the last silth had been. These were like coming home to a friendly world, in a universe that had died too long ago and far away. For a time, he was almost glad that he had not died with it.

Then the first allergic reactions began, and he had to relapse into instinct, to let his being fight to save both himself and his host cells from the reaction.

He set the first stage up, however. This time he managed with no help from Ptarra. Then he relapsed into unconsciousness, making no effort to control his new silth yet. He'd have to revise when the silth awoke, he told himself.

But it was only a dream order, half completed....

It was a sudden painful pressure of acceleration that finally brought him out of his torpor. He felt half sick, and he could vaguely sense that the new silth was fevered and uncomfortable. But, amazingly, it was sitting up. And around it was a room bigger than the whole ship had seemed, and controls under its hands, and fantastic equipment.

"It's about time," Ptarra's thoughts reached him. They were weak now, since it was hard to transmit in a partial stage, but they were cold and sure. "I've been aware for hours, while the silths reached the ship and took off. We've been off planet for at least an hour. Long enough to study their body controls and to learn how the ship operates."

Arnek sighed to himself, while the pressure of tension refused to leave. "Are you sure?"

"Of course I'm sure! These are primitive machines, and I learned most of it from dismantling the first. They're primitive--but they're logical enough for understanding. I can even control the silth when she isn't aware."

The larger human suddenly moved the controls, then jerked its hand back, staring at it. Words came to the ears of the silth in which Arnek rode. "I'm sick, Luke. I've got the twitches."

The words brought stirrings strongly on the low band, almost but not quite understandably. They also brought a vocal reply from the other human. "Be glad you can twitch. Some bug we picked up, but it's better than being eaten. We're in the clover, kid. Maybe we still got more cop ships tailing us, but let 'em look. When they find the dinosaurs and what's left of our ship, they'll stop looking. The heat's going to be off! We can get back to Earth in a year or so and really live."Ptarra's thoughts cut through Arnek's efforts to understand. "Reproduction feelings," she 

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