s, of course, but the change is
instant and we feel no pressure, no pain."

Ramsey was waiting until 0134:57 on the ship chronometer. At that
precise instant in time, and at that instant only, blastoff would place
them on the proper hyper-space orbit. And, before they could feel the
mounting pressure of blastoff, the timelessness of hyper-space would
intervene.

"0130:15," Margot read the chronometer for Ramsey. "It won't be long
now. 30:20--"

"All right," Ramsey said suddenly. "All right. I can read the
chronometer."

"Why, Ramsey! I do believe you're nervous."

"Anxious, Margot. A hyper-pilot is always anxious just before crossover.
You've got to be, because the slightest miscalculation can send you
fifty thousand light years off course."

"So? All you'd have to do is re-enter hyper-space and go back."

Ramsey shook his head. "Hyper-space can only be entered from certain
points in space. We've never been able to figure out why."

"What certain points?"

* * * * *

Ramsey looked at her steadily. "Points which vary with the orbits of the
three thousand humanoid worlds, Margot," he said slowly. He watched her
for a reaction, knowing that strange fact about hyper-space--perfectly
true and never understood--dovetailed with her father's letter about
proto-man, an unknown pre-human ancestor of all the humanoid races in
the galaxy, who had discovered hyper-space, bred variations to colonize
all the inhabitable worlds, found or created the three thousand
crossover points in space, and used them.

Margot showed no response, but then, Ramsey told himself, she was a
tri-di actress. She could feign an emotion--or hide one. She merely
asked: "Is it true that there's no such thing as time in hyper-space?"

"That's right. That's why you can travel scores or hundreds or thousands
of light years through hyper-space in hours. Hyper-space is a continuum
of only three dimensions. There is no fourth dimension, no dimension of
duration."

"Then why aren't trips through hyper-space instantaneous? They take
several hours, don't they?"

"Sure, but the way scientists have it figured, that's subjective time.
No objective time passes at all. It can't. There isn't any--in
hyper-space."

"Then you mean--"

Ramsey shook his head. "0134:02," he said. "It's almost time."

The seconds ticked away. Even Margot did not seem relaxed now. She
stared nervously at the chronometer, or watched Ramsey's lip