Terrans on the idea that they were
the master race. It never occurred to them that we might be anything but
Terrans; Terrans who didn't know the Mancji. And they were canny enough
to use an old form of Interlingua; somewhere they'd met men before.

"Then we needed food. They knew what we ate, and that was where they
went too far. They had, among the flotsam in their hive, a few human
bodies they had picked up from some wreck they'd come across in their
travels. They had them stashed away like everything else they could lay
a pseudopod on. So they stacked them the way they'd seen Terran frozen
foods shipped in the past, and sent them over. Another of their little
jokes.

"I suppose if you're already overwrought and eager to quit, and you've
been badly scared by the size of an alien ship, it's pretty
understandable that the sight of human bodies, along with the story that
they're just a convenient food supply, might seem pretty convincing. But
I was already pretty dubious about the genuineness of our pals, and when
I saw those bodies it was pretty plain that we were hot on the trail of
Omega Colony. There was no other place humans could have come from out
there. We had to find out the location from the Mancji."

"But, Admiral," said the reporter, "true enough they were humans, and
presumably had some connection with the colony, but they were naked
corpses stacked like cordwood. The Mancji had stated that these were
slaves, or rather domesticated animals; they wouldn't have done you any
good."

"Well, you see, I didn't believe that," the Admiral said. "Because it
was an obvious lie. I tried to show some of the officers, but I'm afraid
they weren't being too rational just then.

"I went into the locker and examined those bodies; if Kramer had looked
closely, he would have seen what I did. These were no tame animals. They
were civilized men."

"How could you be sure, Admiral? They had no clothing, no identifying
marks, nothing. Why didn't you believe they were cattle?"

"Because," said the Admiral, "all the men had nice neat haircuts."

THE END

+--------------------------------------------------------------+
| Transcriber's Notes and Errata |
| |
| This etext was produced from "Amazing Science Fiction |
| Stories" April 1959. Extensive research did not uncover any |
| evidence that the U. S. copyrigh