It possessed hard sleek lines, pointed nose, flaring tail vanes. Its designers, he guessed, must still be thinking in terms of atmospheric flight. It hardly seemed the type of craft that could cross the broad interstellar reaches; probably had been built simply to plod about its neighboring planets. It must be an early development, for spaceships had never before been detected in the Restus system. More than likely the ship had not even become aware of their presence. Small wonder Karsine had decided to grapple. The force heads on Narant's side of the cruiser began to shimmer under the surge of power being fed to them. They grew red hot, almost translucent. They would hold fire until the beam became powerful enough to withstand tremendous forces. Sometimes in grappling, an enemy craft had been known to discharge its main rocket batteries in an effort to wrench loose. But any second now.... "Execute grapple!" Karsine ordered. The cruiser shuddered. Lights dimmed as the force heads sucked at every available bit of power. With a blinding flash, a blue-white ribbon of energy streaked across the mile-wide void to the alien ship. It flicked the nose of the Restus craft, gripped, and swept over the entire hull like a glittering cocoon. "Tension indicator: Nine-eight-point-eight," reported a too-casual voice over the speaker. "Enemy ship secured." "Opposing force?" "Negative." Karsine cautiously studied his dials, alert for the first sign of a counter-blow. Nothing happened. A minute dragged by. The tension indicators remained constant; detection heads, zero. And then: "Bring it alongside." The grappling beam slowly began to contract, bringing the alien ship closer. As it passed through the invisibility screen, multi-colored de-action rays focussed upon it, nullifying virtually every weapon known to man. Narant's hopes dissolved. The emptiness left only an aching futility. As usual, the capture had been simple ... and complete. "Advance parties prepare to go aboard," commanded the loudspeaker. A man behind Narant unbuckled his straps, got up and stretched. "Here we go again," he said. And then, to nobody in particular: "I used to get a kick out of investigating strange creatures. Now it's work. Just work." Narant looked over his shoulder at the cruiser's anthropometrist. He would have to board the ship right behind the combat team, analyze the tools, controls, living conditions of the crew. Perhaps he, too, experienced this ennui of persistent success? * * * * * Narant had ended his preparations in the psych-examination chamber by the time they brought the first of the alien people to him. Narant stared in sudden amazement. The creature was humanoid. It had a well-formed head with a squat, shrunken nose and steep brows; there were prehensile arms, and hands with five fingers. But the man was hairy and, Narant winced, immodestly naked.