"I'm going," Alan said. He passed through the photobeam and into the games parlor. Another robot came sliding up to him and scanned his features. "This is a Class C establishment, sir. If your card is any higher than Class C you cannot compete here. Would you mind showing me your card, sir?" "I don't have any. I'm an unrated beginner." That was what Hawkes had told him to say. "I'd like a single table, please." He was shown to a table to the left of the croupier's booth. The Atlas was a good bit dingier than the Class A parlor he had been in the night before; its electroluminescent light-panels fizzed and sputtered, casting uncertain shadows here and there. A round was in progress; figures were bent busily over their boards, altering their computations and changing their light-patterns. Alan slid a five-credit piece into the slot and, while waiting for the round to finish and the next to begin, looked around at his fellow patrons. In the semi-dark that prevailed it was difficult to make out faces. He would have trouble recognizing Steve. A musky odor hung low over the hall, sweet, pungent, yet somehow unpleasant. He realized he had experienced that odor before, and tried to remember--yes. Last night in the other games parlor he had smelled a wisp of the fragrance, and Hawkes had told him it was a narcotic cigarette. It lay heavy in the stale air of the Class C parlor. Patrons stared with fanatic intensity at the racing pattern of lights before them. Alan glanced from one to the next. A baldhead whose dome glinted bright gold in the dusk knotted his hands together in an anguish of indecision. A slim, dreamy-eyed young man gripped the sides of the table frenziedly as the numbers spiralled upward. A fat woman in her late forties, hopelessly dazed by the intricate game, slumped wearily in her seat. Beyond that he could not see. There were other patrons on the far side of the rostrum; perhaps Steve was over there. But it was forbidden for anyone to wander through the rows of tables searching for a particular player. The gong rang, ending the round. "Number 322 wins a hundred credits," barked the croupier. The man at Table 322 shambled forward for his money. He walked with a twisted shuffle; his body shook palsiedly. Hawkes had warned him of these, too--the dreamdust addicts, who in the late stages of their addiction became hollow shells of men, barely able to walk. He took his hundred credits and returned to his table without smiling. Alan shuddered and looked away. Earth was not a pretty world. Life was good if you had the stream running with you, as Hawkes did--but for each successful one like Hawkes, how many fought unsuccessfully against the current and were swept away into dreamdust or worse? Steve. He looked down the row for Steve. And then the board lit up again, and for the first time he was playing.