Finally the ultimate weapon was ready, the creation of long-ago Man plus ten billion. (Because there was no poetry in Ixmal's soul, he conceived solely in terms of cause and effect: he named the weapon "Star-Blaster.") Ixmal moved the great weapon into position and rapidly calculated the Earth-Callisto relationship, projecting the space ratio in terms of velocity, distance, gravities. No need to pinpoint the alien's plasto-metallic body: the whole of Callisto would vanish, reduced to cosmic dust under the bomb's furious impact. (A feathered bird sang from a tree. The trill liquid sound infuriated Ixmal, but he ended it. A puff of feathers drifted down through the leaves. The robin had sung of spring.) Ha! Ixmal exulted, following his precise calculations. At the exact ten-thousandths of a second he concentrated five billion thought units. Winds rushed into the spot where the bomb had stood, and for a long moment the forests trembled. (At the base of the batholith several of the strange man-forms chattered excitedly: the concept of a god was born.) Ixmal gloatingly followed "Star-Blaster's" course. He saw it hurtle past the moon, watched while for a split second it formed one apex of an equilateral triangle with Mars and earth, reveled as it drove through the belt of asteroids. Ha, the alien was doomed. His very atoms would be flung to the stars. He was watching "Star-Blaster" when.... Ixmal recoiled, disbelieving, then terrified. A great warhead hurtled through the belt of asteroids, earth-bound, driven at unbelievable velocity by the mind of Zale-3. Ixmal frantically calculated, pounding his circuits to produce answers in split thousandths of a second. Frenzied, he analyzed his findings: the warhead would strike his very body. * * * * * "Concentrate, concentrate," Psychband interrupted. "Divert the weapon by mind force." Ixmal concentrated, focusing ten billion thought units on the oncoming warhead. It flashed unswervingly past Mars, flicking like a heavenly rapier toward earth, its velocity unbelievable. "The moon! The moon! Use the moon," Psychband cried. Yes, the moon. He shook earth's satellite. An additional ten billion thought units reversed its orbit; he sped it up, hurling the Moon toward interception with Zale-3's warhead. Too late! "Think, think," Psychband urged. Ixmal mustered another two billion thought units, to no avail. The terrible weapon bashed past the moon, only seconds from earth. "Hurry!" Psychband screamed. Ixmal was trying to muster another two billion thought units when the alien warhead struck. There was a horrible shattering thousandths of a second before consciousness fled. Amorphic blackness. Night. Nothingness.