with
the thick, the syrupy lignin, this amber-colored sluggish stream of
woodpulp liquefied, this soft bed of The Brain's vibrant nerves.
Unthinking, absent-minded, Lee wiped the finger with his handkerchief.

"Now, I'm going to try a slightly different arrangement of the tests,"
he thought. "It's normal; I'm doing that almost every day."

The feeling he experienced as he swung into action was strange. As he
walked back and forth it felt like somnambulic walk; something his limbs
did without an act of will. As his hands did things expertly and
skillfully the feeling was that they were instruments automatically
moved not by his own volition but by some power outside himself.

His movements were those of a child serenely at play, a child
incongruously tall and gaunt and grey-haired constructing little
causeways and bridges on the ground with the logs of the fireplace; a
happy child engrossed in an innocent game....

* * * * *

It took about an hour and then causeways of fresh pulpwood were laid
from every termite hill to every feeding gate, from every glass cubicle
to the south wall and along the south wall to the "Lignin-Filler-Spout";
and from the ground up to the spout a little tepee of sticks had been
built.

Admiringly the grey-haired child looked at its handiwork through
thick-lensed glasses. "It's been an interesting game," Lee thought, "it
might turn out to be a valuable new experiment. I'll sit down now and
observe what happens...."

He went over to the desk again and settled down. He opened his files and
laid out his charts on the desk and there were colored pencils to be
sharpened for the entries. He was glad of that; his conscious mind
rejoiced now over every little pursuit of routine, of normalcy, of the
established scientific order of things; it concentrated on these. Pencil
in hand, reclined in comfort, his heartbeat even, he kept expectant eyes
upon the staggered rows of fluorescent screens, ready to note any
significant developments.

He didn't have to wait long; their strange sixth sense, the telepathy of
their collective brains, the spirit of the hive with the immortality of
their race for its supreme law, had already told them of a promised land
and of new worlds to conquer.

On the fluorescent screens Lee watched their preparations for the big
drive: The nasicorn-soldiers clotting together at the exit tunnels like
assault troops at the bow of invasion barges w