STORM CLOUD ON DEKA By Edward E. Smith, Ph.D. [Transcriber's Note: This etext was produced from Astonishing Stories, June 1942. Extensive research did not uncover any evidence that the U.S. copyright on this publication was renewed.] CHAPTER ONE From a Seed.... Tellurian Pharmaceuticals, Inc., was civilization's oldest and most conservative drug house. "Hide-bound" was the term most frequently used, not only by its younger employees but also by its more progressive competitors. But, corporatively, Tellurian Pharmaceuticals did not care. Its board of directors, by an iron-clad, if unwritten law, was limited to men of over three score years and ten. Against the inertia of that ruling body the impetuosity of the younger generations was precisely as efficacious as the dashing of waves against the foot of an adamantine cliff--and in very much the same fashion. Ocean waves do, in time, cut into even the hardest rock; and, every century or so, Tellurian Pharmaceutical, Inc., did take a forward step. However, "Rather than make a mistake, do nothing" was its creed. To that creed it adhered rigorously. Thus, it did not establish branches upon other planets until a century or so of experiment had proved that no unforeseen factor would operate to lessen the prodigiously high standard of its products. Nor would it own or operate spaceships, as did other large firms. Its business was the manufacture of the universe's finest, most carefully standardized drugs and it would go into no sidelines whatever. Even the location of its head office; directly under the guns of Prime Base, bore out the same theme. Originally it had been in the middle of the city, miles away from the reservation; but as Prime Base had expanded, the city had moved aside. Tellurian Pharmaceuticals, however, would not give way. It stolidly refused to sell its holdings even to the Galactic Patrol; it would not move until the patrol should condemn its property and compel it by law to vacate. Into that massive gray building there strode a tall, lean, gray man; into an old-fashioned elevator, operated by a seventy-year-old "boy"; into a darkish, severe room whose rock-of-ages furniture had become pricelessly antique. Without a word he handed a card to the receptionist, a prim spinster of some fifty summers. "Ezekiel R. Stonely, M.D., Sc.D., Consultant in Radiation," she read precisely into a communicator. "By appointment." "Let him come in, please." Dr. Stonely entered the private office of a vice-president--a young man, as T. P.'s executives went--a man scarcely sixty years of age. "All ready," the consultant reported briefly. "Graves is here, you said?" "Yes. He got in from Deka last night. How long will the demonstration take?" "Seven hours to the point of maximum yield; twelve for the full life cycle."