Any human or near-human lensman would have been appalled by the sheer

loneliness of Nadreck's long vigil. Almost any one of them would have cursed, fluently

and bitterly, when the time came at which he was forced to concede that the being for

whom he lay in wait was not going to visit that particular planet.

     But utterly unhuman Nadreck was not lonely. In fact, there was no word in the

vocabulary of his race even remotely resembling the term in definition, connotation, or

implication. From his galaxy-wide study he had a dim, imperfect idea of what such an

emotion or feeling might be, but he could not begin to understand it. Nor was he in the

least disturbed by the fact that Kandron did not appear. Instead, he held his orbit until

the minute arrived at which the mathematical probability became point nine nine nine

that his proposed quarry was not going to appear. Then, as matter-of-factly as though

he had merely taken half an hour out for lunch, he -abandoned his position and set out

upon the course so carefully planned for exactly this event.

     The search for further clues was long and uneventful; but monstrously,

unhumanly patient Nadreck stuck to it until he found one. True, it was so slight as to be

practically non-existent—a mere fragment of a whisper of zwilnik instruction—but it bore

Kandron's unmistakable imprint. The Palainian had expected no more. Kandron would

not slip. Momentary leakages from faulty machines would have to occur from time to

time, but Kandron's machines would not be at fault either often or long at a time.

     Nadreck, however, had been ready. Course after course of the most delicate

spotting screen ever devised had been out for weeks. So had tracers, radiation

absorbers, and every other insidious locating device known to the science of the age.

The standard detectors remained blank, of course—no more so than his own

conveyance would that of the Onlonian be detectable by any ordinary instruments. And

as the Palainian speedster shot away along the most probable course, some fifty

delicate instruments in its bow began stabbing that entire region of space with a pattern

of needles of force through which a Terrestrial barrel could not have floated untouched.

     Thus the Boskonian craft—an inherently indetectable speedster—was located;

and in that instant was speared by three modified CRX tracers. Nadreck then went inert

and began to plot the other speedster's course. He soon learned that that course was

unpredictable; that the vessel was being operated statistically, completely at random.

This too, then, was a trap.

     This knowledge disturbed Nadreck no more than had any more-or-less similar

event of the previous twenty-odd years. He had realized fully that the leakage could as

well have been deliberate as accidental. He had at no time underestimated Kandron's

ability; the future alone would reveal whether or not Kandron would at any time

underestimate his. He would follow through—there might be a way in which this

particular trap could be used against its setter.

     Leg after leg of meaningless course Nadreck followed, until there came about

that which the Palainian knew would happen in time—the speedster held a straight

course for more parsecs than six-sigma limits of probability could ascribe to pure

randomness. Nadreck knew what that meant. The speedster was returning to its base

for servicing, which was precisely the event for which he had been awaiting. It was the

base he wanted, not the speedster; and that base would never, under any conceivable

conditions, emit any detectable quantity of traceable radiation. To its base, then,

Nadreck followed the little space-ship, and to say that he was on the alert as he

approached that base is a gross understatement indeed. He expected to set off at least

one, and probably many blasts of force. That would almost certainly be necessary in

order to secure sufficient information concerning the enemy's defensive screens. It was

necessary— but when those blasts arrived Nadreck was elsewhere, calmly analyzing

the data secured by his instruments during the brief contact which had triggered the

Boskonian projectors into action.

     So light, so fleeting, and so unorthodox had been Nad-reek's touch that the

personnel of the now doomed base could not have known with any certainty that any

visitor had actually been there. If there had been, the logical supposition would have

been that he and his vessel had been resolved into their component atoms.

Nevertheless Nadreck waited—as has been shown, he was good at waiting—until the

burst of extra vigilance set up by the occurrence would have subsided into ordinary

watchfulness. Then he began to act.

     At first this action was in ultra-slow motion. One millimeter per hour his drill

advanced. Drill was synchronized precisely with screen, and so guarded as to give an

alarm at a level of interference far below that necessary to energize any probable

detector at the generators of the screen being attacked.

     Through defense after defense Nadreck. made his cautious, indetectable way

into the dome. It was a small base, as such things go; manned, as expected, by

escapees from Onlo. Scum, too, for the most part; creatures of even baser and more

violent passions than those upon whom he had worked in Kandron's Onlonian

stronghold. To keep those intractable entities in line during their brutally long tours of

duty, a psychological therapist had been given authority second only to that of the base

commander. That knowledge, and the fact that there was only one populated dome,

made the Palainian come as close to grinning as one of his unsmiling race can.

     The psychologist wore a multiplex thought-screen, of course, as did everyone

else; but that did not bother Nadreck. Kinnison had opened such screens many times;

not only by means of his own hands, but also at various times by the use of a dog's

jaws, a spider's legs and mandibles, and even a worm's sinuous body. Wherefore,

through the agency of a quasi-fourth-dimensional life form literally indescribable to

three-dimensional man, Nadreck's ego was soon comfortably ensconced in the mind of

the Onlonian.

     That entity knew in detail every weakness of each of his personnel. It was his

duty to watch those weaknesses, to keep them down, to condition each of his wards in

such fashion that friction and strife would be minimized. Now, however, he proceeded to

do exactly the opposite. One hated another. That hate became a searing obsession,

requiring the concentration of every effort upon ways and means of destroying its

objects. One feared another. That fear ate in, searing as it went, destroying every

normality of outlook and of reason. Many were jealous of their superiors. This emotion,

requiring as it does nothing except its own substance upon which to feed, became a

fantastically spreading, caustically corrosive blight.

     To name each ugly, noisome passion or trait resident in that dome is to call the

complete roster of the vile; and calmly, mercilessly, unmovedly, ultra-efficiently, Nadreck

manipulated them all. As though he were playing a Satanic organ he touched a nerve

here, a synapse there, a channel somewhere else, bringing the whole group, with the

lone exception of the commander, simultaneously to the point of explosion. Nor was any

sign of this perfect work evident externally; for everyone there, having lived so long

under the iron code of Boskonia, knew exactly the consequences of any infraction of

that code.

     The moment came when passion overmastered sense. One of the monsters

stumbled, jostling another. That nudge became, in its recipient's seething mind, a lethal

attack by his bitterest enemy. A forbidden projector flamed viciously: the offended one

was sating his lust so insensately that he scarcely noticed the boh that in turn rived

away his own life. Detonated by this incident, the personnel of the base exploded as

one. Blasters raved briefly; knives and swords bit and slashed; improvised bludgeons

crashed against preselected targets; hard-taloned appendages gouged and tore. And

Nadreck, who had long since withdrawn from the mind of the psychologist, timed with a

stop-watch the duration of the whole grisly affair, from the instant of the first stumble to

the death of the last Onlonian outside the commander's locked and armored sanctum.

Ninety-eight and three-tenths seconds. Good—a nice job.

     The commander, as soon as it was safe to do so, rushed out of his guarded room

to investigate. Amazed, disgruntled, dismayed by the to him completely inexplicable

phenomenon he had just witnessed, he fell an easy prey to the Palainian Lensman.

Nadreck invaded his mind and explored it, channel by channel; finding—not entirely

unexpectedly—that this Number One knew nothing whatever of interest.

     Nadreck did not destroy the base. Instead, after setting up a small instrument in

the commander's private office, he took that unfortunate wight aboard his speedster and

drove off into space. He immobilized his captive, not by loading him with manacles, but

by deftly severing a few essential nerve trunks. Then he really studied the Onlonian's

mind—line by line, this time; almost cell by cell. A master—almost certainly Kandron

himself—had operated here. There was not the slightest trace of tampering; no leads to

or indications of what the activating stimulus would have to be; all that the fellow now

knew was that it was his job to hold his base inviolate against any and every form of

intrusion and to keep that speedster flitting around all over space on a director-by-

chance as much as possible of the time, leaking slightly a certain signal now and then.

     Even under this microscopic re-examination, he knew nothing whatever of

Kandron; nothing of Onlo or of Thrale; nothing of any Boskonian organization, activity,

or thing; and Nadreck, although baffled still, remained undisturbed. This trap, he

thought, could almost certainly be used against the trapper. Until a certain call came

through his relay in the base, he would investigate the planets of this system.

     During the investigation a thought impinged upon his Lens from Karen Kinnison,

one of the very few warm-blooded beings for whom he had any real liking or respect.

     "Busy, Nadreck?" she asked, as casually as though she had just left him.

     "In large, yes. In detail and at the moment, no. Is there any small problem in

which I can be of assistance?"

     "Not small—big. I just got the funniest distress call I ever heard or heard of. On a

high band—way, "way up— there. Do you know of any race that thinks on that band?"

     "I do not believe so." He thought for a moment. "Definitely, no."

     "Neither do I. It wasn't broadcast, either, but was directed at any member of a

special race or tribe—very special. Classification, straight Z's to ten or twelve places,

she— or it—seemed to be trying to specify."

     "A frigid race of extreme type, adapted to an environment having a temperature

of approximately one degree absolute."

     "Yes. Like you, only more so." Kay paused, trying to put into intelligible thought a

picture inherently incapable of reception or recognition by her as yet strictly three-

dimensional intelligence. "Something like the Eich, too, but not much. Their visible

aspect was obscure, fluid . . . amorphous . . . Indefinite? . . . skip it—I couldn't really

perceive it, let alone describe it I wish you had caught that thought."

     "I wish so, too—it is very interesting. But tell me— if the thought was directed, not

broadcast, how could you have received it?"

     "That's the funniest part of the whole thing." Nadreck could feel the girl frown in

concentration. "It came at me from all sides at once—never felt anything like it. Naturally

I started feeling around for the source—particularly since it was a distress signal—but

before I could get-even a general direction of the origin it . . . it . . . well, it didn't really

disappear or really weaken, but something happened to it. I couldn't read it any

more—and that really did throw me for a loss." She paused, then went on. "It didn't so

much go away as go down, some way or other. Then it vanished completely, without

really going anywhere. I'm not making myself clear—I simply can't—but have I given

you enough leads so that you can make any sense at all out of any part of it?"

     "I'm very sorry to say that I can not."

     Nor could he, ever, for excellent reasons. That girl had a mind whose power,

scope, depth, and range she herself did not, could not even dimly understand; a mind to

be fully comprehended only by an adult of her own third level. That mind had in fact

received in toto a purely fourth-dimensional thought. If Nadreck had received it, he

would have understood it and recognized it for what it was only because of his

advanced Arisian training—no other Palainian could have done so—and it would have

been sheerly unthinkable to him that any warm-blooded and therefore strictly three-

dimensional entity could by any possibility receive such a thought; or, having received it,

could understand any part of it. Nevertheless, if he had really concentrated the full

powers of his mind upon the girl's attempted description, he might very well have

recognized in it the clearest possible three-dimensional delineation of such a thought;

and from that point he could have gone on to a full understanding of the Children of the

Lens.

     However, he did not so concentrate. It was constitutionally impossible for him to

devote real mental effort to any matter not immediately pertaining to the particular task

in hand. Therefore neither he nor Karen Kinnison were to know until much later that she

had been en rapport with one of Civilization's bitterest, most implacable foes; that she

had seen with clairvoyant and telepathic accuracy the intrinsically three-dimensionally-

indescribable form assumed in their winter by the horrid, the monstrous inhabitants of

that viciously hostile world, the unspeakable planet Floor!

     "I was afraid you couldn't." Kay's thought came clear. "That makes it all the more

important—important enough for you to drop whatever you're doing and join me in

getting to the bottom of it, if you could be made to see it, which of course you can't."

     "I am about to take Kandron, and nothing in the Universe can be as important as

that," Nadreck stated quietly, as a simple matter of fact. "You have observed this that

lies here?"

     "Yes." Karen, en rapport with Nadreck, was of course cognizant of the captive,

but it had not occurred to her to mention this monster. When dealing with Nadreck she,

against all the tenets of her sex, exhibited as little curiosity as did the coldly emotionless

Lensman himself. "Since you bid so obviously for the question, why are you keeping it

alive— or rather, not dead?"

     "Because he is my sure link to Kandron." If Nadreck of Palain ever was known to

gloat, it was then. "He is Kandron's creature, placed by Kandron personally as an

agency of my destruction. Kandron's brain alone holds the key compulsion which will

restore his memories. At some future time— perhaps a second from now, perhaps a

cycle of years— Kandron will use that key to learn how his minion fares.* Kandron's

thought will energize my re-transmitter in the dome; the compulsion will be forwarded to

this still-living brain. The brain, however, will be in my speedster, not in that undamaged

fortress. You now understand why I cannot stray far from this being's base; you should

see that you should join me instead of me joining you."

     "No; not definite enough," Karen countered decisively, "I can't see myself passing

up a thing like this for the opportunity of spending the next ten years .floating around in

an orbit, doing nothing. However, I check you to a certain extent—when and if anything

really happens, shoot me a thought and I'll rally "round."

     The linkage broke without formal adieus. Nadreck went his way. Karen went

hers. She did not, however, go far along the way she had had in mind. She was still

precisely nowhere in her quest when she felt a thought, of a type that only her brother or

an Arisian could send. It was Kit.

     "Hi, Kay!" A warm, brotherly contact. "How'r'ya doing, sis—are you growing up?"

     "Of course I'm grown up! What a question!"

     "Don't get stiff, Kay, there's method in this. Got to be sure." All trace of levity

gone, he probed her unmercifully. "Not too bad, at that, for a kid. As dad would express

it, if he could feel you this way, you're twenty-nine numbers Brinnell harder than a

diamond drill. Plenty of jets for this job, and by the time the real one comes, you'll

probably be ready."

     "Cut the rigmarole, Kit!" she" snapped, and hurled a vicious bolt of her own. If Kit

did not counter it as easily as he had handled her earlier efforts, he did not reveal the

fact. "What job? What d'you think you're talking about? I'm on a job now that I wouldn't

drop for Nadreck, and I don't think I'll drop it for you."

     "You'll have to." Kit's thought was grim. "Mother is going to have to go to work on

Lyrane II. The probability is pretty bad that there is or will be something there that she

can't handle. Remote control is out, or I'd do it myself, but I can't work on Lyrane II in

person. Here's the whole picture—look it over. You can see, sis, that you're elected, so

hop to it."

     "I won't!" she stormed. "I can't—I'm too busy. How about asking Con, or Kat, or

Cam?"

     "They don't fit the picture," he explained patiently—for him. "In this case hardness

is indicated, as you can see for yourself."

     "Hardness, phooey!" she jeered. "To handle Ladora of Lyrane? She thinks she's

a hard-boiled egg, I know, but . . ."

     "Listen, you bird-brained knot-head!" Kit cut in, venomously. "You're fogging the

issue deliberately—stop it! I spread you the whole picture—you know as well as I do

that while there's nothing definite as yet, the thing needs covering and you're the one to

cover it. But no—just because I'm the one to suggest to or ask anything of you, you've

always got to go into that damned mulish act of yours . . ."

     "Be silent, children, and attend!" Both flushed violently as Mentor came between

them. "Some of the weaker thinkers here are beginning to despair of you, but my

visualization of your development is still clear. To mold such characters as yours

sufficiently, and yet not too much, is a delicate task indeed; but one which must and

shall be done. Christopher, come to me at once, in person. Karen, I would suggest that

you go to Lyrane and do there whatever you find necessary to do."

     "I won't—I've still got this job here to do!" Karen defied even the ancient Arisian

sage.

     "That, daughter, can and should wait. I tell you solemnly, as a fact, that if you do

not go to Lyrane you will never get the faintest clue to that which you now seek."