“Oh,” Donal smiled at the expression on the other’s face. “That wasn’t an insult, Lee. It was a pat on the back. Shai was what he said. It means something like—true, pure, the actual.”

Lee grunted. Then he nodded.

“I guess you can figure on him,” he said.

The food came, a tray for each of them. Donal ate lightly and stretched himself out on the couch. It seemed he dropped instantly into sleep; and when he awoke at the touch of Lee’s hand on his shoulder he knew he had been dreaming—but of what, he could not remember. He remembered only a movement of shapes in obscurity, as of some complex physics problem resolving itself in terms of direction and mass, somehow given substance.

“Practice about to start,” said Lee.

“Thank you, orderly,” he said automatically. He got to his feet and headed toward the control room, shedding the druggedness of his sleep as he went. Lee had followed him, but he was not aware of this until the Cobyman pushed a couple of small white tablets into his hand.

“Medication,” said Lee. Donal swallowed them automatically. Bannerman, over by the control board, had seen him come in, and now turned and came across the floor.

“Ready for the first practice run, sir,” he said. “Where would you like to observe—controls, or Eye?”

Donal looked and saw they had a chair set up for him in both locations.

“Eye,” he said. “Lee, you can take the other chair, as long as there does not seem to be one for you.”

“Captain, you—”

“I know, Bannerman,” said Donal, “I should have mentioned the fact I meant to have my orderly up here. I’m sorry.”

“Not at all, sir.” Bannerman went over and fitted himself into his own chair, followed by Lee. Donal turned his attention to the Eye.

The five ships were in line, in deep space, at thousand-kilometer intervals. He looked at their neat Indian file and stepped up the magnification slightly so that in spite of the distance that should have made even the nearest invisible, they appeared in detail, in-lighted by the Eye.

“Sir,” said Bannerman; and his quiet voice carried easily across the room. “I’ve arranged a key-in. When we make our phase shift, that library tape will replace the image in the Eye, so you can see what our approach will actually look like.”

“Thank you, captain.”

“Phase shift in ten seconds—”

The count-down ticked off like the voice of a clock. Then, there was the sensation of a phase shift; and abruptly Donal was sweeping closely over a planet, barely fifty thousand kilometers distance from its surface. “Fire—” and “Fire—” spoke the speaker in the control room ceiling. Again, the indescribable destruction and rebuilding of the body. The world was gone and they were again in deep space.