om we may chance."

"But as my sergeant has already pointed out," Mason said, "our arms
would be worthless to you. And, more importantly, we wish no more part
in warfare. I am afraid, in that respect, you must excuse us, sir....
It has been a pleasure to have you aboard."

And suddenly, the smile was gone from the alien's face.

"I must demand of you, then--force you, if necessary--to take us to
your planet, Lieutenant. For you can quite obviously help us. It is
not your arms we want."

"I fail to understand you sir." Mason felt the icy sweat start again,
repressed a shiver as it trickled the length of his spare body.

"Our planet, as our enemy's, is encircled by a wide ring of floating
cosmic debris," the alien said. "In both instances, the rings are
remnants of what once may have been satellites. In the ring which
encircles us, we have successfully secreted refrigerated,
lead-sheathed stores of male sperm, quite impossible for our enemy to
locate. That is a necessity, of course, for any race that is
constantly at war and is obliged to take all possible safeguards to
insure its continued existence. We assume that Thrayx has done the
same.

"However, our cell stores are useless if they lack ova to fertilize.
On their last attack, Thrayxite ships succeeded in penetrating our
innermost planetary defenses, and heavily damaged a number of our
cities. Many of our women and young were victims.

"We therefore evacuated our planet's entire female population to an
uninhabited world far distant. It was a young world and covered with
thick forests, much like the labor planetoid which circles Thrayx, and
we believed our breeders would be quite sufficiently camouflaged."

"Breeders?" Cain broke in.

"Our philosophy concerning women is slightly different than your own,"
the alien said. And then he resumed, "But in our haste we
underestimated our enemy's cleverness. Thrayxite scouts located the
planet, destroyed it, our women, and our seeds.

"And that is why you will take us to Earth, Lieutenant. We do not want
your arms or your men. What we must ask for is--ten thousand of your
women!"

II

A Cepheid Variable winked tauntingly at the edge of the Milky Way, the
Large Magellanic Cloud strewn like diamonds in a vast cosmic spume
behind it. It corruscated in glorious display as, far off, a great
silvery ship of Space and a tiny jot of man-made metal resumed their
headlong motion through the mighty legion of the stars.