"I harmed--Oh, I see. The girl, eh? We propagate by fission, so we've been spared all that. I didn't harm her, Rawley. All I did was diminish her mass. I had to do that to warm myself. "Rawley, I was almost gone. I can stand a little cold, but that liquid air--" "You did _what_ to her?" "Diminished her mass. Now keep your shirt on, Rawley. I need the glow to warm me. Needed it badly. For real warmth there's nothing like the radiant energies imprisoned in kalium. The bodies of terrestrials are ideal sources of heat in all respects; not only because they contain kalium, but because the other elements of which they are composed are among the easiest to tap. "No harm done, you understand. I can radiate back subatomic particles at any time. All I did was squeeze out the radiations in a soft, glutinous mass. You don't have to bombard atoms or surround them with water-jackets to strip them, Rawley. With a little patience you can squeeze out their energies the way you squeeze toothpaste from a tube. "My body has soaked up a fine, tingling warmth from all those frozen terrestrials. They are mere atomic husks now, but perfectly preserved and restorable at any time." I scarcely heard it. Something was happening to the ship. Beneath my feet the deck was unmistakably swaying, and there were twangings and creakings all along the passageway which could only mean one thing. The ship was in motion! * * * * * The frog had noticed it, too. It stiffened abruptly and cocked its head as though listening, its stalked eyes squinting shut. In paralyzed astonishment I stood staring at the vibrating overhead, wondering what in hell it could mean. Had one of the frozen crewmen regained the use of his limbs and attempted an emergency take-off? I strained my ears, but could detect no atomotor drone, or other indication that we were rocketing upward from the crust. "No, Rawley," the frog's voice came again, vibrant but strained. "No, we are not leaving the planet. I think I know what is happening. Rawley, you have an instrument which enables you to see the ship as though it were being viewed from a distance by someone out on the planet. Horiz--horizonscope. Suppose we see for ourselves." We descended in the jacket-lift together, the frog bracing its knees precisely as the commander had done long ago in another world. I don't know how I lived through the next ten minutes. When I stood in the control room and looked in the horizonscope I saw a sight which I shall never forget if I live to be a hundred. On both sides of the ship were dozens of froglike shapes moving in single file, their bodies bent nearly double as though they were straining at the leash. All about them swirled steamy vapors and flickering tongues of flame. A blood-red sun, so gigantic that it spanned a fifth of the sky, hung like a vast, glowing eye directly overhead, dazzling my pupils as I stared. Even in the horizonscope it seemed huge, blinding.