"I am compassionate, sympathetic. A lover of mine enemy. When smitten upon one cheek, I turn the other cheek for a second wallop. Since you've had only one wallop, I'm keeping you alive so you can get that busted wing back in shape for the second smiting. But you see," added Dave as he saw a wave of pain pass over the pilot, "the book doesn't fill in the gap between the smiting of the first cheek and the offering of the second. Elsewhere in the same book--and a long way in front of that--you find references to the taking of an eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth. You and your gang of hotshots have been responsible for the deaths of a lot of fine men, killed with no warning. "So," finished Dave, hard-voiced, "maybe you'd like to learn what goes on when a mild-mannered gent like myself gets mad?" Dave reached across the pilot's body, grasped the wounded arm and joggled it sharply. The pilot cried out in pain and beads of sweat popped out on his face. "Talk, damn you!" Dave twisted the arm again. "Where are you running this game from?" No answer--and another twist of the arm. "How do you blow up the crystals?" The pilot's eyes closed and he breathed heavily. "Possum!" said Dave, slapping the pilot across the face. There was no response, so he fumbled under the seat and found a water flask. He threw a small handful into the pilot's face. "There isn't much of this here," he said, "and I doubt that there's any water we can drink on this half-world. Wounded men get thirsty, don't they, chum?" The pilot opened his eyes and groaned, "Water--" "Talk!" "I don't know anything." "Then you're no good to me alive!" snapped Dave. The pilot sat up a bit. Dave twisted the arm again. "Don't!" pleaded the pilot. "Then talk!" snapped Dave again. "You got into this world the same as I did, but by choice. How do we get out again?" "There's--no way out." "Baloney." The pilot screamed in pain. "No--I swear it!" "How does the Manhattan Crystal furnish power for New York?" "I don't know." "It's transmission of power, isn't it?" demanded Dave, jerking the wounded arm again. "I--" "Good. That's what I thought. Transmission from one crystal to another. They blow them up the same way?" The pilot nodded, weakly. "So _we_ don't manufacture the crystals in the nuclear laboratories. You and your gang deliver them like Santa Claus, coming down the chimney!" The pilot nodded again. "Now--where is this thing run from?" The pilot shook his head. Dave snapped the arm sharply and the pilot screamed. He screamed a name. "There's no way back?" "No," groaned the pilot. Dave let him go. "No way of communicating with the real world from here?" "No." "Do you know where we are?" "Interstitial time." "What?" roared Dave angrily. The pilot winced. "I'm told," he gasped, "that time moves in quanta, like energy. We're--between two quanta of time." * * * * *