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I'll take the baseball bat and hold it wrong way instead." Nevertheless, as he stepped from the ship, with Afthen close behind, he held the long knife by the blade, and Afthen, very awkwardly operating his still rather unfamiliar power suit, followed. Into the intensely blue sunlight the men stepped. Their skin and clothing took on a peculiar tint under the strange sunlight.
They were ready to start work on the data they had collected in space. "What," asked Zezdon Afthen, as he watched the three terrestrians begin their work, "is the nature of the thing you are attempting to harness?" "In a word, energy," replied Arcot, pausing. "We are attempting to harness energy in its primeval form, in the form of a space-field. Remember, mass is a measure of energy.
"Afthen," replied Stel Felso Theu calmly, "when our friends have smoked, and thought, the Thought will be repaired perfectly, and it will be made invulnerable to that weapon." "I hope so, Stel Felso Theu," smiled Arcot. He was feeling better already. "But do you know what that weapon is, Morey?" "Got some readings on it with the Banderlog's instruments, and I think I do.
Arcot landed near the head of the column, and cut off two or three men from the rest with the aid of his ray pistol. Zezdon Afthen quickly searched his mind, and with Arcot's aid they determined he did not know any of the Gods that Arcot suggested. Finally they had to return to the ship, disappointed.
But we have developed a different science, a science of the mind." "Dogs are far more psychic than are men. They would naturally tend to develop such a civilization," said Arcot judiciously. "Our civilization," continued Zezdon Afthen, "is built largely on the knowledge of the mind. We cannot have criminals, for the man who plots evil is surely found out by his thoughts.
As a final test, Arcot, having finished the ship, suggested that the Venonian officer and one of the men of his ship have a trial of mental powers. Zezdon Afthen tried first, and between the two ships, racing along side by side at a speed unthinkable, the two men struggled with those forces of will. Quickly Zezdon Afthen told Arcot what he had learned.
The single stranger was joined by a second, also holding a reversed weapon, and together they threw them down. Morey and Zezdon Afthen followed suit. The two parties advanced toward each other. The strangers advanced with a swift, light step, jumping from rock to rock, while Morey and Afthen flew part way toward them.
"But they may be willing to help us," replied Afthen, "and we certainly need such help." "I didn't expect to come out alive from that battleship there. It was luck. If they knew what we had, they could insulate against it in an hour," added Arcot. "Let's finish those fellows over there look!" From the wreck of the ship they had downed, a stream of men in glistening relux suits were filing.
"If they who know most of the ship vote for a continuance of the journey, then assuredly we who know so little can only abide by their judgment. Let us continue," said Zezdon Afthen gravely. Space was suddenly black about them. Sirius was gone, all the jewels of the heavens were gone in the black of swift flight. Ten seconds later Arcot lowered the space-control.
"But how did the ship we captured operate?" asked Zezdon Afthen. "It was a very ingenious system, very closely related to ours, really. "We distort space and change the velocity characteristics; in other words, we distort the rate of motion through distance characteristics of normal space.
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