Docchi didn't answer. That the scanner Nona had built was capable of detecting a ship between the stars indicated a tremendous range--old style. But distances had shrunk lately. There was a ship behind them and it wasn't far. Neither was it on a pleasure jaunt. At the hospital steps they conferred briefly and then separated, Cameron leaving to find Jeriann. Docchi went into his office and tried unsuccessfully to locate Jordan. Ultimately he gave it up. Jordan had his own ideas of what was important and lately had been mysteriously concerned with some undertaking he refused to disclose. He had even tried to conceal that there was something he was working on. Docchi switched his efforts and finally contacted Webber. At a time like this they needed what support they could get. Webber was not a substitute for Jordan but he'd do. The person he'd most have liked to have along was Anti but she couldn't leave the prison, her tank. They missed her. They always would as long as she was confined. Docchi sat down while he waited for Webber. He needed the rest. He had been hoping that the pursuit would not begin as soon as it had. They would find some way to throw off the ship behind them--but it was not the biggest threat. * * * * * "Do you suppose she hid here when the guards were looking for her?" said Webber. "Doesn't seem likely," said Docchi, trying to keep up. The other's composite body gave him strength he wasn't aware of. Docchi couldn't match the effortless stride, the endurance. "Guards searched here too." They had, but how thoroughly? The asteroid had once been a planet, a world with an atmosphere, oceans, lakes, streams. Water had seeped into the ground, creating imperceptible weaknesses in the crust. And long ago when the catastrophe came it had struck suddenly. The planet had been split with such violence that whole chunks had been hurled apart, each one intact except that the shock had enlarged on the work begun by water. Faults became underground caverns, tortuous caverns in the rock that intersected the man-made tunnel. No matter what their orders were, the guards wouldn't have been anxious to explore too far. Under the stress of unusual gravity fissures could close again on the unwary--it was possible they'd made only a token search here. "If we come here often there ought to be an easier way than this," said Webber as they went along. Docchi had been thinking of it. He would be able to tell when he saw it whether it would be possible to move the scanner. If so a good place might be in gravity center. As nearly as he could tell it was almost directly overhead. Voices sprang out of the tunnel as they neared the destination. "Don't know what's keeping them," grumbled Jordan. "Maybe we ought not to wait." "He was looking for you," said Jeriann, her voice carrying in the stillness of the underground. "He said it was urgent for you to be here."