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A WAR ON! He stood up and slowly walked to the door.
Sorry, Mr. Gunnderson, the Mindee said emphatically, we can t allow you to leave this room.
He sat down and lifted the battered mouth organ from where it had fallen. He fingered it for a while, then
put it to his lips. He blew, but made no sound.
And he didn t leave.
They thought he was asleep. The Mindee a cadaverously thin man with hair grayed at the temples and
slicked back in strips on top, with a gasping speech and a nervous movement of hand to ear spoke to
the Blaster.
He doesn t seem to be thinking, John!
The Blaster s smooth, hard features moved vaguely, in the nearest thing to an expression, and a quirking
frown split his ink-line mouth. Can he do it?
The Mindee rose, ran a hand quickly through the straight, slicked hair.
Can he do it? No, he shouldn t beable to do it, but he s doing it! I can t figure it out . . . it s eerie,
uncanny. Either I ve lost it, or he s got something new.
Trauma-barrier?
That s what they told me before I left, that he seemed to be blocked off. But they thought it was only
temporary, once he was away from the Bureau buildings he would clear up.
But heisn t cleared up.
The Blaster looked concerned. Maybe it s you.
I didn t get a Master s rating for nothing, John, and I tell you there isn t a trauma-barrier I can t at least
getsomething through. If only a snatch of gabble. But there s nothing . . . nothing!
Maybe it s you, the Blaster repeated, still concerned.
Damn it! It snot me! I can read you, can t I your right foot hurts from new boots, you wish you
could have the bunk to lie down on, you . . . oh hell, I can readyou and I can read the Captain up
front, and I can read the pitmen in the hold, but Ican t readhim !
It s like hitting a sheet of glass in his head. There should be a reflection or some penetration, but it seems
to be opaqued. I didn t want to say anything when he was awake, of course.
Do you think I should twit him a little wake him up and warn him we re on to his game?
The Mindee raised a hand to stop the very thought of the Blaster. Great Gods, no! He gestured wildly.
This Gunnderson s invaluable. If they found out we d done anything unauthorized to him, we d both be
Tanked.
Gunnderson lay on his acceleration-bunk, feigning sleep, listening to them. It was a new discovery to him,
what they were saying. He had always suspected the pyrotic faculty of his mind. It was just too unstable
to be a true-bred trait. There had to be side-effects, other differences from the norm. He knewhe could
not read minds; was this now another factor? Impenetrability by Mindees? He wondered.
Perhaps the Blaster was powerless, too.
It would never clear away his problem that was something he could do only in his own mind but it
might make his position and final decision safer.
There was only one way to find out. He knew the Blaster could not actually harm him severely, by
SpaceCom s orders, but he wouldn t hesitate blasting off one of the pyrotic s arms cauterizing it as it
disappeared to warn him, if the situation seemed desperate enough.
The Blaster had seemed to Gunnderson a singularly overzealous man, in any case. It was a terrible risk,
but he had to know.
There was only one way to find out, and he took it . . . finding a startling new vitality in himself . . . for the
first time in over thirty years . . .
He snapped his legs off the bunk, and lunged across the stateroom, shouldering aside the Mindee, and
straight-arming the Blaster in the mouth. The Blaster, surprised by the rapid and completely unexpected
movement, had a reflex thought, and one entire bulkhead was washed by bolts of power. They crackled,
and the plasteel buckled. His direction had been upset, had been poor, but Gunnderson knew the instant
he regained his mental balance, the power would be directed at him.
The bulkhead oxidized, and popped as it was broken, revealing the outer insulating hull of the invership;
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