Deve sensed the change in him and laid a hand on his arm. "You ... you will listen now?" she asked quietly. Aram nodded, his eyes fixed on her face. The bruise on her lips was dark and painful looking. "I heard of your arrest the day it happened, Aram," she said. "I knew what the end of it would be if they could find no real evidence against you--you'd have been subjected to an extensive mental probing that would have left you ... an ... an idiot. That's true. You know it is." Aram nodded agreement. "You would have been lost to _us_," Deve said, "and Aram, we need you! Need you desperately!" Aram looked about him in confusion. Still weak from his bout with the drugs, he was having difficulty marshalling his thoughts. "Who are you people?" he demanded. "_What_ are you?" * * * * * A grizzled naval officer stepped forward. Aram recognized him as Kant Mikal, recorded in the headquarters of the Thirty Suns Navy as having been lost in space two years earlier while on a routine exploration into the Thirtieth Decant. "We have no name, other than 'the Group,'" he said simply. "We have as our purpose the prevention of a disastrous war ... possibly even the destruction of civilization as we have known it." "You don't make any sense," Jerrold said confusedly. "What is there in the galaxy that can threaten the Tetrarchy with a war such as you describe?" "There is a very real and present danger, Aram Jerrold," Mikal said flatly. "_Santane_...." Aram felt a chilling premonition. Santane again. He remembered the testy words of the black judge who had condemned him: "One would think Santane were building a fleet...." Mikal seemed to read his thoughts. "Yes," he said, "Provincial Governor Santane." "I don't ask you to join us for the sake of the Tetrarchy, Aram," pleaded Deve Jennet earnestly, "or because of any personal relationship between you and me. If the Thirty Suns Government knew of the Group, and of the manipulations we've performed to get equipment and personnel for our mission, not one of us would be left alive by the Greens. We've penetrated the highest circles, we've subverted loyal people. We've used every trick and subterfuge to get the men and women we need out here without giving away our secret." She smiled ruefully. "We've even had men arrested and condemned so that we could gather them here on Atmion IV...." Aram felt a terrible load being lifted from his shoulders. No matter what happened next, it was good to know that Deve had not betrayed him as he had thought. "The Tetrarchy would not allow the existence of such a unit as the Group for a moment. Every hour that passes increases our danger. But we must finish our mission, Aram; we can do nothing else!" Deve said fervently. "If Santane overthrows the Tetrarchy," said Kant Mikal bleakly, "the dark ages will descend. The man is mad for power, cruel and intelligent enough to hold it."