've won. Won your war against this planet, if
you will only hear me out." He turned to Rhes, who was frowning in angry
puzzlement. "Of course your people have won also, Rhes. No more war with
the city, you'll get medicine, off-planet contact--everything you want."

"Pardon me for being cynical," Rhes said, "but you're promising the best
of all possible worlds for everyone. That will be a little hard to
deliver when our interests are opposed so."

"You strike through to the heart of the matter," Jason said. "Thank you.
This mess will be settled by seeing that everyone's interests are not
opposed. Peace between the city and farms, with an end to the useless
war you have been fighting. Peace between mankind and the Pyrran life
forms--because that particular war is at the bottom of all your
troubles."

"The man's mad," Kerk said.

"Perhaps. You'll judge that after you hear me out. I'm going to tell you
the history of this planet, because that is where both the trouble and
the solution lie.

"When the settlers landed on Pyrrus three hundred years ago they missed
the one important thing about this planet, the factor that makes it
different from any other planet in the galaxy. They can't be blamed for
the oversight, they had enough other things to worry about. The gravity
was about the only thing familiar to them, the rest of the environment
was a shocking change from the climate-controlled industrial world they
had left. Storms, vulcanism, floods, earthquakes--it was enough to drive
them insane, and I'm sure many of them did go mad. The animal and insect
life was a constant annoyance, nothing at all like the few harmless and
protected species they had known. I'm sure they never realized that the
Pyrran life was telepathic as well--"

"That again!" Brucco snapped. "True or not, it is of no importance. I
was tempted to agree with your theory of psionic-controlled attack on
us, but the deadly fiasco you staged proved that theory wrong."

"I agree," Jason answered. "I was completely mistaken when I thought
some outside agency directed the attack on the city with psionic
control. It seemed a logical theory at the time and the evidence pointed
that way. The expedition to the island _was_ a deadly fiasco--only don't
forget that attack was the direct opposite of what I wanted to have
done. If I had gone into the cave myself none of the deaths would have
been necessary. I think it would have been discovered that the plant
crea