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+metadata, and any other content or labor, has been confirmed to be
+in the PUBLIC DOMAIN IN THE UNITED STATES.
+
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+Project Gutenberg (https://www.gutenberg.org) public repository for
+eBook #65176 (https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/65176)
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-The Project Gutenberg eBook of Get Out of My Body!, by Tom W. Harris
-
-This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere in the United States and
-most other parts of the world at no cost and with almost no restrictions
-whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or re-use it under the terms
-of the Project Gutenberg License included with this eBook or online at
-www.gutenberg.org. If you are not located in the United States, you
-will have to check the laws of the country where you are located before
-using this eBook.
-
-Title: Get Out of My Body!
-
-Author: Tom W. Harris
-
-Release Date: April 27, 2021 [eBook #65176]
-
-Language: English
-
-Character set encoding: UTF-8
-
-Produced by: Greg Weeks, Mary Meehan and the Online Distributed
- Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net
-
-*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK GET OUT OF MY BODY! ***
-
-
-
-
- Consider an alien infiltrating our
- world--impossible to catch because
- he might inhabit any person--even
- you! You'd likely start screaming--
-
- GET OUT OF MY BODY!
-
- By Tom W. Harris
-
- [Transcriber's Note: This etext was produced from
- Imagination Stories of Science and Fantasy
- February 1958
- Extensive research did not uncover any evidence that
- the U.S. copyright on this publication was renewed.]
-
-
-"I have come to discuss a very grave problem," said the
-talking-attendant.
-
-"Then let's get down to details," said Chester Forge. "It's urgent you
-said."
-
-Interviews with Ravians always made Chester nervous. They wouldn't use
-the psi-control voice sets, and there was something uncanny in talking
-to a human, a talking-attendant, when you knew it wasn't the man
-speaking at all, but the alien intelligence he was temporarily host to.
-
-It was even more unsettling when the Ravian was a high official,
-as at present. Their minds were even more coldly intellectual, dry
-and logical than the usual Ravian tourist's. And they could make a
-lot of trouble. Chester's job as tour-chief here at Knoxville--more
-specifically, Port Knoxville, where the ships came in--was to keep the
-tourists happy as possible. No, not happy. Happiness is an emotion.
-Satisfied maybe.
-
-"There are scant useful details I can give you," said Monnn, the
-Ravian, through the lips of the talking-attendant. "There was a
-stowaway on the sightseeing ship that came in this morning--one of our
-people. He is a fugitive. He has left the ship and is here on earth
-somewhere, perhaps in Knoxville. He must be captured."
-
-Chester Forge was jolted, but he had found you got on better with
-Ravians if you never showed feelings. He made his voice calm.
-
-"A fugitive, hmmm? What was his crime?"
-
-"The question is immaterial," said Monnn. "So typical of your people.
-But I suppose you will function better if not bothered by curiosity.
-Minnn, the stowaway, told a lie."
-
-"A lie?"
-
-"The worst of crimes. Minnn was a politician, campaigning for office,
-and he lied in making a promise he could not execute."
-
-By Joe, thought Chester, now I've heard them all. Well, the rule is you
-never, never question the tastes of an alien. The Martians have a mad
-passion for hop-toads, the Zarlos like to have things hurt them, the
-Frin talk all the time and the Rorn don't talk at all, and--
-
-"We'll get him for you," said Chester more firmly than he felt.
-
-"We feel you may fail," said the Ravian. "We ask permission to send our
-own searchers, no quota on numbers, open-area travel permission."
-
-Chester went white. "I'm afraid we can't grant that. I promise we'll
-get him for you."
-
-"Why can you not grant that?"
-
-"Well--population. There aren't enough volunteers to host any more than
-the present quota, and of course you can't get around without hosts."
-
-"How human," said Monnn through the attendant. "You are afraid of us.
-Yet you know we have no desire at all for this planet, and that we know
-you know this.
-
-"Why do you lie? On our planet you would be treated as Minnn will
-be--your personality dismembered, the useful parts assigned to another,
-the imperfect disposed of."
-
-"Be that as it may," said Chester, a chill in his spine. "We will find
-this fugitive ourselves."
-
-"Of course. And if you do not, within two of your days, we must come
-to search ourselves. One more thing--Minnn may turn killer. And now I
-shall retire--manipulating this organism is most fatiguing."
-
-The talking-attendant stood blank-faced for a moment as the Ravian
-withdrew to some nook of his mentality. Then he blinked and peered
-around, discovered he was in Forge's office, and saluted.
-
-"That's okay, John," said Chester. "Thanks. Take him back to his husk."
-
-The attendant left and Chester picked up his visor, punching the button
-for Security Chief....
-
- * * * * *
-
-On Clinch Street, little Sally Odum was walking home from school. She
-turned down an alley for a shortcut, and there she saw the toy. It
-was a black, fringed globe, a little larger than a grapefruit. "Gee!"
-exclaimed Sally, and reached out and grabbed it.
-
-The globe changed from black to gray, from shiny to dull, and from firm
-to flaccid. Sally felt a little tingle in her fingertips, a tiny tug
-in her mind. Looking thoughtful, she slipped the limp toy under her
-jacket. She trotted home, hid the thing at the bottom of her toy box,
-and promptly forgot about ever finding it.
-
-Minnn, exhausted from the psionic strain of rolling his body through
-the thick earth air all the way from the port to the city, and then
-directing the feeling and movement of Sally, made one little adjustment
-in her memory, then turned off his awareness and rested. In the rich
-rush of mental currents he would soon be replenished. In the meantime
-he was safe....
-
- * * * * *
-
-The Ravian had given Chester Forge two days to find Minnn. A day had
-passed and nothing had happened. He had kept things quiet, up to now.
-There was no indication his quiet search would produce anything. It was
-time for a different tactic....
-
- * * * * *
-
-Sally Odum's father looked up from the news-sheets that had just come
-off the clicker. "Mary, did you see these items about the Ravian loose
-in the city?"
-
-His wife was playing chack with Sally. The child had beaten her four
-games running, and Mary was just beginning to wonder if she was mother
-to a genius. A mother does not appreciate interruption of such
-musings. "Ah--no," she answered absently. "What about um?"
-
-"Seems this bird--Minnn's his tag--is thought to be hiding out in some
-human around town. He forced."
-
-Mary was more interested. "Isn't forcing against galactic convention?"
-
-"Darn right. This guy's a fugitive, like I said."
-
-"I knew they'd get in trouble, letting these foreigners come down."
-
-"Look, honey. One thing, we need the trade. A Ravian pays four picks of
-plainum for a day or two in a human. It's all here in the news-sheet.
-A Ravian hasn't got emotions, and when they're in a host they can feel
-everything the host feels. Real Kicks. The host gets to spend one pick
-himself--a small fortune--he has a shivaree and the Ravian goes for the
-ride. And for the host it's all voluntary."
-
-"What about this Minnn?"
-
-Sally listened with bright attention, slightly flushed.
-
-"It says here he could be anywhere, any man, woman or child. Tells how
-you can spot 'em and names a reward. Person with old Minnn inside is a
-little flushed, feverish, doesn't sleep very well. They...."
-
-"Say, honey, Sally didn't sleep well last night. Do you think she's all
-right?"
-
-"Any kid has a restless night sometimes, Mary. Lemme finish. The person
-is apt to be kind of listless, and might have memory blanks. Oh--and
-the Ravian enters a host by some kind of physical contact, and he can
-get to another host only by a contact with the first one."
-
-"Maybe we ought to take Sally to Dr. Price, hon. She just hasn't been
-herself lately."
-
-"Oh well," sighed Odum, and threw down the clicker-story. "Tell you
-what. All you do is visor security, tell them you're pretty sure a
-person has this Ravian, and the person gets a real good physical--free.
-Let's just tell them Sal has the symptoms and get a deal."
-
-Sally got up listlessly and the screen banged as she wandered out.
-
-"What symptoms?" asked Mary.
-
-"You mean you weren't listening?" And Mr. Odum told Mrs. Odum all the
-signs the article had listed, while Mrs. Odum gradually paled.
-
-"But--those are exactly the symptoms she does have," she said when he
-finished. Their eyes met and he reached for the visor.
-
-The security cops arrived. Chester was with them. As they boiled
-from their 'copter they nearly knocked over an old gentleman who was
-creaking his way delicately along the sidewalk, and one cop stepped on
-a small dog, which bit him.
-
-Two of them stayed with Sally, who stood in the yard with a scared
-expression; two others entered the house with Chester. They all came
-out of the house and Mary explained to Sally that she was not to be
-frightened. Sally was given a nice raincoat with built-in mittens--it
-was triple-ply mento-insulation plastic--and everybody bundled into the
-'copter.
-
-Sally liked the ride and the raincoat, but when it was all over she was
-sad. Mr. Forge seemed disappointed somehow....
-
- * * * * *
-
-Minnn lay quiet in his new host soaking in data. Perfesser Frye ...
-old ... quiet, jogging complex of contentment, and dissatisfaction.
-Cheated on price of eggs ... nice house over there, awful the way
-they've changed things ... little girl, patted her on the head, might
-have had a child like that. Enjoy what you can. Glow-thought connected
-with something called beer.
-
-Minnn was shocked to find that, almost the opposite of Sally,
-Perfesser Frye was a complete liar. He was not a professor, and the
-knowledge he impressed people with was mostly a collection of long,
-mispronounced words and memorized facts of which the Perfesser did
-not know the meaning. His landlady believed he was coming into an
-immense inheritance based on platinum on Vega, and she allowed him
-a familiarity which Minnn found amusing and which included rent
-exemption. The man was a collection of lies. Even his rheumatism was
-not genuine, but psychosomatic.
-
-That evening the Perfesser had the unpleasant experience of seeing
-his own face on the landlady's show-visor set, with the information
-that there was a price on his head. This was the last he remembered
-for some time, although to the landlady he appeared to retain full
-consciousness. He leaped to his feet most unrheumatically, tied her
-up, bashed in the visor, and pattered out into the streets, which were
-deserted.
-
-The Perfesser had good eyes for distance use, Minnn found. He swung
-the Perfesser's hook-beaked head about searchingly. At the end of the
-street men were coming, in mento-insulation. Minnn swung the lanky
-frame about, almost capsizing it, and sprinted long-leggedly in the
-opposite direction.
-
-In a few blocks the heart was pounding and the face was hot and the
-lungs could not suck enough oxygen. The Perfesser was not feeling
-anything consciously, but his parasympathetic nervous system was giving
-Minnn the horrors.
-
-The cops could not be seen. Minnn withdrew to rest. The Perfesser came
-to an abrupt halt, and gazed about him glassily. He remembered the
-nightmarish moment watching the visor; now he found himself in the
-street panting like a horse and raining sweat. He stood getting his
-breath and trying to think, then moved off purposefully....
-
- * * * * *
-
-Chester's eyes felt like they would drop out on his desk at any moment.
-He had had no sleep. He was entertaining a plan to visit the Ravians,
-in disguise, as a tourist, and make things miserable for _them_, when
-two buzzers rang at once.
-
-He answered his chief's buzzer first. Had Minnn been caught? No? Well,
-the governor had called and the heat was on. The chief was forced to
-give Forge a choice of producing Minnn in 24 hours or being sent as
-supercargo to the Mars-deserts. That was all.
-
-The second buzzer was Monnn, speaking through "a talking-attendant."
-
-"Your two days are up this evening," said the Ravian. "Any progress?"
-
-"We ought to have him any time now."
-
-"Nonsense. Minnn had been in that young girl--I could tell, when she
-was here."
-
-Forge got little pleasure from his reply. "I know that. We're after the
-man Minnn moved to."
-
-Monnn was unperturbed. "Good. You have about an hour."
-
-"One thing," said Chester. "You say Minnn might kill. Any special way
-he'd go about it?"
-
-"How should I know?" asked Monnn. "Minnn is an outlaw, under pursuit
-and away from his planet. On our planet there are no killings." And he
-hung up....
-
- * * * * *
-
-The Perfesser, umbrella under his arm, black serge suit dusty, walked
-down a long alley and into Steve's Beer Bar. Beer, he always figured,
-was a real help when you were perplexed.
-
-Minnn witnessed this logic with disgust. The Perfesser's memory-units
-showed the beer just made him more perplexed. But Minnn was resting in
-witness-state, very tired from making the Perfesser do all that running.
-
-The Perfesser hooked his umbrella over the bar and was waited upon by
-Steve himself. "You look kinda bushed," said Steve respectfully.
-
-"A man my age must watch himself, Steve. Especially when he is
-enervated by the hardihoods of lifetime scholarship."
-
-"Rough," said Steve admiringly. He didn't know what the language meant
-but it sounded gorgeous.
-
-The Perfesser turned to a pushed-down man beside him at the bar. "You
-would hardly believe, friend, what has just happened to me. One moment
-I was watching a home-visor-view--and the next I was standing in the
-street. I can scarcely credit this phenomenon."
-
-"Funny things happen," said the pushed-down man. "I drive a laundry
-truck, and one stop is out to the national asylum. They got people out
-there what don't know where they even came from, too."
-
-"You sure this really happened, Perfesser?" said Steve. "I mean--you
-wouldn't make it up or nothing." The Perfesser had drunk only one "fish
-bowl" of beer--it was a little early for his star-spangled lying.
-
-"I can aver it happened," said the Perfesser stiffly. "A phenomena of
-psychic rarity--similar things have occurred to intellectual persons at
-various points in history."
-
-Minnn was not enjoying himself. Humans were fun when they were having
-fun, but other moods were unendurable. Coupled with illogic it was
-worse. Minnn was considering shifting to the truck driver when the man
-suddenly arose. "Well, night, Steve, Perfesser--I gotta get the sheets
-a-rolling," said the man, and vanished out the back door.
-
-It was seconds later that two policemen burst in the front door
-and headed straight for the Perfesser. Minnn acted instantly. The
-Perfesser's awareness was clamped out and the creaking frame was sent
-speeding to the back door.
-
-Down the alley the laundry truck was starting, and the Perfesser's
-voice sailed after it, "Wait, fellow. Hold on!"
-
-The truck slowed and the wizened face of the driver peered back just in
-time to see the police burst into the alley and open fire. The face was
-withdrawn instantly and the truck gained speed.
-
-The Perfesser ran after it, shouting until his breath gave out. There
-was junk in the alley and it was crisscrossed by other alleys with
-traffic on them and the driver dared not approach top speed. The cops
-shot twice again at the Perfesser, who was running like an antelope.
-
-Minnn felt a crash in the Perfesser's shoulder and the tall body
-swayed. A bit of lead had entered the clavicle. Minnn strained and
-the ends of the veins constricted, slowing the loss of blood. The
-Perfesser's heart and lungs were behaving alarmingly but Minnn kept the
-body running. He was gaining on the truck.
-
-The truck gained speed and so did the Perfesser. Ancient arteries,
-brittled with deposits, strained and began to give. The Perfesser's
-arm raised as he drew alongside the truck. The umbrella-tip neared the
-driver.
-
- * * * * *
-
-A bullet grazed the Perfesser's side--Minnn suddenly realized they were
-not shooting to kill: and also the shaky frame he had taken would not
-be able to run much longer. With a surge of concentration he pushed the
-body forward. The umbrella-tip touched the driver, Minnn drove himself
-down the metal ferrule, somewhere an artery burst, and the body of the
-Perfesser sagged, wobbled, and, still carried forward by momentum,
-smashed into a wall and toppled over. It lay there on its back. Being
-front-man for a Ravian had been Perfesser Frye's last falsehood.
-
-The truck got out of the alley, going fast, and kept going fast until
-it came to the asylum. The driver did not go to the back door--there
-might be people waiting for him. He walked in the front door, up to the
-receptionist, and touched her. Then he discovered himself standing
-there, and walked embarrassedly out again.
-
-The receptionist remained at her desk. A visitor was moving toward her;
-as he passed, the receptionist touched his hand.
-
-Down a hallway opening into the reception room came a little group of
-men--three attendants from the hospital and the hospital director; a
-talking-attendant and Chester Forge, and the truck driver. All were
-gloved and clad in mento-insulation but the talking-attendant.
-
-"I was standing right here," said the driver excitedly. "Right here in
-front of this desk."
-
-The talking-attendant rested his hand on the receptionist's forehead.
-"Not there now," he declared.
-
-"Have any of you seen anyone near this desk?" called the director to
-the room at large. A woman pointed to the visitor the receptionist had
-touched. "He was!"
-
-The visitor began to run.
-
-"We've got to get him before he gets into a patient!" yelled Chester.
-"In an unbalanced mind even Monnn can't find him! Get him."
-
-They went plunging after the visitor.
-
-Minnn was pleased. He had a head start, and this human had good running
-potential. He would have fun. An interne stepped out of a door, the
-visitor touched his hand, the interne stepped back through the door,
-rapidly. The searchers swirled down the hall and grabbed the visitor
-and Monnn made his test. "Not here now," he reported.
-
-The interne strolled into an elevator, went up a story, walked quietly
-down another corridor. Excitement was percolating through the place
-almost as though the inmates breathed it. There were many inmates on
-this floor; he could force into one almost at leisure.
-
-Another elevator jarred to a stop, doors opened, and the searchers
-bolted out. Chester's face was like a purple plum, his eyes were red
-and wild. The long chase was teasingly close to ending, and could be
-frustrated forever.
-
-The interne turned and thumbed his nose at Forge, who gave a bellow
-of anger. As the men surged toward him, the attendant sprinted a few
-yards, reached out and touched a patient. The halls were full of them;
-attracted by the excitement. Unobtrusively the patient touched another,
-who in turn touched another, who disappeared in the crowd.
-
-"Go back to your rooms," shouted the director of the hospital. "You are
-impeding a hunt for a fugitive."
-
-But the patients didn't see any fugitive, and they stayed, and more
-kept coming.
-
-There was a disconcerting blur of thought-emotion in the patient Minnn
-was using. The pursuers were the length of the hall away; he caused his
-host to turn, shriek a bad word, and thumb her nose at them.
-
-They came running, impeded by the crowd. The patient turned a corner,
-touched another patient, who touched another.
-
-It was quite an experience, Minnn decided. He had whirled through a
-rich kaleidoscope of minds and emotions; in one woman there had been a
-fountain of ecstacy he would have to go back and sample sometime. He
-had come to the perfect place. Except as he chose to do it, to tease,
-these inmates could not reveal him, and no Ravian could detect him. He
-could stay here an indefinite length of time--wait them out--then go
-back to the toy chest where his husk lay--or trace Sally Odum's memory
-for it in case she had moved it--and repossess himself.
-
-He could learn to live on this planet--perhaps he could even get
-governmental sanctuary, though that was not essential. He would not be
-lonely. Ravians do not get lonely. They do, however, have a sense of
-power.
-
-But the pursuers were coming down the hall, the Ravian in the
-talking-attendant attempting to sort through the twisted minds, the
-person from the tourist service almost out of his own mind. And though
-Minnn was having sport, he was a little tired. He turned the eyes of
-his host toward the group of hunters, and saw that they had stopped
-coming and stood talking. He walked his host to a window-bench, sat it
-down, turned its mind toward slumber, and relaxed.
-
- * * * * *
-
-Chester had to have a plan, and, driven to unwonted efficiency by the
-threat of bureaucratic disgrace and exile, his mind began to form one.
-The plan was not without its dangers, especially to Chester, but it was
-the only plan they had.
-
-Power was shut off to all elevators, and at the flip of a switch all
-the doors on the group's floor were locked. "We've got him penned on
-this floor," said Chester. "I only hope he doesn't come across a mouse."
-
-"He's probably on this floor," corrected Monnn through the
-talking-attendant. "And he'll _probably_ stay. Ravians have a slight
-psionic control, as you know, and it's barely possible Minnn could
-force himself through a door-panel."
-
-"How about a wall?"
-
-"I doubt it."
-
-"What if there was nobody on the other side for him to force into?"
-
-"He would not last very long ... we would lose him. And that would go
-hard for you, Mr. Forge, because we do not want Minnn done away with,
-we want him captured."
-
-"I don't need to be reminded," said Chester, mentally getting a
-two-handed hold on the always-be-polite-to-a-tourist rule. "And now
-let's smoke him out."
-
-The director and a helper lingered unobtrusively near a firehose;
-the rest of the group strolled on down the hall. Minnn had rested
-and was alert again. Through his host-eyes he saw there were many
-patients milling about--there were so many ready refuges. It occurred
-to him that he had not particularly bedeviled his countryman, and he
-caused his host to pick up a vase and hurl it at the head of Monnn's
-talking-attendant.
-
-Almost instantly a blast of chill water struck Minnn's host, knocking
-her sprawling. Minnn found her emotions most unpleasant. He took her
-mind fully, forcing her up from the floor, and a ram of water pounded
-her down again. Somebody was rounding up the other patients, pushing
-them out of his reach. People were yelling, running.
-
-Somebody down the hall aimed a wide-nozzled gun at Minnn's host. There
-was also the blat of an explosion and something hit his host in the
-chest. "What poor weapons," thought Minnn, and then the thing exploded.
-A thick gas swaddled the host-patient, Minnn felt the body sagging.
-There was no time for him to weigh all factors for a really logical
-decision, and he made a snap-judgment to leave this body before it lost
-consciousness and sealed off his contact with his environment.
-
-A form was stumbling past, and Minnn reached his host's hand up and
-touched it. In a flash he had entered. Almost instantaneously he
-realized that this time it was different. The nervous system was alive
-with wild, determined resistance.
-
-His host was Chester Forge.
-
-Chester reeled back from the gas-shrouded, drowsing inmate. The gas
-would stay near her, held by the biostatic charge in all its particles.
-He had to keep away from it; he needed all his consciousness for his
-battle.
-
-He would never be able to quite describe many of the things he felt
-during the struggle he waged within his own organism like a civil war.
-Minnn had entered at his right wrist. Although Chester had mentally
-braced, the alien had surged up his arm almost instantaneously, nearly
-to the shoulder. Chester called on his mind to hold Minnn there. He
-worked some part of his mind to hold Minnn there. He worked some part
-of his mind like a new muscle--one cannot explain how it is he works a
-muscle, he just does it. Simultaneously Chester reeled down the hall
-toward where Monnn, in the talking-attendant, stood by an open door.
-Monnn and the door were his two aces in the hole.
-
-His flesh crawled; the alien was digging, seeping, sparking through
-him, along his nerves, like a fluid, a worm, a gas, an insidious
-writhing electricity. And the alien was winning. Inexorably he drove
-along the stubborn channels to the seat of control, the watchroom in
-the skull.
-
-The talking-attendant stood with a rustling, limp black sac
-out-held--Minnn's husk, taken from the toy chest of Sally Odum. If
-Chester could force the writhing Minnn back down and out of his
-fingertips and into the husk....
-
-But he couldn't. The sweat rolled down his face as the fight went on
-inside him. He had no way of knowing what would happen when Minnn, who
-was nearing it, reached his brain. Insanity? Convulsions? Death? At
-the very least, Minnn would control him, and also know his thoughts,
-his plan, his two aces in the hole.
-
- * * * * *
-
-There was a twist and a tingle at the base of his skull--the invader
-was entering his brainstalk. It was time to play his first ace. With a
-burst of determination to control his reeling motor functions, Chester
-reached out his hand and touched the hand of the talking-attendant.
-Monnn swished vengefully inside him.
-
-When they had discussed this the others had been afraid. So had
-Chester. Two alien forces, one hostile, both struggling, might rip
-and rupture his psychic system like lightning bolts battling inside
-a transistor. But Chester Forge was a stubborn man, with perhaps a
-bureaucratic stubbornness, certainly a human stubbornness, and he was
-committed to an end to be achieved.
-
-For a few split seconds there was in Chester's nervous system what
-might be described as a "hush." He took advantage of it to step through
-the open door into a dimly-lighted room. The hospital director,
-insulation-swathed, followed with the leather-rustling husk.
-
-Then Minnn and Monnn locked forces, and Chester reeled with the shock
-and swirl of the combat. The two forces mixed, fused, separated,
-mingled, yet Chester somehow knew always which was which, got bursts
-of the reasoning of each, knew in some indescribable way the alien,
-indecipherable natures of each of them. For an instant he panicked.
-Something mysterious and terrible as the dark energy of infinity was
-pounding and flashing in his merely human synapses and cells, something
-he understood yet could not understand at all.
-
-He felt a draining, and knew Minnn was tapping him for energy. Chester
-rallied to help Monnn. He pulled his energy, his thoughts, away from
-Minnn, rolling up, balling, clenching his powers, keeping them out of
-reach, probing for a chance to strike. Minnn filamented through half
-his body; part of the alien was needling and darting into Chester's
-mind, burrowing toward knowledge of his plan. Chester buried his plan
-in the very center of the ball of thoughts, hiding his last ace.
-
-He could not keep this up much longer, and he could feel that both
-Minnn and Monnn knew this. It was time for the big assault. He sent
-flash after flash of willpower crisping through his nerves, and Monnn
-interwove himself in these assaults. Minnn was being forced back, and
-back, intolerably pressured.
-
-Minnn hurled his energies at them in a sudden rush, and Chester felt
-something in him begin to tear like a piece of silk.
-
-Concealed from Minnn like the kernel of a nut, Chester cupped the
-knowledge, his last ace. He was at the verge of cracking, now was the
-time to play it. He edged toward the wall of the room, where a patient
-sat darkly on a bench. At the same time both he and Monnn drove forth
-their last few ergs of pressure against Minnn.
-
-Chester felt something raise his arm. His arm moved toward the patient;
-his palm touched the man's cheek. There was a sudden cleanness in him,
-and Minnn was gone.
-
-He leaped backward through the door and it swung to and locked. A
-peep-panel was opened in it and the black fringed husk hung up before
-the opening. Chester touched the talking-attendant so Monnn could pass
-over, then leaned weakly against the wall opposite the door.
-
-"I give him half an hour," he said. "Who's got a drink of water?"
-
-It turned out that they had waited only twenty-two minutes when the
-fringed sac began to take a luster, to puff and to fill. When they were
-quite sure Minnn was entirely within it, they wrapped it tightly in
-the insulation and took it away.
-
-"It was a good plan," said Monnn through the talking-attendant as
-they drove back toward the town. "We could never have forced him to
-leave you to enter his husk--his logic would have driven him to fight
-even harder and to stay, with rather unfortunate results to you, Mr.
-Forge, but under pressure he would leave to enter another host. And
-it was lucky the walls of that room held him--as you said, that was a
-gamble we had to take. But I wish you would again describe to me the
-phenomenon in that room. It sounds quite strange."
-
-"It's something that happens to humans," said Chester, "and I knew no
-Ravian could put up with it. Illogic disturbs you, and you tour in
-human beings only for the sake of one kind of emotion, the pleasant
-kind. In that room there was no logic, and the emotions were of a
-different kind, a kind you haven't heard of. The humans there were in
-what is called a depressive ward. They are illogically unhappy, all the
-time."
-
-"I see," said Monnn through the lips of the attendant. "You have good
-logic, Mr. Forge. I have a new respect for human logic. Yes."
-
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-<div style='text-align:center; font-size:1.2em; font-weight:bold'>The Project Gutenberg eBook of Get Out of My Body!, by Tom W. Harris</div>
-
-<div style='display:block; margin:1em 0'>
-This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere in the United States and
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-</div>
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-<div style='display:block; margin-top:1em; margin-bottom:1em; margin-left:2em; text-indent:-2em'>Title: Get Out of My Body!</div>
-
-<div style='display:block; margin-top:1em; margin-bottom:1em; margin-left:2em; text-indent:-2em'>Author: Tom W. Harris</div>
-
-<div style='display:block; margin:1em 0'>Release Date: April 27, 2021 [eBook #65176]</div>
-
-<div style='display:block; margin:1em 0'>Language: English</div>
-
-<div style='display:block; margin:1em 0'>Character set encoding: UTF-8</div>
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-<div style='display:block; margin-left:2em; text-indent:-2em'>Produced by: Greg Weeks, Mary Meehan and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net</div>
-
-<div style='margin-top:2em; margin-bottom:4em'>*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK GET OUT OF MY BODY! ***</div>
-
-<div class="titlepage">
-
-<p>Consider an alien infiltrating our<br />
-world&mdash;impossible to catch because<br />
-he might inhabit any person&mdash;even<br />
-you! You'd likely start screaming&mdash;</p>
-
-<h1>GET OUT OF MY BODY!</h1>
-
-<h2>By Tom W. Harris</h2>
-
-<p>[Transcriber's Note: This etext was produced from<br />
-Imagination Stories of Science and Fantasy<br />
-February 1958<br />
-Extensive research did not uncover any evidence that<br />
-the U.S. copyright on this publication was renewed.]</p>
-
-</div>
-
-<hr class="chap" />
-
-<div class="figcenter">
- <img src="images/illus.jpg" alt=""/>
-</div>
-
-<hr class="chap" />
-
-<p>"I have come to discuss a very grave problem," said the
-talking-attendant.</p>
-
-<p>"Then let's get down to details," said Chester Forge. "It's urgent you
-said."</p>
-
-<p>Interviews with Ravians always made Chester nervous. They wouldn't use
-the psi-control voice sets, and there was something uncanny in talking
-to a human, a talking-attendant, when you knew it wasn't the man
-speaking at all, but the alien intelligence he was temporarily host to.</p>
-
-<p>It was even more unsettling when the Ravian was a high official,
-as at present. Their minds were even more coldly intellectual, dry
-and logical than the usual Ravian tourist's. And they could make a
-lot of trouble. Chester's job as tour-chief here at Knoxville&mdash;more
-specifically, Port Knoxville, where the ships came in&mdash;was to keep the
-tourists happy as possible. No, not happy. Happiness is an emotion.
-Satisfied maybe.</p>
-
-<p>"There are scant useful details I can give you," said Monnn, the
-Ravian, through the lips of the talking-attendant. "There was a
-stowaway on the sightseeing ship that came in this morning&mdash;one of our
-people. He is a fugitive. He has left the ship and is here on earth
-somewhere, perhaps in Knoxville. He must be captured."</p>
-
-<p>Chester Forge was jolted, but he had found you got on better with
-Ravians if you never showed feelings. He made his voice calm.</p>
-
-<p>"A fugitive, hmmm? What was his crime?"</p>
-
-<p>"The question is immaterial," said Monnn. "So typical of your people.
-But I suppose you will function better if not bothered by curiosity.
-Minnn, the stowaway, told a lie."</p>
-
-<p>"A lie?"</p>
-
-<p>"The worst of crimes. Minnn was a politician, campaigning for office,
-and he lied in making a promise he could not execute."</p>
-
-<p>By Joe, thought Chester, now I've heard them all. Well, the rule is you
-never, never question the tastes of an alien. The Martians have a mad
-passion for hop-toads, the Zarlos like to have things hurt them, the
-Frin talk all the time and the Rorn don't talk at all, and&mdash;</p>
-
-<p>"We'll get him for you," said Chester more firmly than he felt.</p>
-
-<p>"We feel you may fail," said the Ravian. "We ask permission to send our
-own searchers, no quota on numbers, open-area travel permission."</p>
-
-<p>Chester went white. "I'm afraid we can't grant that. I promise we'll
-get him for you."</p>
-
-<p>"Why can you not grant that?"</p>
-
-<p>"Well&mdash;population. There aren't enough volunteers to host any more than
-the present quota, and of course you can't get around without hosts."</p>
-
-<p>"How human," said Monnn through the attendant. "You are afraid of us.
-Yet you know we have no desire at all for this planet, and that we know
-you know this.</p>
-
-<p>"Why do you lie? On our planet you would be treated as Minnn will
-be&mdash;your personality dismembered, the useful parts assigned to another,
-the imperfect disposed of."</p>
-
-<p>"Be that as it may," said Chester, a chill in his spine. "We will find
-this fugitive ourselves."</p>
-
-<p>"Of course. And if you do not, within two of your days, we must come
-to search ourselves. One more thing&mdash;Minnn may turn killer. And now I
-shall retire&mdash;manipulating this organism is most fatiguing."</p>
-
-<p>The talking-attendant stood blank-faced for a moment as the Ravian
-withdrew to some nook of his mentality. Then he blinked and peered
-around, discovered he was in Forge's office, and saluted.</p>
-
-<p>"That's okay, John," said Chester. "Thanks. Take him back to his husk."</p>
-
-<p>The attendant left and Chester picked up his visor, punching the button
-for Security Chief....</p>
-
-<hr class="tb" />
-
-<p>On Clinch Street, little Sally Odum was walking home from school. She
-turned down an alley for a shortcut, and there she saw the toy. It
-was a black, fringed globe, a little larger than a grapefruit. "Gee!"
-exclaimed Sally, and reached out and grabbed it.</p>
-
-<p>The globe changed from black to gray, from shiny to dull, and from firm
-to flaccid. Sally felt a little tingle in her fingertips, a tiny tug
-in her mind. Looking thoughtful, she slipped the limp toy under her
-jacket. She trotted home, hid the thing at the bottom of her toy box,
-and promptly forgot about ever finding it.</p>
-
-<p>Minnn, exhausted from the psionic strain of rolling his body through
-the thick earth air all the way from the port to the city, and then
-directing the feeling and movement of Sally, made one little adjustment
-in her memory, then turned off his awareness and rested. In the rich
-rush of mental currents he would soon be replenished. In the meantime
-he was safe....</p>
-
-<hr class="tb" />
-
-<p>The Ravian had given Chester Forge two days to find Minnn. A day had
-passed and nothing had happened. He had kept things quiet, up to now.
-There was no indication his quiet search would produce anything. It was
-time for a different tactic....</p>
-
-<hr class="tb" />
-
-<p>Sally Odum's father looked up from the news-sheets that had just come
-off the clicker. "Mary, did you see these items about the Ravian loose
-in the city?"</p>
-
-<p>His wife was playing chack with Sally. The child had beaten her four
-games running, and Mary was just beginning to wonder if she was mother
-to a genius. A mother does not appreciate interruption of such
-musings. "Ah&mdash;no," she answered absently. "What about um?"</p>
-
-<p>"Seems this bird&mdash;Minnn's his tag&mdash;is thought to be hiding out in some
-human around town. He forced."</p>
-
-<p>Mary was more interested. "Isn't forcing against galactic convention?"</p>
-
-<p>"Darn right. This guy's a fugitive, like I said."</p>
-
-<p>"I knew they'd get in trouble, letting these foreigners come down."</p>
-
-<p>"Look, honey. One thing, we need the trade. A Ravian pays four picks of
-plainum for a day or two in a human. It's all here in the news-sheet.
-A Ravian hasn't got emotions, and when they're in a host they can feel
-everything the host feels. Real Kicks. The host gets to spend one pick
-himself&mdash;a small fortune&mdash;he has a shivaree and the Ravian goes for the
-ride. And for the host it's all voluntary."</p>
-
-<p>"What about this Minnn?"</p>
-
-<p>Sally listened with bright attention, slightly flushed.</p>
-
-<p>"It says here he could be anywhere, any man, woman or child. Tells how
-you can spot 'em and names a reward. Person with old Minnn inside is a
-little flushed, feverish, doesn't sleep very well. They...."</p>
-
-<p>"Say, honey, Sally didn't sleep well last night. Do you think she's all
-right?"</p>
-
-<p>"Any kid has a restless night sometimes, Mary. Lemme finish. The person
-is apt to be kind of listless, and might have memory blanks. Oh&mdash;and
-the Ravian enters a host by some kind of physical contact, and he can
-get to another host only by a contact with the first one."</p>
-
-<p>"Maybe we ought to take Sally to Dr. Price, hon. She just hasn't been
-herself lately."</p>
-
-<p>"Oh well," sighed Odum, and threw down the clicker-story. "Tell you
-what. All you do is visor security, tell them you're pretty sure a
-person has this Ravian, and the person gets a real good physical&mdash;free.
-Let's just tell them Sal has the symptoms and get a deal."</p>
-
-<p>Sally got up listlessly and the screen banged as she wandered out.</p>
-
-<p>"What symptoms?" asked Mary.</p>
-
-<p>"You mean you weren't listening?" And Mr. Odum told Mrs. Odum all the
-signs the article had listed, while Mrs. Odum gradually paled.</p>
-
-<p>"But&mdash;those are exactly the symptoms she does have," she said when he
-finished. Their eyes met and he reached for the visor.</p>
-
-<p>The security cops arrived. Chester was with them. As they boiled
-from their 'copter they nearly knocked over an old gentleman who was
-creaking his way delicately along the sidewalk, and one cop stepped on
-a small dog, which bit him.</p>
-
-<p>Two of them stayed with Sally, who stood in the yard with a scared
-expression; two others entered the house with Chester. They all came
-out of the house and Mary explained to Sally that she was not to be
-frightened. Sally was given a nice raincoat with built-in mittens&mdash;it
-was triple-ply mento-insulation plastic&mdash;and everybody bundled into the
-'copter.</p>
-
-<p>Sally liked the ride and the raincoat, but when it was all over she was
-sad. Mr. Forge seemed disappointed somehow....</p>
-
-<hr class="tb" />
-
-<p>Minnn lay quiet in his new host soaking in data. Perfesser Frye ...
-old ... quiet, jogging complex of contentment, and dissatisfaction.
-Cheated on price of eggs ... nice house over there, awful the way
-they've changed things ... little girl, patted her on the head, might
-have had a child like that. Enjoy what you can. Glow-thought connected
-with something called beer.</p>
-
-<p>Minnn was shocked to find that, almost the opposite of Sally,
-Perfesser Frye was a complete liar. He was not a professor, and the
-knowledge he impressed people with was mostly a collection of long,
-mispronounced words and memorized facts of which the Perfesser did
-not know the meaning. His landlady believed he was coming into an
-immense inheritance based on platinum on Vega, and she allowed him
-a familiarity which Minnn found amusing and which included rent
-exemption. The man was a collection of lies. Even his rheumatism was
-not genuine, but psychosomatic.</p>
-
-<p>That evening the Perfesser had the unpleasant experience of seeing
-his own face on the landlady's show-visor set, with the information
-that there was a price on his head. This was the last he remembered
-for some time, although to the landlady he appeared to retain full
-consciousness. He leaped to his feet most unrheumatically, tied her
-up, bashed in the visor, and pattered out into the streets, which were
-deserted.</p>
-
-<p>The Perfesser had good eyes for distance use, Minnn found. He swung
-the Perfesser's hook-beaked head about searchingly. At the end of the
-street men were coming, in mento-insulation. Minnn swung the lanky
-frame about, almost capsizing it, and sprinted long-leggedly in the
-opposite direction.</p>
-
-<p>In a few blocks the heart was pounding and the face was hot and the
-lungs could not suck enough oxygen. The Perfesser was not feeling
-anything consciously, but his parasympathetic nervous system was giving
-Minnn the horrors.</p>
-
-<p>The cops could not be seen. Minnn withdrew to rest. The Perfesser came
-to an abrupt halt, and gazed about him glassily. He remembered the
-nightmarish moment watching the visor; now he found himself in the
-street panting like a horse and raining sweat. He stood getting his
-breath and trying to think, then moved off purposefully....</p>
-
-<hr class="tb" />
-
-<p>Chester's eyes felt like they would drop out on his desk at any moment.
-He had had no sleep. He was entertaining a plan to visit the Ravians,
-in disguise, as a tourist, and make things miserable for <i>them</i>, when
-two buzzers rang at once.</p>
-
-<p>He answered his chief's buzzer first. Had Minnn been caught? No? Well,
-the governor had called and the heat was on. The chief was forced to
-give Forge a choice of producing Minnn in 24 hours or being sent as
-supercargo to the Mars-deserts. That was all.</p>
-
-<p>The second buzzer was Monnn, speaking through "a talking-attendant."</p>
-
-<p>"Your two days are up this evening," said the Ravian. "Any progress?"</p>
-
-<p>"We ought to have him any time now."</p>
-
-<p>"Nonsense. Minnn had been in that young girl&mdash;I could tell, when she
-was here."</p>
-
-<p>Forge got little pleasure from his reply. "I know that. We're after the
-man Minnn moved to."</p>
-
-<p>Monnn was unperturbed. "Good. You have about an hour."</p>
-
-<p>"One thing," said Chester. "You say Minnn might kill. Any special way
-he'd go about it?"</p>
-
-<p>"How should I know?" asked Monnn. "Minnn is an outlaw, under pursuit
-and away from his planet. On our planet there are no killings." And he
-hung up....</p>
-
-<hr class="tb" />
-
-<p>The Perfesser, umbrella under his arm, black serge suit dusty, walked
-down a long alley and into Steve's Beer Bar. Beer, he always figured,
-was a real help when you were perplexed.</p>
-
-<p>Minnn witnessed this logic with disgust. The Perfesser's memory-units
-showed the beer just made him more perplexed. But Minnn was resting in
-witness-state, very tired from making the Perfesser do all that running.</p>
-
-<p>The Perfesser hooked his umbrella over the bar and was waited upon by
-Steve himself. "You look kinda bushed," said Steve respectfully.</p>
-
-<p>"A man my age must watch himself, Steve. Especially when he is
-enervated by the hardihoods of lifetime scholarship."</p>
-
-<p>"Rough," said Steve admiringly. He didn't know what the language meant
-but it sounded gorgeous.</p>
-
-<p>The Perfesser turned to a pushed-down man beside him at the bar. "You
-would hardly believe, friend, what has just happened to me. One moment
-I was watching a home-visor-view&mdash;and the next I was standing in the
-street. I can scarcely credit this phenomenon."</p>
-
-<p>"Funny things happen," said the pushed-down man. "I drive a laundry
-truck, and one stop is out to the national asylum. They got people out
-there what don't know where they even came from, too."</p>
-
-<p>"You sure this really happened, Perfesser?" said Steve. "I mean&mdash;you
-wouldn't make it up or nothing." The Perfesser had drunk only one "fish
-bowl" of beer&mdash;it was a little early for his star-spangled lying.</p>
-
-<p>"I can aver it happened," said the Perfesser stiffly. "A phenomena of
-psychic rarity&mdash;similar things have occurred to intellectual persons at
-various points in history."</p>
-
-<p>Minnn was not enjoying himself. Humans were fun when they were having
-fun, but other moods were unendurable. Coupled with illogic it was
-worse. Minnn was considering shifting to the truck driver when the man
-suddenly arose. "Well, night, Steve, Perfesser&mdash;I gotta get the sheets
-a-rolling," said the man, and vanished out the back door.</p>
-
-<p>It was seconds later that two policemen burst in the front door
-and headed straight for the Perfesser. Minnn acted instantly. The
-Perfesser's awareness was clamped out and the creaking frame was sent
-speeding to the back door.</p>
-
-<p>Down the alley the laundry truck was starting, and the Perfesser's
-voice sailed after it, "Wait, fellow. Hold on!"</p>
-
-<p>The truck slowed and the wizened face of the driver peered back just in
-time to see the police burst into the alley and open fire. The face was
-withdrawn instantly and the truck gained speed.</p>
-
-<p>The Perfesser ran after it, shouting until his breath gave out. There
-was junk in the alley and it was crisscrossed by other alleys with
-traffic on them and the driver dared not approach top speed. The cops
-shot twice again at the Perfesser, who was running like an antelope.</p>
-
-<p>Minnn felt a crash in the Perfesser's shoulder and the tall body
-swayed. A bit of lead had entered the clavicle. Minnn strained and
-the ends of the veins constricted, slowing the loss of blood. The
-Perfesser's heart and lungs were behaving alarmingly but Minnn kept the
-body running. He was gaining on the truck.</p>
-
-<p>The truck gained speed and so did the Perfesser. Ancient arteries,
-brittled with deposits, strained and began to give. The Perfesser's
-arm raised as he drew alongside the truck. The umbrella-tip neared the
-driver.</p>
-
-<hr class="tb" />
-
-<p>A bullet grazed the Perfesser's side&mdash;Minnn suddenly realized they were
-not shooting to kill: and also the shaky frame he had taken would not
-be able to run much longer. With a surge of concentration he pushed the
-body forward. The umbrella-tip touched the driver, Minnn drove himself
-down the metal ferrule, somewhere an artery burst, and the body of the
-Perfesser sagged, wobbled, and, still carried forward by momentum,
-smashed into a wall and toppled over. It lay there on its back. Being
-front-man for a Ravian had been Perfesser Frye's last falsehood.</p>
-
-<p>The truck got out of the alley, going fast, and kept going fast until
-it came to the asylum. The driver did not go to the back door&mdash;there
-might be people waiting for him. He walked in the front door, up to the
-receptionist, and touched her. Then he discovered himself standing
-there, and walked embarrassedly out again.</p>
-
-<p>The receptionist remained at her desk. A visitor was moving toward her;
-as he passed, the receptionist touched his hand.</p>
-
-<p>Down a hallway opening into the reception room came a little group of
-men&mdash;three attendants from the hospital and the hospital director; a
-talking-attendant and Chester Forge, and the truck driver. All were
-gloved and clad in mento-insulation but the talking-attendant.</p>
-
-<p>"I was standing right here," said the driver excitedly. "Right here in
-front of this desk."</p>
-
-<p>The talking-attendant rested his hand on the receptionist's forehead.
-"Not there now," he declared.</p>
-
-<p>"Have any of you seen anyone near this desk?" called the director to
-the room at large. A woman pointed to the visitor the receptionist had
-touched. "He was!"</p>
-
-<p>The visitor began to run.</p>
-
-<p>"We've got to get him before he gets into a patient!" yelled Chester.
-"In an unbalanced mind even Monnn can't find him! Get him."</p>
-
-<p>They went plunging after the visitor.</p>
-
-<p>Minnn was pleased. He had a head start, and this human had good running
-potential. He would have fun. An interne stepped out of a door, the
-visitor touched his hand, the interne stepped back through the door,
-rapidly. The searchers swirled down the hall and grabbed the visitor
-and Monnn made his test. "Not here now," he reported.</p>
-
-<p>The interne strolled into an elevator, went up a story, walked quietly
-down another corridor. Excitement was percolating through the place
-almost as though the inmates breathed it. There were many inmates on
-this floor; he could force into one almost at leisure.</p>
-
-<p>Another elevator jarred to a stop, doors opened, and the searchers
-bolted out. Chester's face was like a purple plum, his eyes were red
-and wild. The long chase was teasingly close to ending, and could be
-frustrated forever.</p>
-
-<p>The interne turned and thumbed his nose at Forge, who gave a bellow
-of anger. As the men surged toward him, the attendant sprinted a few
-yards, reached out and touched a patient. The halls were full of them;
-attracted by the excitement. Unobtrusively the patient touched another,
-who in turn touched another, who disappeared in the crowd.</p>
-
-<p>"Go back to your rooms," shouted the director of the hospital. "You are
-impeding a hunt for a fugitive."</p>
-
-<p>But the patients didn't see any fugitive, and they stayed, and more
-kept coming.</p>
-
-<p>There was a disconcerting blur of thought-emotion in the patient Minnn
-was using. The pursuers were the length of the hall away; he caused his
-host to turn, shriek a bad word, and thumb her nose at them.</p>
-
-<p>They came running, impeded by the crowd. The patient turned a corner,
-touched another patient, who touched another.</p>
-
-<p>It was quite an experience, Minnn decided. He had whirled through a
-rich kaleidoscope of minds and emotions; in one woman there had been a
-fountain of ecstacy he would have to go back and sample sometime. He
-had come to the perfect place. Except as he chose to do it, to tease,
-these inmates could not reveal him, and no Ravian could detect him. He
-could stay here an indefinite length of time&mdash;wait them out&mdash;then go
-back to the toy chest where his husk lay&mdash;or trace Sally Odum's memory
-for it in case she had moved it&mdash;and repossess himself.</p>
-
-<p>He could learn to live on this planet&mdash;perhaps he could even get
-governmental sanctuary, though that was not essential. He would not be
-lonely. Ravians do not get lonely. They do, however, have a sense of
-power.</p>
-
-<p>But the pursuers were coming down the hall, the Ravian in the
-talking-attendant attempting to sort through the twisted minds, the
-person from the tourist service almost out of his own mind. And though
-Minnn was having sport, he was a little tired. He turned the eyes of
-his host toward the group of hunters, and saw that they had stopped
-coming and stood talking. He walked his host to a window-bench, sat it
-down, turned its mind toward slumber, and relaxed.</p>
-
-<hr class="tb" />
-
-<p>Chester had to have a plan, and, driven to unwonted efficiency by the
-threat of bureaucratic disgrace and exile, his mind began to form one.
-The plan was not without its dangers, especially to Chester, but it was
-the only plan they had.</p>
-
-<p>Power was shut off to all elevators, and at the flip of a switch all
-the doors on the group's floor were locked. "We've got him penned on
-this floor," said Chester. "I only hope he doesn't come across a mouse."</p>
-
-<p>"He's probably on this floor," corrected Monnn through the
-talking-attendant. "And he'll <i>probably</i> stay. Ravians have a slight
-psionic control, as you know, and it's barely possible Minnn could
-force himself through a door-panel."</p>
-
-<p>"How about a wall?"</p>
-
-<p>"I doubt it."</p>
-
-<p>"What if there was nobody on the other side for him to force into?"</p>
-
-<p>"He would not last very long ... we would lose him. And that would go
-hard for you, Mr. Forge, because we do not want Minnn done away with,
-we want him captured."</p>
-
-<p>"I don't need to be reminded," said Chester, mentally getting a
-two-handed hold on the always-be-polite-to-a-tourist rule. "And now
-let's smoke him out."</p>
-
-<p>The director and a helper lingered unobtrusively near a firehose;
-the rest of the group strolled on down the hall. Minnn had rested
-and was alert again. Through his host-eyes he saw there were many
-patients milling about&mdash;there were so many ready refuges. It occurred
-to him that he had not particularly bedeviled his countryman, and he
-caused his host to pick up a vase and hurl it at the head of Monnn's
-talking-attendant.</p>
-
-<p>Almost instantly a blast of chill water struck Minnn's host, knocking
-her sprawling. Minnn found her emotions most unpleasant. He took her
-mind fully, forcing her up from the floor, and a ram of water pounded
-her down again. Somebody was rounding up the other patients, pushing
-them out of his reach. People were yelling, running.</p>
-
-<p>Somebody down the hall aimed a wide-nozzled gun at Minnn's host. There
-was also the blat of an explosion and something hit his host in the
-chest. "What poor weapons," thought Minnn, and then the thing exploded.
-A thick gas swaddled the host-patient, Minnn felt the body sagging.
-There was no time for him to weigh all factors for a really logical
-decision, and he made a snap-judgment to leave this body before it lost
-consciousness and sealed off his contact with his environment.</p>
-
-<p>A form was stumbling past, and Minnn reached his host's hand up and
-touched it. In a flash he had entered. Almost instantaneously he
-realized that this time it was different. The nervous system was alive
-with wild, determined resistance.</p>
-
-<p>His host was Chester Forge.</p>
-
-<p>Chester reeled back from the gas-shrouded, drowsing inmate. The gas
-would stay near her, held by the biostatic charge in all its particles.
-He had to keep away from it; he needed all his consciousness for his
-battle.</p>
-
-<p>He would never be able to quite describe many of the things he felt
-during the struggle he waged within his own organism like a civil war.
-Minnn had entered at his right wrist. Although Chester had mentally
-braced, the alien had surged up his arm almost instantaneously, nearly
-to the shoulder. Chester called on his mind to hold Minnn there. He
-worked some part of his mind to hold Minnn there. He worked some part
-of his mind like a new muscle&mdash;one cannot explain how it is he works a
-muscle, he just does it. Simultaneously Chester reeled down the hall
-toward where Monnn, in the talking-attendant, stood by an open door.
-Monnn and the door were his two aces in the hole.</p>
-
-<p>His flesh crawled; the alien was digging, seeping, sparking through
-him, along his nerves, like a fluid, a worm, a gas, an insidious
-writhing electricity. And the alien was winning. Inexorably he drove
-along the stubborn channels to the seat of control, the watchroom in
-the skull.</p>
-
-<p>The talking-attendant stood with a rustling, limp black sac
-out-held&mdash;Minnn's husk, taken from the toy chest of Sally Odum. If
-Chester could force the writhing Minnn back down and out of his
-fingertips and into the husk....</p>
-
-<p>But he couldn't. The sweat rolled down his face as the fight went on
-inside him. He had no way of knowing what would happen when Minnn, who
-was nearing it, reached his brain. Insanity? Convulsions? Death? At
-the very least, Minnn would control him, and also know his thoughts,
-his plan, his two aces in the hole.</p>
-
-<hr class="tb" />
-
-<p>There was a twist and a tingle at the base of his skull&mdash;the invader
-was entering his brainstalk. It was time to play his first ace. With a
-burst of determination to control his reeling motor functions, Chester
-reached out his hand and touched the hand of the talking-attendant.
-Monnn swished vengefully inside him.</p>
-
-<p>When they had discussed this the others had been afraid. So had
-Chester. Two alien forces, one hostile, both struggling, might rip
-and rupture his psychic system like lightning bolts battling inside
-a transistor. But Chester Forge was a stubborn man, with perhaps a
-bureaucratic stubbornness, certainly a human stubbornness, and he was
-committed to an end to be achieved.</p>
-
-<p>For a few split seconds there was in Chester's nervous system what
-might be described as a "hush." He took advantage of it to step through
-the open door into a dimly-lighted room. The hospital director,
-insulation-swathed, followed with the leather-rustling husk.</p>
-
-<p>Then Minnn and Monnn locked forces, and Chester reeled with the shock
-and swirl of the combat. The two forces mixed, fused, separated,
-mingled, yet Chester somehow knew always which was which, got bursts
-of the reasoning of each, knew in some indescribable way the alien,
-indecipherable natures of each of them. For an instant he panicked.
-Something mysterious and terrible as the dark energy of infinity was
-pounding and flashing in his merely human synapses and cells, something
-he understood yet could not understand at all.</p>
-
-<p>He felt a draining, and knew Minnn was tapping him for energy. Chester
-rallied to help Monnn. He pulled his energy, his thoughts, away from
-Minnn, rolling up, balling, clenching his powers, keeping them out of
-reach, probing for a chance to strike. Minnn filamented through half
-his body; part of the alien was needling and darting into Chester's
-mind, burrowing toward knowledge of his plan. Chester buried his plan
-in the very center of the ball of thoughts, hiding his last ace.</p>
-
-<p>He could not keep this up much longer, and he could feel that both
-Minnn and Monnn knew this. It was time for the big assault. He sent
-flash after flash of willpower crisping through his nerves, and Monnn
-interwove himself in these assaults. Minnn was being forced back, and
-back, intolerably pressured.</p>
-
-<p>Minnn hurled his energies at them in a sudden rush, and Chester felt
-something in him begin to tear like a piece of silk.</p>
-
-<p>Concealed from Minnn like the kernel of a nut, Chester cupped the
-knowledge, his last ace. He was at the verge of cracking, now was the
-time to play it. He edged toward the wall of the room, where a patient
-sat darkly on a bench. At the same time both he and Monnn drove forth
-their last few ergs of pressure against Minnn.</p>
-
-<p>Chester felt something raise his arm. His arm moved toward the patient;
-his palm touched the man's cheek. There was a sudden cleanness in him,
-and Minnn was gone.</p>
-
-<p>He leaped backward through the door and it swung to and locked. A
-peep-panel was opened in it and the black fringed husk hung up before
-the opening. Chester touched the talking-attendant so Monnn could pass
-over, then leaned weakly against the wall opposite the door.</p>
-
-<p>"I give him half an hour," he said. "Who's got a drink of water?"</p>
-
-<p>It turned out that they had waited only twenty-two minutes when the
-fringed sac began to take a luster, to puff and to fill. When they were
-quite sure Minnn was entirely within it, they wrapped it tightly in
-the insulation and took it away.</p>
-
-<p>"It was a good plan," said Monnn through the talking-attendant as
-they drove back toward the town. "We could never have forced him to
-leave you to enter his husk&mdash;his logic would have driven him to fight
-even harder and to stay, with rather unfortunate results to you, Mr.
-Forge, but under pressure he would leave to enter another host. And
-it was lucky the walls of that room held him&mdash;as you said, that was a
-gamble we had to take. But I wish you would again describe to me the
-phenomenon in that room. It sounds quite strange."</p>
-
-<p>"It's something that happens to humans," said Chester, "and I knew no
-Ravian could put up with it. Illogic disturbs you, and you tour in
-human beings only for the sake of one kind of emotion, the pleasant
-kind. In that room there was no logic, and the emotions were of a
-different kind, a kind you haven't heard of. The humans there were in
-what is called a depressive ward. They are illogically unhappy, all the
-time."</p>
-
-<p>"I see," said Monnn through the lips of the attendant. "You have good
-logic, Mr. Forge. I have a new respect for human logic. Yes."</p>
-
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