s setting a snith-trap, you just hump
right down here and ask me, and I'll tell you all about it. On the
other hand, if the lower levels all suddenly become infested with
shelks at the same time, why, you just take care of that little detail
yourself, eh? The only other alternative is to learn to think."

Wygor winced a trifle and kept his mouth shut.

Having delivered himself of his jet of acid, Dodeth Pell looked down
at the data booklet that Wygor had handed him. "Fortunately," he said,
"there doesn't seem to be much to worry about. Only the Universal
Motivator knows how this thing could have spawned, but it doesn't
appear to be very efficient."

"No, sir, it doesn't," said Wygor, taking heart from his superior's
mild tone. "The eating orifice is oddly placed, and the teeth are
obviously for grinding purposes."

"I was thinking more of the method of locomotion," Dodeth said. "I
believe this is a record, although I'll have to look in the files to
make sure. I think that six locomotive limbs is the least I've ever
heard of on an animal that size."

"I've checked the files," said Wygor. "There was a four-limbed
leaf-eater recorded seven hundred years ago--four locomotive limbs,
that is, and two grasping. But it was only as big as your hand."

Dodeth looked through the three pages of the booklet. There wasn't
much there, really, but he knew Wygor well enough to know that all the
data he had thus far was there. The only thing that rankled was that
Wygor had delayed for three work periods before reporting the
intrusion of the new beast, and now five of them had been spotted.

He looked at the page which showed the three bathygraphs that had been
taken of the new animals from a distance. There was something odd
about them, and Dodeth couldn't, for the hide of him, figure out what
it was. It aroused an odd fear in him, and made him want to burrow
deeper into the ground.

"I can't see what keeps 'em from falling over," he said at last. "Are
they as slow-moving as they look?"

"They don't move very fast," Wygor admitted, "but we haven't seen any
of them startled yet. I don't see how they could run very fast,
though. It must take every bit of awareness they have to stay balanced
on two legs."

Dodeth sighed whistlingly and pushed the data booklet back across the
business bench to Wygor. "All right; I'll file the preliminary
spotting report. Now get out there and get me some pertinent data on
this queer beast. Scram