s knew of
their presence on Sirene IV. They'd been made aghast by the brisk and
competent nullification of their eighty-gee rocket defenses. They'd been
appalled by the appearance of a space fleet which--if it had been a
space fleet--could have blasted the planet to a cinder. And then they
were bewildered that the humans asked no submission--not even promises
from them.

There was only one conclusion to be drawn. It was that if the humans
were willing to be friendly, it would be a good idea to agree. Another
idea followed. A grand gesture by Huks would be an even better idea.

"Wait!" said the interpreter. He turned. A momentary further discussion
among the Huks. The interpreter turned back.

"There is a ship here," he said uneasily. "It is a human ship. There are
humans in it. The ship is disabled."

Sergeant Madden affected surprise.

"Yeah? How come?"

"It ar-rived two days ago," said the interpreter. Then he plunged. "We
br-rought it. We have a mine on what you call Pr-rocyron Three. The
human ship landed, because it was disabled. It discovered our ship and
our mine there. We wished to keep the mine secret. Because the humans
had found out our secret, we br-rought them here. And the ship. It is
disabled."

"Hm-m-m," said Sergeant Madden. "I'll send a repair-boat down to fix
whatever's the matter with it. Of course you won't mind." He turned
away, and turned back. "One of the solar systems we'd like you to take
over and defend," he observed, "is Procyron. I haven't a list of the
others, but when your ship comes over to Varenga it'll be ready. Talk
our repair-boat down, will you? We'll appreciate anything you can do to
help get the ship back out in space with its passengers, but our
repair-boat can manage."

He waved his hand negligently and went back to the squad ship. He got
in. Patrolman Willis followed him.

"Take her up," said Sergeant Madden.

The squad ship fell toward the sky. Sergeant Madden said satisfiedly:

"That went off pretty good. From now on it's just routine."

* * * * *

There was a bubble in emptiness. It was a large bubble, as such things
go. It was nearly a thousand feet in diameter, and it was made of
multipoly plastic which is nearly as anomalous as its name. The bubble
contained almost an ounce of helium. It had a three-inch small box at
one point on its surface. It floated some twenty-five million miles from
the Huk planet, and five million mile