conferred among itself for a moment, Hatcher waiting. It was not really a waste of time for him; with the organs he had left in the probe-team room, he was in fairly close touch with what was going on—knew that McCray was once again fumbling among the objects in the dark, knew that the team-members had tried illuminating the room for him briefly and again produced the rising panic.

Still, Hatcher fretted. He wanted to get back.

"Stop fidgeting," commanded the council leader abruptly. "Hatcher, you are to establish communication at once."

"But, sir...." Hatcher swung closer, his thick skin quivering slightly; he would have gestured if he had brought members with him to gesture with. "We've done everything we dare. We've made the place homey for him—" actually, what he said was more like, we've warmed the biophysical nuances of his enclosure—"and tried to guess his needs; and we're frightening him half to death. We can't go faster. This creature is in no way similar to us, you know. He relies on paranormal forces—heat, light, kinetic energy—for his life. His chemistry is not ours, his processes of thought are not ours, his entire organism is closer to the inanimate rocks of a sea-bottom than to ourselves."

"Understood, Hatcher. In your first report you stated these creatures were intelligent."

"Yes, sir. But not in our way."

"But in a way, and you must learn that way. I know." One lobster-claw shaped member drifted close to the councillor's body and raised itself in an admonitory gesture. "You want time. But we don't have time, Hatcher. Yours is not the only probe team working. The Central Masses team has just turned in a most alarming report."

"Have they secured a subject?" Hatcher demanded jealously.

The councillor paused. "Worse than that, Hatcher. I am afraid their subjects have secured one of them. One of them is missing."

There was a moment's silence. Frozen, Hatcher could only wait. The council room was like a tableau in a museum until the councillor spoke again, each council member poised over his locus-point, his members drifting about him.

Finally the councillor said, "I speak for all of us, I think. If the Old Ones have seized one of our probers our time margin is considerably narrowed. Indeed, we may not have any time at all. You must do everything you can to establish communication 

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