"It wouldn't be very bright of you. And since I want to do business, I guess I got to meet you part way. How would this be? You pull your ships away, out of range. My ship takes station right above this here Lensman's office. I go down in my speedster, like I did here, and go inside to meet him and you. I'll wear my armor--and when I say it's real armor I ain't just snapping my choppers, neither." "I can see only one slight flaw." The Boskonian was really trying to work out a mutually satisfactory solution. "The Lensman will open our minds to you in proof, however, that we will have no intention of bringing up our maulers or other heavy stuff while we are in conference." "Right then he'll show you that you hadn't better, too." Kinnison grinned, wolfishly. "What do you mean?" The officer demanded. "I mean that I've got enough good big superatomic bombs aboard to blow the planet apart, and that the boys'll drop 'em all if you start playing dirty. I've got to take a little chance, of course, to start doing business, but it's a small one. If you ain't smart enough to know that what would happen would be mighty poor business, your Lensman will be--especially when it won't get you any dope on what makes this ship of mine tick the way she does. And the clincher is that even if you bring up everything you've got, I never did figure on living forever, and going out in an atomic blast of that size, together with your fleet and half your planet and you and your Lensman and seven hundred million other people, is as good a way as I can think of." "If the Lensman's examination bears that out, it will constitute an absolute guarantee," the officer agreed. Hard as he was, he could not conceal the fact that he had been shaken: "Everything, then, is satisfactory?" "On the green. Are you ready to flit?" "We are ready." "Call your Lensman, then, and lead the way. Boys, take her upstairs!" XVI. Karen Kinnison was worried. She, who had always been so steady, so sure of herself, had for weeks been conscious of a gradually increasing ... what was it, anyway? Not exactly a loss of control ... a _change_ ... a something that manifested itself in increasingly numerous fits of senseless--sheerly idiotic--stubbornness. And always and only it was directed at--of all the people in the universe--her brother. She got along with her sisters perfectly; their tiny tiffs barely rippled the surface of any of their minds. But any time her path of action crossed Kit's, it seemed, the profoundest depths of her being flared into opposition like exploding duodec. Worse than senseless and idiotic, it was inexplicable, for the feeling which the Five had for each other was much deeper than that felt by ordinary brothers and sisters.