He didn't know how long they walked. Time had no expression in this state. Alpha Centauri A hung always in the same spot just above the horizon. He thought of Villainowski's inverted formula--"To travel through time during a passage of space." The Little Death must be like this, if one were conscious. He was still turning it over in his mind when he perceived the station. The station appeared to be a cubical structure like a large plastic block, except that the matter of which it was formed wasn't matter at all. It was energy, Saxon sensed, pulsating sheets of energy that must not be visible in the normal, three-dimensional world. The Alien stood to one side, motioned them through the shimmering walls. Saxon was conscious of a throbbing rhythm which swept through him like the hum of a dynamo. He experienced the eerie giddiness for the second time and groped for Ileth before he blanked out. * * * * * This time Saxon was longer regaining consciousness. He came out from under the effects of the pulsation, feeling his flesh solid again. Air warmed and caressed his skin. He was materialized, he saw, as he leaped to his feet and opened his eyes. He felt vaguely overwhelmed by the return of his senses. He had never before appreciated their infinite variety. The walls were yellow, lemon yellow; the floor cool and firm underfoot; the air had a faint odor of bitter almonds; and Ileth.... He said, "Open your eyes, Ileth. You'll be able to see better that way." The girl's eyes popped open. She took one look at Saxon, then at herself. Her eyes grew rounder, her throat flamed. She gasped, "Oh! You should have let me keep my eyes shut," and whipped her back to him. She must have realized instantly that the view she presented was no better screened, for she sat down with a thump, saying, "Oh!" again. Then, in an embarrassed voice, "This is just like a dream I had once. Only everyone but me wore clothes in the dream, and there isn't a fig leaf between the three of us." "The three of us?" Saxon glanced around, discovered the Alien rummaging in one of the cabinets, from which he produced three of the gleaming kilts, tossed them each one. "You humans," he said in an amused tone and perfect English, "have odd notions about concealing yourselves. Here." Saxon gratefully buckled his kilt in place, examined the material. The threads were almost weightless and glowed like strands of light. With a start, he recalled where he had seen them before. The man and the woman had been wearing kilts like these in his vision during the Little Death. Then.... His mind refused to entertain the possibility. And yet it was a piece of everything else. His inability to remember his childhood. The development of first a sixth sense at twenty-seven, then a seventh at thirty-one. He strode abruptly to the windows and looked out. The windows were at an elevation and gave a view of the strangest city he had ever beheld.