And of assistance he was. For it was he whose adroit questioning of the Jovian engineers finally brought clarity to a question whose answer had been often hinted but never answered. As the workmen put the finishing touches on the warping unit's installation he asked, "And just what, gentlemen, are the limitations of this device ... the usage to which it may not safely be put? Your Councillor, Kushra, gave us to understand that there was a certain amount of peril inherent to its use." * * * * * The chief technician frowned. "That is right. However, we have taken all safety factors into consideration. In reaching your destination, if the dials and verniers are not changed from the settings which we have established, you will not experience the slightest difficulty--" "But just what," asked Gary, "is the nature of this danger?" "Simply that through an improper setting of the dials you might end your journey in some place quite unlike that which was your destination. In other words, if this central vernier were twisted to the right by so much as one degree the _Liberty's_ flight might end not, as intended, within the solar galaxy of the star Sirius ... but within the burning heart of the star itself." Gary frowned uneasily. "The only consolation to that thought is that if such a thing happened none of us would ever know anything about it." "Quite true. The _Liberty_ and all aboard would be instantaneously seared to a clinker by the inconceivable heat of a star thousands of times greater than our little sun." "Why, then," asked Dr. Anjers, "employ control verniers at all? Why not simply set and lock the controls upon the desired objective?" The Jovian smiled. "Have you forgotten, sir, that when your mission is ended you will wish to return home? Then the new course and trajectory must be calculated and the verniers reset. That is why it is necessary we install a complete unit and train you in its use." The scientist said petulantly, "Despite all these precautions it is a fool-hardy trip. It would be safer, to my way of thinking, to visit a nearer star ... say Proxima Centauri ... thereby diminishing the risk of over or undershooting our mark. "Sometimes," he bridled, "I think this whole scheme is madness. It is ridiculous to think of us, tiny mites that we are, daring to attack the people of a universe so infinitely greater than ours that we will be as dust motes beneath their crushing heels!" Gary stared at the little man curiously. "People greater than us, Dr. Anjers? Now, that's a peculiar thought. Whatever makes you say--" Anjers wriggled in sudden defiant embarrassment. "It was not my idea, Dr. Lane, but your own. It was you who advanced the theory that our universe is dwindling. It follows as a natural corollary that any race existing _outside_ our universe--" Gary nodded. "Why, yes, I suppose you're right. But I'd never stopped to think of it in quite that way. A race of giants--"