When he awoke in the drab Jovian dawn, his metallic body was lightly touching hers. The sole purpose of the tactility which had been built into his being was to give him an alertness which he might otherwise have lacked, and as a result he had never associated his ability to feel with the perception of pleasure. He did so now, though, and he was loath to move away. When at last he did so, she awoke. "Good morning," she said. He could not remember the last time he had been greeted with those two sweet words. "Good morning," he said back. "Did you sleep well?" "Yes. But I dreamed too." "The dreams are a part of it," he said. "You'll get used to them." * * * * * He led the way out of the valley, and they started back toward the base. He saw the track-impressions then, and knew instantly that neither he nor EV had made them. The wind had long since obliterated their own impressions, and in any event, these had been made by a different type of machine. "They're Boa 9 impressions," EV said. "We have company." "It must have skirted my alert-field--I should have upped the radius. I hope the base is all right." The impressions led straight to it, paralleled the line of footings for a while, then veered off in an altogether different direction. The M.A.N. and the W.O.M.A.N. stuck to the trail, but the impressions grew rapidly less distinct, and presently faded out altogether. 8M halted on a high hill, and EV drew up beside him. "You know more about this business than I do," he said, when his transperipheral vision netted him nothing more than the usual quota of murk and desolation. "Why should Dickens go to such lengths to defeat the Company when he may not be able to get its contract with the Earth Government anyway?" "Vengeance," EV said. "He was pretty high on the Company ladder when he got the sack, and the fall must have been pretty painful. When he left, he talked quite a number of other employees into leaving with him, which explains how he was able to set up a rival concern so fast." "And he actually sacrificed his life and became a M.A.N. just to get even?" "Not a M.A.N.--a sort of super-M.A.N. And he didn't sacrifice his life. The Boa 9, which he designed himself, goes one step beyond the Company's M.A.N. Dickens solved the riddle of per-planet radio waves, and controls the machine from his orbiting ship. But he sees, feels and hears just as he would if he were actually a part of the machine, and his reactions, despite the slight time-lapse, are almost as hair-fine as ours are. He is a very brilliant man, and I'm afraid that someday the Company will regret letting him go." "Perhaps. Obviously, though, he's emotionally unstable." 8M swung his block-long body around. "Well, it's time we got on the job. We'll work eight hours on, and eight off--that way we'll stay in step with Jupiter's night-and-day cycle. All right?" "All right," she said. * * * * *