nd investigated. It was quickly evident that the
damage was caused by a fusing ray.

Strange life-forms were crawling about the ship, protected by flexible,
transparent suits. Their bodies were short, and squat, four-limbed and
evidently powerful. They, like insects, were equipped with a thick,
durable exoskeleton, horny, brownish coating that covered arms and legs
and head. Their eyes projected slightly, protected by horny protruding
walls--eyes that were capable of movement in every direction--and there
were three of them, set at equal distances apart.

The tiny investigation machine hurled itself violently at one of the
beings, crashing against the transparent covering, flexing it, and
striking the being inside with terrific force. Hurled from his position,
he fell end over end across the weightless ship, but despite the blow,
he was not hurt.

The investigator passed to the power room ahead of the Outsiders, who
were anxiously trying to learn the reason for their companion's plight.

[Illustration: Illustrated by MOREY]

Directed by the Center of Rulers, the investigator sought the power
room, and relayed the control signals from the Rulers' brains. The
ship-brain had been destroyed, but the controls were still readily
workable. Quickly they were shot home, and the enormous plungers shut. A
combination was arranged so that the machine, as well as the
investigator and the Outsiders, were destroyed. A second investigator,
which had started when the plan was decided on, had now arrived. The
Outsider's ship nearest the transport-machine had been badly damaged,
and the investigator entered the broken side.

* * * *

The scenes were, of course, remembered by the memory-minds back on Earth
tuned with that of the investigator. The investigator flashed down
corridors, searching quickly for the apparatus room. It was soon seen
that with them the machine was practically unintelligent, very few
machines of even slight intelligence being used.

Then it became evident by the excited action of the men of the ship,
that the presence of the investigator had been detected. Perhaps it was
the control impulses, or the signal impulses it emitted. They searched
for the tiny bit of metal and crystal for some time before they found
it. And in the meantime it was plain that the power these Outsiders used
was not, as was ours of the time, the power of blasting atoms, but the
greater power of disintegrating m