"I am asking you," he replied, carefully. "For your information, when I know what should be done, I give orders. When I don't know, as now, I ask advice. If I like it, I follow it. Fair enough?" "Fair enough. We're apt to need any number of specialists." "Lola?" "Of course we shouldn't duplicate. What shall I study?" "That's what we must figure out. We can't do it exactly, of course; all we can do now is to set up a rough scheme. Jim's job is the only one that's definite. He'll have to work full time on nebular configurations. If we hit inhabited planets he'll have to add their star-charts to his own. That leaves three of us to do all the other work of a survey. Ideally, we would cover all the factors that would be of use in getting us back to Tellus, but since we don't know what those factors are.... Found out anything yet, Jim?" "A little. Tellus-type planet, apparently strictly so. Oceans and continents. Lots of inhabitants--farms, villages, all sizes of cities. Not close enough to say definitely, but inhabitants seem to be humanoid, if not human." "Hold her here. Besides astronomy, which is all yours, what do we need most?" "We should have enough to classify planets and inhabitants, so as to chart a space-trend if there is any. I'd say the most important ones would be geology, stratigraphy, paleontology, oceanography, xenology, anthropology, ethnology, vertebrate biology, botany, and at least some ecology." "That's about the list I was afraid of. But there are only three of us. The fields you mention number much more." "Each of you will have to be a lot of specialists in one, then. I'd say the best split would be planetology, xenology, and anthropology--each, of course, stretched all out of shape to cover dozens of related and non-related specialties." "Good enough. Xenology, of course, is mine. Contacts, liaison, politics, correlation, and so on, as well as studying the non-human life forms--including as many lower animals and plants as possible. I'll make a stab at it. Now, Belle, since you're a Prime and Lola's an Operator, you get the next toughest job. Planetography." "Why not?" Belle smiled and began to act as one of the party. "All I know about it is a hazy idea of what the word means, but I'll start studying as soon as we get squared away." "Thanks. That leaves anthropology to you, Lola. Besides, that's your line, isn't it?" "Yes. Sociological Anthropology. I have my M.S. in it, and am--was, I mean--working for my Ph.D. But as Jim said, it isn't only the one specialty. You want me, I take it, to cover humanoid races, too?" "Check. You and Jim both, then, will know what you're doing, while Belle and I are trying to play ours by ear." "Where do we draw the line between humanoid and non-human?" "In case of doubt we'll confer. That covers it as much as we can, I think. Take us down, Jim--and be on your toes to take evasive action fast." * * *