e too long.
Captain, I wish we could think of something. About the only thing we can
suggest--"

The reception suddenly failed again.

Rajcik cursed frustratedly as he worked over the radio. Watkins gnawed
at his mustache. Somers glanced out a porthole and looked hurriedly
away, for the stars, their destination, were impossibly distant.

They heard static again, faintly now.

"I can't get much more," Rajcik said. "This damned reception.... What
could they have been suggesting?"

"Whatever it was," said Watkins, "they didn't think it would work."

"What the hell does that matter?" Rajcik asked, annoyed. "It'd give us
something to do."

They heard the official's voice, a whisper across space.

"Can you hear ... Suggest ..."

At full amplification, the voice faded, then returned. "Can only suggest
... most unlikely ... but try ... calculator ... try ..."

[Illustration]

The voice was gone. And then even the static was gone.

"That does it," Rajcik said. "The calculator? Did he mean the Fahrensen
Computer in our hold?"

"I see what he meant," said Captain Somers. "The Fahrensen is a very
advanced job. No one knows the limits of its potential. He suggests we
present our problem to it."

"That's ridiculous," Watkins snorted. "This problem has no solution."

"It doesn't seem to," Somers agreed. "But the big computers have solved
other apparently impossible problems. We can't lose anything by trying."

"No," said Rajcik, "as long as we don't pin any hopes on it."

"That's right. We don't dare hope. Mr. Watkins, I believe this is your
department."

"Oh, what's the use?" Watkins asked. "You say don't hope--but both of
you are hoping anyhow! You think the big electronic god is going to save
your lives. Well, it's not!"

"We have to try," Somers told him.

"We don't! I wouldn't give it the satisfaction of turning us down!"

* * * * *

They stared at him in vacant astonishment.

"Now you're implying that machines think," said Rajcik.

"Of course I am," Watkins said. "Because they do! No, I'm not out of my
head. Any engineer will tell you that a complex machine has a
personality all its own. Do you know what that personality is like?
Cold, withdrawn, uncaring, unfeeling. A machine's only purpose is to
frustrate desire and produce two problems for every one it solves. And
do you know why a machine feels this way?"

"You're hysterical," Somers told him.

"I am not. A mac