"Your friend," she gurgled, "doesn't believe he's alive, or that I am, or you. Tell him we are." Carr grinned. Mado did look funny at that. "Hello, old sock," he said, "had a bad dream?" "Did I? Oh boy!" Mado rocked to and fro, his head in his hands. Then he displayed sudden intense interest. "Rapaju?" he asked. "His guards--the fleet--what's happened?" "Ah ha! Now you know you're alive!" Carr laughed. "But the others are dead and gone. The fleet's gone to smash--and how!" "But Carr. How did you do it? Tell me!" Mado threw off his covers and clapped his friend on the back, a resounding thump that brought a gasp from Ora. "Your Sargasso Sea did it. And it's a thing of the past, too. Wait till I tell you about it!" * * * * * Ora tripped from the room as Carr sat on the edge of the bunk to spin his yarn. "But man alive!" Mado exclaimed when the story was finished. "Don't you know you've done a miraculous thing? I'd never have had the nerve. That damn creature out there had more than four times its former attracting energy. That's what made it impossible for the fleet to get away. And you--you lucky devil--you just doped it out right. The fleet of the Llotta gave you a tremendous push from astern when you used the repulsive energy. If they hadn't been there with their enormous mass to react against we'd all have been mincemeat now along with the Llotta. You Terrestrials sure can think fast! Me, now--Lord, if it had been me, I'd have thought of it after my spirit had departed to its reward--or punishment. Glory be! It's the greatest thing I ever heard of." "Rats! You'd have done the same as I did. Probably would have missed it a mile instead of nearly getting caught as I did. A good thing the fleet's gone, though. Mars and Terra--Venus, too--they'll never know how close it was for them. Wouldn't have sense enough to appreciate it, anyway." "They would if they ever got a taste of what the Llotta planned. But what's wrong with you Carr? You act sore. Want to go home?" "Me? Don't be like that. No--I'd like to carry on as we planned. There's Saturn, Uranus and Neptune yet; Planet 9; a flock of satellites and asteroids. Oh, dammit!" Mado looked his amazement. "Well, what's to prevent it?" he demanded. "The _Nomad's_ still here, and so are we. I'm just as anxious to keep going as you are. Why not?" But Carr did not reply. Why not, indeed? He strode from the cabin and into the control room. The _Nomad_ was drifting in space, subject only to natural forces that swung it in a vast orbit around the sun. He started the generators and drove the vessel from her temporary orbit with rapid acceleration. Out--out into the jeweled blackness of the heavens. There was Jupiter out there, a bright orb that came suddenly very near when he centered it on the cross-hairs of the telescope.