"our control board is showing that the vital functions of your
partner Michael Altmann are gone." 
   Copeland succeeded beautifully in showing only a 
pretend expression of fright. He told the physician that he 
and Altmann had separated only a few minutes ago so that 
they could look in different places with the sonarscope for 
Tiranium stores. 
   The physician did not doubt his words in the slightest. 
   Forty five minutes later when a search team arrived, 
Copeland had hidden Michael Altmann's corpse so well 
under the rubble of a small crater that nobody found it. 
   Cold triumph ascended in Copeland. 
   And now to you, Elkie, he thought to himself. 

                             *


   Leroy Nilsson was an engineer who worked in the 
generator center of Moonbase Alpha. Two hours ago his 
shift had come to and end. Since then he had stopped off in 
his private quarters and did something that he had done in 
years:  he read the Bible. 
	He was so deep into the study of the holy writing that 
the humming of his commlock was heard only in his 
subconscious. It was only after thirty seconds that he 
consciously took note of it. 
	Tom Stills, a technician from the hydroponics system, 
announced himself. 
	"What's the matter with you, Leroy? " Came Stills' 
slightly ungracious voice. "We sit here and wait and wait. . ."
	Nilsson needed a moment to even begin to understand 
what the other one wanted from him. Naturally, today was 
the day on which he, Stills and two other men held their 

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