by Edward Elmer Smith and Edward Everett Evans

“ The fact that there was enough concentrate on hand to last a world for a hundred years made no difference at all to these automatics; a crew of erector-mechs was building new silos as fast as existing ones were being filled.
Since the men now understood everything that was going on, it was a simple matter for them to stop the whole Strett operation in its tracks. Then every man and every Oman leaped to his assigned job. Three days later, all the mechs went back to work. Now, however, they were working for the Ardans. ”

“ Hilton snapped. Then, as the admiral began to bellow orders into his microphone, he went on: “You want it the hard way, eh? Watch what happens, all of you!”
The UC-1 shot vertically into the air. Through its shallow dense layer and into and through the stratosphere. Earth's fleet, already on full alert and poised to strike, rushed to the attack. But the carrier had reached the Orion and both Ardvorian ships had been waiting, motionless, for a good half minute before the Terran warships arrived and began to blast with everything they had. ”

“ Sawtelle and his officers went to the new Command Central, where everything was rolling smoothly and very much faster than Sawtelle had dared hope.
The Terran immigrants had to live in the Orion, of course, until conversion into Ardans. Almost equally of course—since the Bryant infant was the only young baby in the lot—Doris and her Sammy Small were, by popular acclaim, in the first batch to be converted. For little Sammy had taken the entire feminine contingent by storm. No Oman female had a chance to act as nurse as long as any of the girls were around. ”

“ The admiral, outraged almost to the point of apoplexy, came in. “Sawtelle, report yourself for court-martial at ...”
“Keep still, Gordon,” the captain snapped. In sheer astonishment old Five-Jets obeyed. “I am no longer Terran Navy; no longer subject to your orders. As a matter of cold fact, I am no longer human. For reasons which I will explain later to the full Advisory Board, some of the personnel of Project Theta Orionis underwent transformation into a form of life able to live in an environment of radioactivity so intense as to kill any human being in ten seconds. ”

“ Sawtelle said, calmly. “You aren't even warming up our screens. As soon as you quit making a damned fool of yourself by wasting energy that way, we'll set the UC-1 back down where she was and get on with our business here.”
“You will order a cease-fire at once, Admiral,” the chairman said, “or the rest of us will, as of now, remove you from the Board.” Gordon gritted his teeth in rage, but gave the order.
“If he hasn't had enough yet to convince him,” Hilton suggested, “he might send up a drone. We don't want to kill anybody, you know. ”

“ Each one will learn from and profit by the mistakes made by preceding numbers and will assume command the instant his preceding number is killed.”
“Oh, you expect, then...?”
“Expect? No. I know it damn well, and so do you. That's why we Ardans will all stay aground. Why the Kedys' first job will be to make the heavy stuff in and around Ardane as heavy as it can be made. Why it'll all be on twenty-four-hour alert. Then they can put as many thousands of Omans as you please to work at modernizing all the Oman ships you want and doing anything else you say. Check?” ”

“ The story, which had been sent in to the Board the day before on a scrambled beam, was one upon which the Ardans had labored for days. Many facts could be withheld. However, every man aboard the Perseus would agree on some things. Indeed, the Earthship's communications officers had undoubtedly radioed in already about longevity and perfect health and Oman service and many other matters. Hence all such things would have to be admitted and countered. ”

“ Sawtelle said in disgust. His sneer was plainly visible through the six-ply, plastic-backed lead glass of his face-plate. “Either shut up or accept my personal invitation to come to Ardvor and try to go through the wringer. That's an invitation to your own funeral.” Five-Jet Admiral Gordon, torn inwardly to ribbons, made no reply.
“I repeat,” Hilton went on, “we are not asking you to do anything whatever. We are offering to give you; free of charge but under certain conditions, all the power your humanity can possibly use. ”

“ She glanced at her own taut, trim abdomen; upon which a micrometrically-precise topographical mapping job might have revealed an otherwise imperceptible bulge. “Just you wait until Junior arrives and I'll show you how to really spoil a baby. Besides, what's the hurry?”
“He needs his supper. Vitamins and minerals and hard radiations and things, and then he's going to bed. I don't approve of this no-sleep business. So run along, both of you, until tomorrow.” ”

“ If you really mean any of this yelling you've been doing about being too big in the hips—I think you're exactly right, myself—you can rebuild yourself any way you please. Or change your shape every hour on the hour. ”

“ First, the Stretts were building a fleet that in their minds would be invincible. Second, they would attack Ardane as soon as that fleet could be made ready. The unanswerable question was: how long would that take?
“So we want to get every ship we have. How many? Five thousand? Ten? Fifteen? We want them converted to maximum possible power as soon as we possibly can,” Sawtelle said. “And I want to get out there with my boys to handle things.”
“You aren't going to. Neither you nor your boys are expendable. Particularly you.” Jaw hard-set, Hilton studied the situation for minutes. “No. ”