The captain waddled over to an elaborate-looking machine near the wall, and removed its translucent hood. Marten looked at it, and almost gasped. The thing was so much like the Terran model of a brainprobe that only a practiced eye could tell them apart. Obviously, this machine worked on the same principle as the Earth-type brainprobe did. And that, Marten reflected, was not a pleasant thought. "You use that for picking your teeth, Ghuvek?" "You'll find out its use soon enough, Earthman." The Flesso scowled and signalled to the captain to wheel the brainprobe over. No organic brain, Marten knew, could stand up against the mental energies of a brainprobe. Within seconds, it could render any person a slave to the will of whoever operated the machine. Marten clenched his jaws grimly, ready to resist anything the Flesso could throw against him. There was always a chance that-- "Your mouth will be less full of insults when we have finished with you, Earthman." "You're scaring me, Ghuvek." "We'll see. Clamp down the helmet." The cold metal descended and the Captain anchored it tightly around Marten's skull. "What shall I ask first, Most Noble Sire?" Captain Yknor asked. Ghuvekenkh-Nathor smiled harshly. "I am interested in knowing how it was that he deflected the death-dealing beam that shot him down. It should have killed him--but it merely knocked him out. Ask the prisoner what protection he has." Yknor threw a switch, and a low buzzing hum throbbed in the room as the brainprobe's generators went to work. Marten felt a faint tingling in his skull. Then Yknor turned a dial, and the probe sank into his brain. * * * * * He held his breath as the energy projectors of the brainprobe wandered around in his skull, seeking to gain hold. They failed. The Flesso model wasn't attuned to Earth minds, apparently. "Why didn't the energy beam kill you?" Captain Yknor asked. "Because it missed me," said Marten calmly. A grin spread across Ghuvek's evil, toadish face. "Good!" he said exultantly. "It missed him--but now we know that the Earthmen have no defense against our weapons." He rubbed his dry, scaly hands together. "The next question, Sire?" "Make him tell us about the defenses of Earth," Ghuvek said. "I'll be damned if I will, you bloated monstrosity." Ghuvek's globular eyes blinked slowly in surprise. "But--you're supposed to be under the power of the machine!" He turned his flat, batrachian head to glare at Captain Yknor. "Turn up the power!" "Yes, Sire." Yknor's thick claws wrenched up the dial and a surge of power thundered through Marten's brain without leaving an impression. "Feels nice," he said. "Like an extra-special shampoo. But you wouldn't know what a shampoo is, would you?" "Up higher!" Ghuvek snapped. "That's as high as it goes, Sire." Marten still sat there, sneering openly at the alien's attempts to read his brain. Ghuvek paced angrily around the seated Earthman without speaking.