"--the ballots have been counted, gentlemen...." The deep voice was slow and deliberate as it always was--yet it seemed, somehow, too slow now, too deep. "Majtech B-Haaq's proposals are approved by a majority of--of one vote. We will therefore begin our search immediately, and will trust that I was also incorrect in my evaluation of our present technological efficiency. This session is now adjourned." Director Gentech Starn had suffered the first overruling of his long career. VII There were hard, stinging sensations in his face. They pierced the infinity of darkness until somewhere in it they touched his naked nerves and the darkness receded, slowly and became a blinding light. A space-suited figure was standing over him, and it held the limp form of an empty suit in one hand, and a hand-weapon in the other, and the weapon was extended toward him, butt first! He could see the hard, beetle-browed face behind the sealed face piece of the helmet. The mouth was moving rapidly, but he could not hear. Jon's head hurt, and the pain spread throughout his body when he moved to get his feet beneath him, stood up. Subconsciously he knew he was aboard a ship in Space; there was the subtle, rippling vibration so familiar to any man with Spacelegs, and there was the smell of pumped atmosphere and the curious feeling of artificial gravity. He tried to think even as he took the suit shoved into his arms by the man who had brought him back to consciousness, and began climbing dazedly into it. A suit, inside a ship in which the atmosphere was perfectly breathable? A _ship_! Tinker? No--no ITA craft, even the newest, had such thick-looking bulkheads, or was equipped with suits of such peculiar design--hard to get into the thing, nothing was in its right place. But if not an ITA craft, then--but that was not possible! He had no sooner gotten the helmet adjusted than the radiophones in it crackled. "Snap it up, get that face plate sealed! Here, you may need this--" He had taken care of the face plate, and now the curiously fashioned hand weapon was pushed into his right hand. "What--" "There's half a hundred Tinkers out fumbling around with a Project AA. Things are letting up on the planets, but they still haven't got the damn thing fixed the way it should be ... found us, though...." "Us?" His tongue was still thick in his mouth and it was difficult to talk, or even think of words to say. "You'll find out about us later. But in about a minute more they'll be in range, and those Space cannons of theirs'll be whaling away at us for all they're worth. They'd be dead ducks if this bucket was equipped the way it should be...." The man cursed. "... but there's not enough E-blasters to go around yet, or I-drives either, and that's why we're going to be a big sieve in less time than it takes to tell it. I suppose it ain't your fault--" "My fault? Last I knew--"