galley and brewed a steaming pot of coffee and brought it back. He found Underwood staring unseeingly ahead of him into the dark, empty corners of the lab.

"What is it?" Terry exclaimed. "What have you found?"

"I'm not sure. Do you know what the end product of all this math is?"

"What?"

"A set of wave equations, but such wave equations as any physicist would be thought crazy to dream up. Yet, in light of some new manipulations introduced by the Stroids, they seem feasible."

"What can we do with them?"

"We can build a generator and see what kind of stuff comes out of it when we operate it according to this math. The Stroids obviously intended that someone find this and learn to produce the radiation described. For what purpose we can only guess—but we might find out."

"Do we have enough equipment aboard to build such a generator?"

"I think so. We could cannibalize enough from equipment we already have on hand. Let's try it."

Terry hesitated. "I'm not quite sure, but—well, this stuff comes about as near as anything I ever saw to giving me what is commonly known as the creeps. Somehow these Stroids seem too—too anxious. That sounds crazy, I know, but there's such alienness here."

"Nuts. Let's build their generator and see what they're trying to tell us."

 CHAPTER THREE

Phyfe was exuberant. He not only gave permission to construct the generator, he demanded that all work aboard the lab ship give priority to the new project.

The design of the machine was no easy task, for Underwood was a physicist and not an engineer. However, he had two men, Moody and Hansen, in his staff who were first rate engineers. On them fell the chief burden of design after Underwood worked out the rough specifications.

One of the main laboratories with nearly ten thousand square feet of floor space was cleared for the project. As the specifications flowed from Underwood's desk, they passed over to Moody and Hansen, and from there out to the lab where the mass of equipment was gathered from all parts of the fleet.

An atomic power supply sufficient to give the large amount of energy required 

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