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And then a voice from behind them said politely, "It's no use. We've taken over the spacecraft."
Stan spun around. An elderly man who definitely hadn't been therebefore wasstanding at the closed
door, shabbily dressed, not recently shaved, a short stick in his hand.
Achiever leaped to his feet, and wordlessly hurled himself at the stranger. He accomplished nothing,
though: his body passed straight through the other's and he wound up crashing against the wall.
"Oh, hell," the stranger said plaintively, "didn't I tell you it wasn't any use? You can't touch me because
I'm a simulation, can't you see? And you can't do anything with the controls because we've got them
locked. Your ship has been requisitioned by Wan, and now I have to ask you to step into another room
so you'll be out of the way, okay? We won't hurt you unless oh, I wish you wouldn't do that."
Achiever had rebounded to his feet and was heading toward the simulation again. This time he didn't get
that far. The stranger lifted the baton and pointed it at him. Nothing came from the rod, but a bright
greenish spark flew out of the hexagonal box, and when it hit Achiever, his arms and legs flew wide, he
emitted a screech of pain and crashed to the floor. "See," the stranger said patiently, "you don't want to
give us any trouble, because if you do we'll just have to hurt you. Hurt you a lot worse than that, I mean.
So just step along, please, and anyway I think we might be going to let you out after we rescue up the
others because, you know, there won't be anything you can do anyway."
II
The living quarters were all pretty much like Stan and Estrella's own, except that all the lookplates were
off and Salt was waiting at the door. She greeted them with relief and maybe a little satisfaction. "Were in
any way harmed? No? Is how they also treated me, except for causing major painfulness. But not you?"
Generated by ABC Amber LIT Converter, http://www.processtext.com/abclit.html
Achiever was busy checking all the doors. Stan answered for them all. "I think Achiever got a dose." He
raised his voice. "What about it, Achiever? Did they hurt you?"
Achiever didn't look back. "Extremely yes," he said, then signed for silence as he peered around the
corner of the doorway. Then, in his captain-in-command voice: "Salt!"
She turned to confront him. "Yes?"
"Are aware all entrances unsealed?"
She said patiently. "Is true, Achiever, as I verified on first being delivered here. However, do not attempt
going through, for same greatly painful event occurring at every time, or worse."
He gave her a skeptical look. "You know this because have self tried? Huh. Nevertheless event is only
painfulness, which persons of determination may ignore."
"Not correct, Achiever." She flapped her fingers at him. "In first event, great pain. Second event, pain
much greater still. Third event such pain as to cause unconsciousness. Have opinion that fourth time
become life terminating, but cannot verify experimentally as did not try after third."
Achiever returned into the room, rubbing his chest muscles indecisively. "But same is only conjecture.
How can ascertain same is true if is not attempted?"
"Don't try it," advised an amiable voice from the doorway Achiever had just left. When Stan turned he
saw another of those insubstantial and uninvited visitors, this one female. She was conspicuously
good-looking, too, and, in a low-cut gown with a diamond-shaped chunk cut out over her abdomen, not
overdressed. "The Heechee lady has it right, hon. My name's Sindi Gaslakhpard. You can call me just
Sindi. I'm machine-stored like all the rest of us on this tub, so don't get any ideas about jumping us when
we aren't looking. You can't hurt us, and we're always looking."
She advanced into the room, giving Estrella a look of curiosity and Stan one of some admiration.
"Considering you're all natural, hon," she told him, "you're not so bad. Anyway, I'm here on business.
Wan's gonna be on the screens any minute now, and he sent word he wants you to watch so you won't
do anything stupid. So Horace's activated your screens, and you better watch. Got it?" She glanced
around the four of them like a kindergarten teacher checking her class for washed faces and combed
hair, stopping at Estrella. The woman regarded her thoughtfully for a moment. Then, "Hon," she said,
"I've been meaning to tell you, you don't have to look that way. If you went ahead and got yourself
machine-stored you could get your face fixed." And then, pop, she was gone.
The lookplates all went on at once. Achiever hurled himself at them. If he expected to see the man Sindi
had talked about he was disappointed, for each screen showed a different image. Two were displaying
curious-looking spacecraft of a design Stan didn't recognize. A third and a fourth displayed individual
stars, or different views of the same star, one so brightly hot that its light was almost bluish, the other a
lemony-yellow sun not unlike old Earth's. The fifth
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