had on one throw of the dice. He had risked his own life, 
Thayenta's, R.C.'s and Eads' and the lives of all the colonists. All 
hung in the balance, now that Ken had thrown away his one 
Terran weapon. 
Briv's bony face took on a peculiar expression. If the M'Nae 
were human, Ken would have called it mischievous. Briv sidled 
another step forward, within arm's length of Ken. His full lips 
were pulled back in a grimace. The M'Nae version of a smile? If 
so, it was a nasty one, and one very suited to Briv. 
Without a word, Briv swung a clumsy punch at Ken's head. He

was not accustomed to this style of fighting yet he stepped into a 
physical world and left himself wide open for a counter punch. 
Ken parried the blow and closed his hand over Briv's fist. His 
muscles strained to hold the attack in check. Briv was strong, as 
Ken had known from the first. 
For several long moments they wrestled silently, Briv's fist in 
Ken's hand. 
Finally, Briv drew back, let his hand fall. Ken's breath whistled 
out and he mopped sweat from his face and neck. He hoped this 
wasn't merely the first round! 
Thayenta ran to Ken, slipped her small hands around his arm, 
clinging to him. Her elation washed against his mind. 
Apparently Ken had scored a telling point and had not violated 
the rules of the game. 
Briv gestured to the prism. "Gera-ana." 
"I see," Ken said, employing Briv's ritual phrase. "Your matter 
transmitter from your home world. How did you get it to this 
planet?" 
Briv frowned and closed his eyes. Images rushed at Ken. He let 
them in. His practice with Thayenta made it easier to erase the 
last traces of resistance to telepathic communication. At one 
with Briv's mind, Ken was on another world, far from NE 592, 
far from any solar system yet known to Earth. 
It was a world of purple mists and moonlight, and of a 
darkening, rapidly dying sun. 
Ken was a spectator on that other world, watching Briv and 
many other M'Nae deep in concentration, combining their 
telepathic powers for a gigantic effort beyond any single M'Nae. 
They were… moving the Gera-ana, the matter transmitter prism, 
moving it off their world and into space! 
They sent the object through the void, across incredible gulfs, 
until it came to a hospitable world, a resting place suitable for

M'Nae colonization. 
It landed here—on NE 592. 
The image shifted. Ken was back on the M'Nae's home world 
again. All those many aliens who had stood beside Briv, helping 
move the prism, all but two lay limp and still and dead on the 
earth. 
They had died, their minds destroyed in the act of teleporting 
that transmitter to another planet. They had sacrificed their 
lives for the welfare of their people. 
The vision faded, and Ken shook himself back to present 
reality. "You had to leave your home world?" 
Briv imitated a human nod, his strong jaw nudging toward 
his chest. "In four hundred valia our sun will grow cold forever. 
We must leave. There is only one Gera-ana. It was bought with 
much blood and life over the long times. And it is here." 
"And the force that could move it to still another planet is 
depleted," Ken said, remembering the dead M'Nae. The cost was 
higher than the aliens could bear. They had drained their 
strongest and finest telepathic abilities to transport the object. 
This had to be it for the M'Nae. There was no other choice 
remaining to them. 
Of course, there were variations in abilities among them, just 
as there were among humans. Ken thought of the difference 
between a Zachary or an Eads and one of those club wielding 
goons. If the M'Nae operated like every other intelligent species, 
they would send their brightest and best through the transmitter 
first, making sure some of their species escaped the death of 
their home world. 
Their brightest and best, people like Thayenta and Briv! Briv 
was one of two survivors among the powers on M'Nae—the 
movers of the prism. He had come through with this first 
expeditionary force to the new world, putting his life on the line 
again, for his people.

It put Briv in new perspective for Ken. He forgave some of the 
harsh and cruel behavior. Briv was an alien leader desperately 
intent on survival for his race, one of the few leaders they had 
left.
There was no way Briv could have known that NE 592 had 
already been claimed by a Terran. Nor could he have known that 
this Terran would return with his followers for a rendezvous 
nobody wanted. 
"There will be more Terrans coming, Briv," Ken warned. "If 
they approach this world—even by accident—they'll be caught 
and they'll crash." Ken indicated the prism. "The Gera-ana 
brings M'Nae from their home world to this one. But for Terrans 
it's a trap, a deadly trap. You've killed Terrans with it, and you'll 
kill more. They're innocent victims, like your ambassador. My 
people didn't know who he was. They panicked and fired. The 
man who did that is ill, his mind twisted." 
Ken sensed emotions emanating from the M'Nae. Pity? A 
stricken sympathy? Eads, the Terran who'd killed the 
ambassador, was a man whose mind was disordered? That must 
have struck particularly hard at the M'Nae; they placed such 
reliance on the intellect. 
"More Terrans," Briv said slowly. "The Gera-ana, the 
Iontran…" 
Someday Ken vowed he'd learn the specifics of those terms. 
But for now Ken nodded emphatically. "They will come. They will 
come seeking Eads. They want to cure him, heal his mind." 
"How… how may they be stopped?" Briv had taken a giant 
step toward concession. 
Hurriedly, Ken seized the chance. "Maybe a beacon would 
work. We could cannibalize some equipment to build a crude 
warning signal." As he considered that, inspiration came to him 
and he added enthusiastically, "When the Patrol ships see the 
beacon and park out in lunar orbit, the M'Nae could reach 
them—telepathically. Explain what has happened, the dangers of 
the Gera-ana. We can lick it, Briv! M'Nae and humans working

together can lick it." 
"You are not like the death bringers." It was meant as a 
compliment, one Ken dared not accept. 
"But we are, Briv. We're just like Eads and the others. We're 
no different," Ken insisted. "Except that R.C. and I understand. 
You must make Eads understand, somehow." 
Briv stepped directly into Ken's mind. There were no raking 
talons this time. And Ken accepted, letting the alien leader 
explore his thoughts at will. The sensation was unnerving. Here 
was an intense, very masculine personality, examining his brain. 
Ken felt Thayenta's hand in his and was grateful for that gentle 
contact with reality. 
It was an experience of sharing. Briv, and now all the other 
M'Nae, were absorbing Ken's memories and ideas. They were 
doing it instantly, in a heartbeat, and making a strenuous effort 
to adopt the human's attitudes. 
The shock of the telepathic exploration jolted Ken. With 
difficulty, he held his ground. He mustn't cringe away, not now, 
not when they were meeting him, compromising. 
He hoped he was up to the job—serving as a representative for 
the entire Terran race! 
I see. 
None of the aliens uttered the simple phrase, yet Ken heard it. 
He didn't hear it in Terran. It wasn't possible, he couldn't 
understand the M'Nae language. 
Good. Thayenta spoke up, telepathically. He can be helped, 
become good once more. 
Eads, she was talking about curing the man. Was it possible? 
Would it be in time? 
R.C. Ken reached out with his thoughts. Where was R.C. right

now? Was the space veteran managing okay? He was alone and 
wounded. Things would get rough for him if Eads' search veered 
toward the wrecked Class-D, as inevitably it must. 
The M'Nae felt Ken's concern for the older man. They turned 
his anxiety over and over, examining emotions, learning about 
Terrans. Ken bore the invasion of privacy stolidly. 
Then, abruptly, he was being carried on a beam of telepathy. 
It stretched out across kilometers, toward the colonists' valley, 
across the village, to the wrecked cargo ship. 
Teleporting! 
This time Ken's stomach didn't complain. He was getting used 
to a whole new set of physical sensations. 
He moved telepathically along darkened corridors, searching 
for R.C. 
There! Ken saw him. The pilot had managed to climb to the 
middle decks in the smashed hulk. And the man was hurting. He 
had asked too much of that wounded leg. 
Voices echoed down the ship's corridors. Lights flashed in the 
distance. Eads and his men were closing in on the injured 
Surveyman. 
Frustration ground at Ken. If only he were there. If only he 
could help R.C! 
His mind was divorced from his body, yet towing it along 
invisibly, like cargo. And he wasn't alone. Many other presences 
crowded into the wrecked space craft alongside him. 
They were here in the ship. And it wasn't dark any more. With 
those cat's eyes of theirs, the M'Nae didn't need artificial 
lighting. But they provided illumination for their new Terran 
friends: glowing, sourceless light, like the one that had led from 
the prism chamber to the raft by the stream. 
"What? Ken!" R.C. turned and stared at his ap-prentice and at

the aliens accompanying him, Briv, Thayenta, and a dozen of the 
M'Nae. 
"My escort," Ken said wryly, shifting mental gears to cope 
with the situation. He ran to the door of the cargo hold where 
R.C. had been hiding. He saw bobbing torches, down the 
corridor. The hunters were coming to catch their quarry—just as 
Ken had seen them in his mind's eye. 
"Closing fast," R.C. said heavily. He leaned on a bulkhead, 
breathing hard. He hefted his needier and glared at it. "I hate to 
use this damned thing, but… So far I've been able to dodge them, 
lead them on a wild goose chase. But it's getting harder and 
harder. They've got me pinned. Where's your needier, Ken?" 
"I threw it away." 
"You… have you gone crazy, son?" Zachary gawked at him. 
Ken said quietly, "I won't need it, and you won't need yours, 
R.C. Briv, can you teleport all the weapons out of range? All the 
weapons—the clubs and farm tools too?" 
Briv jerked his head in that characteristic M'Nae sideways 
nod. Down the corridor there were startled shouts, followed by 
silence, then a confused murmuring. 
Zachary gazed at his empty hand. 
"Gives you something to think about, doesn't it?" Ken said 
with a wry grin. "And it'll give the colonists something to think 
about, too, namely—just what they're up against. It's more than 
they can handle with brute force, and might inject a note of 
compromise, one we've been hoping for." 
"But without weapons…" 
Ken went to the pilot, urging the man to sit down and rest. As 
R.C. submitted to Thayenta's ministrations, Ken said, "We don't 
need weapons. Not now. I got through to the M'Nae, R.C." 
"What about their dead ambassador? asked R.C, eying Briv

warily. 
"He understands. And I'm beginning to," Ken said. "There's a 
lot yet for me to learn. But I seem to be a quick study. Maybe I 
have telepathic abilities. You were right, R.C. The M'Nae have 
power, more than we can comprehend, totally different from 
human technology and they're willing to work with us." Ken felt 
Briv and the other M'Nae brushing against his mind, taking 
their cues from Earth's unofficial spokesman to the alien 
delegation. 
The mutterings of the search party had died away. Their 
footsteps were measured and unmenacing. R.C. tensed, waved a 
warning hand at Ken. 
Ken shook his head, unalarmed, knowing what was coming. 
Eads, his Praetorians, and several other colonists entered the 
cargo hold. They weren't in a trance, but their belligerence was 
gone. A completely different mood had taken hold of them, one 
of openness. They were willing to listen, to have their questions 
answered. 
"I… I don't know." Noland Eads said softly. There was an 
uneasy stirring among his followers. Without Eads' direction, 
they were rudderless, and Ken conveyed that fact to the M'Nae. A 
few of the men were still staring wonderingly at their empty 
hands. Naked without their weapons, they acted without 
desperation. They were simply confused. 
"It's okay, Captain Eads," Ken said smoothly. "There has been 
some confusion. That alien you met earlier was an ambassador 
from the M'Nae. His people would like to negotiate with you, 
Captain, about sharing this planet." 
"Sharing?" Eads wasn't angry. In fact he looked like a man 
waking out of a nightmare. He shook his head slightly. "An 
ambassador?" Remembrance slid over his craggy features, 
remembrance and horror. "We… we killed him! My God! We 
killed him." 
Sanity was returning to him.

"It was a mistake," Ken said. "The M'Nae understand. They'd 
still like to be friends. You might be interested in some of their 
methods of living, Captain Eads. The M'Nae live in complete 
harmony with nature." 
"Harmony?" Eads settled on the critical point, brightening. 
"That's right. They work with nature, not against it. This is 
Briv, the leader of the M'Nae," Ken introduced. "I'm sure he'd be 
glad to tell you about their clothes and rafts and other materials. 
They have some astonishing techniques, Captain." 
He played on Eads' vulnerabilities, won his interest. And Briv 
made the next logical step in this sudden peace conference. His 
hand went out—not palm up—ready to take Eads'." 
"And don't try to outgrip him," Ken warned tele-pathically. He 
noticed a slight quirk at Briv's mouth. So the M'Nae leader did 
have a sense of humor, after all! 
"They're not so bad, are they?" the Praetorians were 
murmuring. "If they really can do things like that…" 
Briv didn't push it, but there was a small test of strength 
between him and Eads, a mute little challenge between two 
strong males of different species. It ended in a draw. Both of 
them backed off simultaneously. That gesture had good 
implications. 
Eads smiled and said, "That's pretty good, friend." 
"Friend," Briv repeated, not using the translator. 
Eads rubbed his forehead, struggling to recall something. "It 
might work. It just might work. But that gravity trap of yours! 
We've got to stop it." 
"Beacon," Briv said, picking up a word from Ken's thoughts. 
"Yes, yes!" Eads bubbled with enthusiasm, addressing his 
men. "Of course. That's the answer. A beacon. We'll make sure 
nobody else gets sucked down. It'll warn them off. Don't you see,

men? The M'Nae can guarantee we'll be left alone. There'll be 
just us, working together with nature!" 
Ken eased out of the mainstream of the conversation. Eads 
seemed to be doing all right without further human help. He 
knelt beside R.C. and asked, "How's it going?" 
"Not too bad, now that the war's delayed," R.C. murmured. 
"Not delayed. Over." 
Doubtful, R.C. eyed his old classmate. "How long can that 
last?" 
"Leg better," Thayenta announced, patting pink fluff around 
R.C.'s wound. "The Chief's mind is better, too." 
R.C. looked at her, then at Ken. Grinning, Ken said, "I told you 
she was a great little nurse. The M'Nae have a knack for 
medicine—and it's not limited to repairing needier wounds. 
Remember, R.C., they can go directly into a man's mind, and if 
that mind's sick, they just may be able to put it right again." 
"If they can…" R.C. hardly dared hope. 
"Relax, R.C. you've earned a vacation." At the pilot's outraged 
sputtering Ken laughed, and Thayenta muffled one of those 
noises between a giggle and sneeze. She fully grasped the teasing 
going on. Ken glanced at her fondly. "Briv can handle it, now that 
he understands Terrans. Think of all our two peoples can learn 
from each other." 
R.C. caught the exchange between Ken and Thayenta and 
rolled his eyes in exasperation. "I was talking about a war." 
"Which is over." Ken chuckled and said, "Have you ever 
ridden a telepathic wave, R.C? You've got something to look 
forward to." 
R.C.'s indulgent smile reflected approval and pioneer 
excitement.

"It could have turned out a lot worse," Ken murmured. "For a 
first contact between two such disparate species." 
"First contact." R.C. tasted the word, liking it. 
"Let them probe your mind," Ken advised. "Don't fight them. 
Let them in, so they can get all they need. Don't think of it as an 
invasion." 
"Peaceful co-existence," R.C. responded. "Terrans and 
M'Nae." 
Ken nodded. "The M'Nae have got to come here before their 
sun goes cold. They're already coming through the transmitter. 
You can't blame them for that." 
"No, certainly not." 
"It will work," Ken promised. 
"Easy." Thayenta spoke the word out loud and in Terran, 
smiling shyly at Ken. 
"Right. We have a good solid beginning right here!" Ken took 
her small hand. 
R.C. tried to ignore them, muttering to himself. "They'll have 
to leave that space trap transmitter of theirs in place till then. 
How long will that be?" 
"Why, what difference does it make, Captain?" Ken said. "We 
are in Survey. Didn't you always tell me survival is our business? 
The first item on our agenda is exploring new worlds and new 
people, if we can find them, isn't it? Very few Secondary 
Sur-veymen ever have this kind of opportunity—discovering a 
whole new race of intelligent telepaths. And until they're all 
transmitted here from their home world, we're stuck, rooted on 
this planet by that gravity vortex. There's plenty of leisure time 
for us to get to know the M'Nae well." 
R.C. sighed and conceded. Thayenta sat back on her heels, 
admiring her handiwork in rebandaging

R.C.'s leg. As a result of that first aid, her dress was once more 
reduced to an attractive, skimpy version of its former pink glory. 
What had Ken told Dave Saunders back on Earth before he'd 
lifted ship on his way to NE 592? Survey was a soft assignment! 
It was not true, of course, as this strange world had proved. 
But with lovely Thayenta by his side—and he wondered if the 
thought were entirely his own, for she glanced at him with a 
special expression he hadn't seen before—he would never be able 
to call the years ahead the worst of times!