solation, with nothing to do but explore the resources of his own
mind. He'd tried some of the ancient Rhine experiments, but that was
no good; he still didn't show any particular psi talents. He couldn't
unlock the cell door with his unaided mind; he couldn't even alter the
probability of a single dust-mote's Brownian path through the somewhat
smelly air. Nor could he disappear from his cell and appear, as if by
magic, several miles away near the slightly-damaged hulk of his ship,
to the wonder and amazement of his Tr'en captors.

He could do, as a matter of fact, precisely nothing. He wished quietly
that the Tr'en had seen fit to give him a pack of cards, or a book, or
even a folder of tourist pictures. The Wonders of Tr'en, according to
all the advance reports, were likely to be pretty boring, but they'd
have been better than nothing.

In any decently-run jail, he told himself with indignation, there
would at least have been other prisoners to talk to. But on Tr'en
Korvin was all alone.

True, every night the guards came in and gave him a concentrated
lesson in the local language, but Korvin failed to get much pleasure
out of that, being unconscious at the time. But now he was equipped to
discuss almost anything from philosophy to plumbing, but there was
nobody to discuss it with. He changed position on the bunk and stared
at the walls. The Tr'en were efficient; there weren't even any
imperfections in the smooth surface to distract him.

He wasn't tired and he wasn't hungry; his captors had left him with a
full stock of food concentrates.

But he was almightily bored, and about ready to tell anything to
anyone, just for the chance at a little conversation.

As he reached this dismal conclusion, the cell door opened. Korvin got
up off the bunk in a hurry and spun around to face his visitor.

The Tr'en was tall, and slightly green.

He looked, as all the Tr'en did, vaguely humanoid--that is, if you
don't bother to examine him closely. Life in the universe appeared to
be rigidly limited to humanoid types on oxygen planets; Korvin didn't
know why, and neither did anybody else. There were a lot of theories,
but none that accounted for all the facts satisfactorily. Korvin
really didn't care about it; it was none of his business.

The Tr'en regarded him narrowly through catlike pupils. "You are
Korvin," he said.

It was a ritual, Korvin had learned. "You are of the Tr'en," he
replied. The green being nodded.