"But what did you do with the men in the satellite?" Web asked, doing his best to follow but fast losing ground. "How did you know--?" And then the alien almost collapsed again. He had heard, undoubtedly, of the one man that had escaped from the satellite. But that had been a Galactic-- "Why did you do that, kill all those men, and how?" Web shook him, the alien yelped feebly, then babbled it out. "The satellite was in a very dangerous position. It could see all our intercontinental travel, the ships we have going and coming daily. It would undoubtedly warn the planet of what it saw. But we could not simply destroy it. Blame for that might conceivably be placed on your enemies, and you are such unstable peop--that is--we--there was no need for a general war. We could not risk that, being ourselves just as vulnerable to atomic attack as any life. So we--removed the men on the satellite." "How, dammit, how?" When he swore the alien jumped. "Through devices which you--if you do not already know, you cannot be--oh--yes--I will tell, I will tell--" The old man searched desperately for an explanation. "Your body has--every body is held together by electric forces. By million upon millions of tiny electric currents. The atoms of any body are kept in position by a--by an attraction between them. Now, if that attraction is nullified, the atoms will drift apart, disperse. The atoms will no longer exist in any form. That was what happened to the men in the satellite. They were--turned off." Web sat perfectly still for a long moment. Then he said swiftly, viciously: "But why didn't it get me?" The alien writhed on the couch. "Your blood must be different. We thought you were a Galactic. Your body chemistry is unusual, your--your charge is different." Once again Web sat in silence, trying to follow that. Galactic and different blood. But he wrenched his mind away. The sun would be up soon and he would have to be out of here quickly. He would need to know where their main base was. Then it was the army's turn. Although what could the army do? He got the location out of the old man. It was surprisingly near to Chicago. And the time of the first take-off, the first shipment, would be that night. He rose to leave. Then he turned back to the old man. He debated it for a moment, but saw nothing else possible. The old man knew who he was and where he was going, and what he knew. He could not leave the old man to warn the others. The old man knew that too, looked up at him and saved him the trouble. He died just before Web's great hands reached him. VII Within the next hour he had a gun, taken from an amiable but unfortunate young cop who had the courtesy to stop and give him a match on a dark back street. He was sincerely sorry for that, knowing what would happen to the cop, but he was also acutely aware that he needed the gun a hell of a lot more than the cop did, even if this was Chicago.