y were the
keyboards of a great organ, and he felt his insides writhe as he
slipped the hurtling ship back into E-Space, then back to R-level
again. He played the tiny craft between levels as though it were a
stone skipping across water, and altered course with each Transition
with no attempt at plan or pattern. Rivulets of ice water trickled
down across his ribs, and the flesh of his thin face was stiff.

"Wrong again," he heard Cain saying. "At least we can tell the brain
trust that their precious R-factor is constant beyond the Rim ...
maybe that'll be worth a buck or two. At least those kids back there
are playing around in this galaxy like it was their own front yard. Go
on, skipper, take a look yourself!"

Mason didn't have to look. He knew that he hadn't lost the alien; had
known somehow that he wouldn't be able to. Too apparently, their own
galaxy, near as it was to the Milky Way, was of the same Space, its
continuum forged in the same curvature matrices.

"Shall I order our m-guns placed, sir?" It was Judith, and he knew she
had grasped the implications of the situation as quickly as she always
did. Sometimes he wondered if she were a computer herself, clad in the
graceful body of a young woman rather than in a shell of permasteel.
And other times....

He didn't even think about his answer. The "No" was automatic.

"I'll give the order, then, myself!" Cain said flatly.

"As you were, Mister Cain!"

"So it's rank, now, is it?" And he was grinning that damn grin again.

"Take it any way you want. If you think three meson cannon will stop a
ship that's obviously built for battle, you're hardly thinking well
enough for the responsibilities of your post."

"Well listen to who's sounding off! So we're just going to let 'em
overhaul us; just let 'em blast us out of Space, or come tramping
aboard if they want to!"

Mason didn't reply. He looked at the scanner, and now the alien craft
was no longer a dot, but taking definite shape. It would be a couple
of hours, yet, perhaps. And then it would have to be the way Cain had
said.

The alien overhauled them hardly a billion miles inside the Rim, and
Mason offered no resistance when he felt their magnetics touch the
Scout and draw it gently to the flank of their great ship. It was
necessary to scale down the scanner's field to see the huge shape in
its entirety. Beside it, the Scout was like a sparrow's egg.

He punched the stud that would swing in the outer l