The recording ended and for a long moment Elge sat motionless in his chair. Had he and Nequal before him been guilty of a heinous crime? The recording had been taken from brains since destroyed. Minds judged to be insane and erased for fear of future contamination. But what if the apparent sickness had been the result of a natural progression? The next step in the evolutionary scale?

Elge had considered this possibility before. A mind, like a body, could grow and mature, develop like a child into a man. To progress from the fear-ridden, superstition-poisoned mentality of an aboriginal savage to the calculating intellect of a being able to recognize the stars for what they were, demons and ghosts for the nonsense they represented, the awe of the unknown for the ignorance it personified.

A normal man could do that contaminated as he was with destructive emotions. A cyber was superior to a normal man, free as he was from distorting glandular exudations. And, as a cyber to a man-the developed brains?

Even if that were so there had been no crime. Life was the cheapest thing in the universe and, though some had been destroyed, others would follow if the theory was correct. And would the development end there? Elge remembered the demonstration and the massive arm of the robot which had crushed the brain controlling it. It would be suicide if the mind had been aware of what was happening and what it was doing. But if it had been aware, and there was no doubt that was the case, could it have been not suicide but release?-the intelligence finally freed of the last vestige of hampering flesh so as to soar into the limitless regions of the universe?

Such speculation held endless connotations and opened vistas of entrancing complexity which a century of uninterrupted thought would only begin to comprehend.

Could the intelligence survive once the brain had been destroyed? The mind was not the organ-that much had been proved long ago. The ego, the self, was the product of an electromagnetic potential which could be plotted and measured and set down in graphs and wavering lines. Could be caught by machines which emulated telepathy as the recordings demonstrated.

And a world of the mind, to that mind, was as real as any other.

For a moment his senses swam and Elge straightened, one hand reaching toward the recorder to play again the trapped emissions of now-dead brains. Or brains which even now were enjoying true release. Freed from the prisons in which, all unwittingly, they had been placed.

His hand halted as the door opened and Jarvet entered the room, a folder beneath his arm.

"Master!" He placed the folder on the desk and glanced at the apparatus recently installed. "The latest report from Cyber Vire."

"Leave it."

"Yes, Master. The Council has studied the report and it would be best to bring your information up to date."

A warning? Elge glanced at the aide then at the folder. Engrossed with the recordings, he had mischanneled his energies and recognized the error. Time had been lost which should have been put to better use. A matter of minutes only, perhaps, but there could be no excuse for inefficiency.

He reached for the file and began to scan the contents.

Lim was dead and Vire had failed. The Saito had vaporized and all within it-Lim's pyre and one he had merited by his stupidity. Vire was not wholly to blame and yet the tools he had chosen reflected on his ability.

"Time was a matter of prime importance," said Jarvet as Elge put down the final sheet. "He contacted agents on Sorkendo while in transit and arranged for a military-type operation. One which, as we now know, failed."

That failure left the cyber in a damaged vessel, the mercenaries dead or stranded, their own ship taken by the man they had been engaged to capture.

Where was he now?

Correction-where would he be? And when?

Elge looked again at the report. As yet Vire had made only radio contact with Pendance and it would take time before his ship could reach Zabul. The result for which Dumarest had planned.

How to locate him in the immensity of space?

A man, using available transportation, was restricted to certain definable areas of operation. He could only go where ships were available to take him. Even if he adopted a random path it could never wholly be that because, always, his choices were limited. But now Dumarest was in his own vessel and could go where he pleased.

At least so it seemed, but Elge knew better.

Paper moved beneath his hand as he checked certain data. Vire had been thorough in his questioning of Pendance and his men. Facts; details as to supplies carried by the Moira, the temperament of the crew, the state of the vessel itself-all helping to build an overall picture.

The faulty generator would slow the ship and need repairing. Fuel was low. Of the crew Maynard had emotional difficulties which could lead to a confrontation if the woman was careless. The engineer, while skilled, would be of little use outside his field.

To operate the ship Dumarest would need men, money and material.

And those needs could drive him into a trap.

CHAPTER NINE

Ysanne said, "Millett, Earl, or Emney. Either will do but you'll have to decide now so I can set the new course. Even as it is we'll be pushing things to the limit."

She sat in the chart room, almanacs at her side, the chamber filled with the flash and winks from the instruments, the pungent odor of her perfume, which was in keeping with the barbaric dress she wore: leather decorated with painted symbols, the skirt fringed and falling to her knees. The belt hugging her waist was broad, beaded, the buckle massive.

She seemed a savage seated in the middle of modern technology, hair and skin illuminated by the glow of telltales and registers. It was easy to imagine her squatting before an open fire, tearing at half-cooked meat with her strong teeth, face and hands smeared with grease and stained with smoke. A child of nature, now over-tired and short on patience.

"Earl?"

A choice and a decision he had to make but one he didnt like. The choice was too limited, the decision too predictable.

"Millett is favorite by a hair," she said. "Good yards and facilities. We could raise a loan or charter the ship to cover the cost of fees and generator-parts. Emney is more isolated but could do the job and we'd have no trouble eating. The place is lousy with game."

"You know it."

"I've been there." She volunteered no further information. Instead, as if reading his mind, she said, "You aren't happy with either. Why? Afraid of Pendance?"

Pendance was the least of his worries; the man would be dead by now if Volodya had any sense. But she had provided a reason he could use.

"He could have friends who'd recognize the Moira and get curious. They might even decide to take over and we aren't strong enough to safeguard the ship. Are you sure there's no other choice?"

"There's always a choice. We could drift until we're forgotten and thought dead. We could try to reach the Puchon or Venner's Twin-good worlds if you can breathe chlorine. We could even try praying for a miracle-one which will give us fuel and a new generator and supplies."

"I'm serious."

"So am I." Her gesture embraced the instruments, the almanacs and navigational tables, the charts. "Facts, Earl. I have to deal in facts and they are against us. We aren't free agents. That damned generator makes us prisoners of the equations and we can only go so far. So which is it to be? Millett or Emney?"

The decision was reached through fatigue but absolved her of further strain. Now the burden was his and she could rest and close her eyes and remember the touch of cool winds on her face and hair as she ran over rolling plains to where the fires of the evening meeting already shone like ruby stars beneath their thin columns of smoke.