Mice scurrying at midnight in a vast cathedral--and the faint suggestion that the cathedral might not be otherwise wholly empty. Oktav, or that which had been Oktav, oriented itself--himself--making use of the sole means of perception that functioned in the Zone. It was most akin to touch, but touch strangely extended and sensitive only to projected thought or processes akin to thought. Groping like a man shut in an infinite closet, Oktav felt the eternal hum of the Probability Engine, the lesser hum of the seven unlocked talismans. He felt the seven human minds in their stations around the engine, felt six of them stiffen with cold disapproval as Ters made report. Then he took his own station, the last and eighth. Ters concluded. Prim thought, "We summoned you, Oktav, to hear your explanation of certain highly questionable activities in which you have recently indulged--only to learn that you have additionally committed an act of unprecedented negligence. Never before has a talisman been lost. And only twice has it been necessary to make an expedition to recover one--when its possessor met accidental death in a space-time world. How can you have permitted this to happen, since a talisman gives infallible warning if it is in any way spatially or temporarily parted from its owner?" "I am myself deeply puzzled," Oktav admitted. "Some obscure influence must have been operative, inhibiting the warning or closing my mind to it. I did not become aware of the loss until I was summoned. However, casting my mind back across the last Earth-day's events, I believe I can now discern the identity of the individual into whose hands it fell--or who stole it." "Was the talisman inert at the time?" thought Prim quickly. "Yes," thought Oktav. "A Key-idea known only to myself would be necessary to unlock its powers." "That is one small point in your favor," thought Prim. "I am gravely at fault," thought Oktav, "but it can easily be mended. Lend me another talisman and I will return to the world and recover it." "It will not be permitted," thought Prim. "You have already spent too much time in the world, Oktav. Although you are the youngest of us, your body is senile." Before he could check himself, or at least avoid projection, Oktav thought, "Yes, and by so doing I have learned much that you, in your snug retreat, would do well to become aware of." "The world and its emotions have corrupted you," thought Prim. "And that brings me to the second and major point of our complaint." * * * * * Oktav felt the seven minds converge hostilely upon him. Careful to mask his ideational processes, Oktav probed the others for possible sympathy or weakness. Lack of a talisman put him at a great disadvantage. His hopes fell.