n people."

"Well," said the general, "they're _your_ patients. I'll see you at
the ship in five minutes."

"I'll be there, sir." Colonel Halter flipped the switch. The
visiophone blanked out. He looked at the television screen.

The six black-clothed figures were quiet on the floor of their ship's
control room. They reminded him of sleeping children curled together
for warmth.

As he left his office and walked out into the humming city, he felt
drained, still shaking with tension, realizing even now how close he
had come to failure.

But there was the scarred and pitted needle-nosed old hull, bright
with moonlight, standing like a monument against the night sky.

Not a monument to the past, though.

It marked the birthplace of the future ... and he had been midwife. He
felt his shoulders straighten at the knowledge as he walked toward the
ancient ship.

--RICHARD STOCKHAM

* * * * *

End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Perfect Control, by Richard Stockham

*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK PERFECT CONTROL ***

***** This file should be named 31985.txt or 31985.zip *****
This and all associated files of various formats will be found in:
http://www.gutenberg.org/3/1/9/8/31985/

Produced by Sankar Viswanathan, Greg Weeks, and the Online
Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net

Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions
will be renamed.

Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no
one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation
(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without
permission and without paying copyright royalties. Special rules,
set forth in the General Terms of Use part of this license, apply to
copying and distributing Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works to
protect the PROJECT GUTENBERG-tm concept and trademark. Project
Gutenberg is a registered trademark, and may not be used if you
charge for the eBooks, unless you receive specific permission. If you
do not charge anything for copies of this eBook, complying with the
rules is very easy. You may use this eBook for nearly any purpose
such as creation of derivative works, reports, performances and
research. They may be modified and printed and given away--you may do
practically ANYTHING with public domain eBooks. Redistribution