_ reduced it,
extracted some of the pure metal. See all the little reddish specks
shining? It is pretty well established that the process is something
like electroplating. There's a dissolving acid--then a weak electric
current--from a kind of battery... Oh, nobody should laugh, Frank--Dr.
Pacetti keeps pointing out that there are electric eels on Earth, with
specialized muscle-tissue that acts as an electric cell... But this is
somewhat different. Don't ask me exactly how it functions--I only heard
our orientation lecture, while we toured this museum. But see those
small compartments in the thick shells of the pod--with the membranes
separating them? All of them contained fluids--some acid, others
alkaline. Mixed in with the cellulose of the membranes, you can see both
silvery and reddish specks--as if _they_ had to incorporate both a
conductor and a difference of metals to get a current. At least, that
was what was suggested in the lecture..."

Frank Nelsen and Nance Codiss moved on from display case to display
case, each of which showed another kind of pod cut in half. The
interiors were all different and all complicated... Membranes with a
faint, metallic sheen--laminated or separated by narrow air spaces as in
a capacitor, for instance... Balls of massed fibre, glinting... Curious,
spiral formations of waxy tissue...

"They use electricity as a minor kind of defense," Nance went on, her
tone still low with suppressed excitement that was close to dread. "We
know that some of them can give you a shock--if you're fool enough to
get so close that you can touch them. And they do emit radio impulses on
certain wavelengths. Signals--communication...? As for the rest, perhaps
you'd better do your own guessing, Frank. But the difference between us
and them seems to be that we _make_ our apparatus. They _grow_ them,
_build_ them--with their own living tissue cells--in a way that must be
under their constant, precise control. I suppose they even work from a
carefully thought-out design--a kind of cryptic blueprint... Go along
with the idea--or not--as you choose. But our experts suspect that much
of what we have here represents research apparatus--physical, chemical,
electrical. That _they_ may get closer to understanding the ultimate
structure of matter than we can, because their equipment is part of
themselves, in which they can develop senses that we don't possess...
Well, I'll skip any more of that. Because the best--or