"That is apparent, now," Crane conceded. "They are quite evidently patterns of sixth-order forces, and as such have a velocity of anything they want to use. They absorb force from the radiations in free space, and are capable of diverting and of utilizing those forces in any fashion they may choose. They would of course be eternal, and, so far as I can see, they would be indestructible. What are we going to do about it, Dick? What _can_ we do about it?" "We'll do _something_!" Seaton gritted. "We're not as helpless as they think we are. I've got out five courses of six-ply screen, with full interliners of zones of force. I've got everything blocked, clear down to the sixth order. If they can think their way through those screens they're better than I think they are, and if they try anything else we'll do our darnedest to block that, too--and with this Norlaminian keyboard and all the uranium we've got that'll be a mighty lot, believe me! After that last crack of theirs they'll hunt for us, of course, and I'm pretty sure they'll find us. I thought so--here they are! Materialization, huh? I told him once that if he'd stick to matter that I could understand, I'd give him a run for his money, and I wasn't kidding him, either." VI. Far out in the depths of the intergalactic void there sped along upon its strange course the newly materialized planet of the intellectuals. Desolate and barren it was, and apparently destitute of life; but life was there--eternal, disembodied life, unaffected by any possible extreme of heat or cold, requiring for its continuance neither water nor air, nor, for that matter, any material substance whatsoever. And from somewhere in the vacuum above that planet's forbidding surface there emanated a thought--a thought coldly clear, abysmally hopeless. "I have but one remaining aim in this life. While I have failed again, as I have failed innumerable times in the past, I shall keep on trying until I succeed in assembling in sufficient strength the exact forces necessary to disrupt this sixth-order pattern which is I." "You speak foolishly, Eight, as does each of us now and again," came instant response. "There is much more to see, much more to do, much more to learn. Why be discouraged or disheartened? An infinity of time is necessary in which to explore infinite space and to acquire infinite knowledge." "Foolish I may be, but this is no simple recurrent outburst of melancholia. I am definitely weary of this cycle of existence, and I wish to pass on to the next, whatever of experience or of sheer oblivion it may bring. In fact, I wish that you, One, had never worked out the particular pattern of forces that liberated our eleven minds from the so-called shackles of our material bodies. For we cannot die. We are simply patterns of force eternal, marking the passage of time only by the life cycles of the suns of the Galaxies.