Part 22 (1/2)

”It doesn't seem to, but there it is.” Teddy Blake shook her head hopelessly.

Big Bill Karns, hands still shaking, lit a cigarette before he spoke again. ”Well, I've never been a proponent of genocide. But it's my considered opinion that the Stretts are one race the galaxy can get along without.”

”A h.e.l.l of a lot better without,” Poynter said, and all agreed.

”The point is, what can we do about it?” Kincaid asked. ”The first thing, I would say, is to see whether we can do this--whatever it is--without Tuly's help. Shall we try it? Although I, for one, don't feel like doing it right away.”

”Not I, either.” Beverly Bell held up her right hand, which was shaking uncontrollably. ”I feel as though I'd been bucking waves, wind and tide for forty-eight straight hours without food, water or touch. Maybe in about a week I'll be ready for another try at it. But today--not a chance!”

”Okay. Scat, all of you,” Hilton ordered. ”Take the rest of the day off and rest up. Put on your thought-screens and don't take them off for a second from now on. Those Stretts are tough hombres.”

Sandra was the last to leave. ”And you, boss?” she asked pointedly.

”I've got some thinking to do.”

”I'll stay and help you think?”

”Not yet.” He shook his head, frowned and then grinned. ”You see, chick, I don't even know yet what it is I'm going to have to think about.”

”A bit unclear, but I know what you mean--I think. Luck, chief.”

In their subterranean sanctum turn on distant Strett, two of the deepest thinkers of that horribly unhuman race were in coldly intent conference via thought.

”My mind has been plundered, Ynos,” First Lord Thinker Zoyar radiated, harshly. ”Despite the extremely high reactivity of my s.h.i.+eld some information--I do not know how much--was taken. The operator was one of the humans of that s.h.i.+p.”

”I, too, felt a plucking at my mind. But those humans could not peyondire, First Lord.”

”Be logical, fool! At that contact, in the matter of which you erred in not following up continuously, they succeeded in concealing their real abilities from you.”

”That could be the truth. Our ancestors erred, then, in recording that all those weak and timid humans had been slain. These offenders are probably their descendants, returning to reclaim their former world.”

”The probability must be evaluated and considered. Was it or was it not through human aid that the Omans destroyed most of our task-force?”

”Highly probable, but impossible of evaluation with the data now available.”

”Obtain more data at once. That point must be and shall be fully evaluated and fully considered. This entire situation is intolerable. It must be abated.”

”True, First Lord. But every operator and operation is now tightly screened. Oh, if I could only go out there myself ...”

”Hold, fool! Your thought is completely disloyal and un-Strettly.”

”True, oh First Lord Thinker Zoyar. I will forthwith remove my unworthy self from this plane of existence.”

”You will not! I hereby abolish that custom. Our numbers are too few by far. Too many have failed to adapt. Also, as Second Thinker, your death at this time would be slightly detrimental to certain matters now in work. I will myself, however, slay the unfit. To that end repeat The Words under my peyondiring.”

”I am a Strett. I will devote my every iota of mental and of physical strength to forwarding the Great Plan. I am, and will remain, a Strett.”

”You do believe in The Words.”