He told of his own fears, doubts -- his awe, here before the Snowflake, with the Galaxy a cloud beneath him; of his almost superstitious response to Godel; of his fear of failure, and his petty relationship with Mace.

The 'Man was like a mirror, one part of his mind told him, or like a Virtual psychoanalysis program. There was no one there to respond, he knew now, but he told it all anyway.

He told the 'Man of his own, tenuous, qualifications for this Assimilation mission. That he was a policeman; that he specialized in the resolution of the cruel, the vicious, the most bizarre crimes. His job was to work through the sites of crimes, trying to see the smashed property, the bones and scattered flesh, through the eyes of the perpetrator.

Kapur was qualified enough to seek the motivation of the Snowmen, after twenty-five years striving to unravel the minds of aliens within his own species.

All of this shivered into the heart of the Snowman, without comment or reaction, without praise or disgust.

Kapur, his time spent, grew ashamed. He fell silent, arms akimbo, before the maw of the Snowflake.

The 'Man watched steadily.

And, at last, Kapur understood.

Something like a ripple passed under Kapur; it was as if space were a lake on which his encased body floated, passive.

"Kapur." Mace's voice was strained. "The Spline."

Kapur felt enormously tired. "What about it?"

"...It's gone."

Time had run out. The Spline had opened its laser-cannon orifices.

...The ship had been torn aside, dragged from its site like an eyeball from a socket, thrown a million miles across space; it had been left spinning, bruised and torn.

Kapur returned to the yacht.

"Were there injuries?"

Mace's face was wide, blank, angry. "What do you think? But the automatics are functioning; the ship's returning to pick us up. What did you do to the damn 'Flake, Kapur?"

"It was not I who tried to open fire on it," Kapur said softly. "What happened?"

"Gravity waves," Mace said. "Like a tractor beam." Suddenly fear broke to the surface of Mace's hard features; his Eyes seemed even more incongruous, metal islands in a sea of human emotion. He pointed through the viewport, picking out a palm-sized patch of darkness. "From the direction of the Virgo supercluster; although that's probably coincidence..."

"I caught an echo of the beam."

"Kapur, I think I know how they did it."

"The Snowmen?"

"Mach's principle. I think they can manipulate Mach's principle."

Kapur shook his head.

With a kind of irritated patience, Mace said, "The Spline is embedded in a Universe of matter. That matter tugs at the Spline with gravity fields -- but the fields surround the ship uniformly; they are equal in all directions, isotropic and timeless."

Kapur frowned. "And you think the Snowmen have a way of making the field -- unequal?"

Mace laughed uneasily. "I guess you learn a lot in fourteen billion years."