Draken backed away. "No, it isn't."
"Don't let the presence of this man be known beyond these four walls, or out of your own laboratory. For your sake and mine, heed my suggestion, Draken."
"Yes," quivered Draken. "I am heeding it. But you know my attitude toward this great order. You know how I regard the maintenance of the Status Quo."
I knew it too, from the way his pallid lips curled. This little man hated the Mohln system, whatever it was.
Jokan got languidly to her feet, a fluid musical allegro. "I know, Draken. If you weren't the greatest thinker in Mohln besides myself, I would report you to the Council for the Maintenance of the Status Quo. But as long as you only think idly, you can cause Mohln no harm."
"The only harm Mohln can suffer," said Draken wearily, "is to continue on as it does now. Toward final decay and rot."
Jokan laughed frostily. I shivered. "Stop worrying, Draken, and go away. I must begin my experiments." She turned her eyes on me. She could have stared down a bronze statue. I turned my eyes from hers on the pretense of looking for Draken, but he was gone.
I jumped to my feet, and the movement revealed that I, too, had on the costume that Draken wore.
Without egoism, I can say that it must have looked more becoming on me than on the little scientist. I was at least a foot taller than Jokan.
She came toward me, fluid motion. I couldn't back away—I insist I wanted to get away for various reasons, the least being that I wanted to get solid on my mental feet—from the metal table. I looked almost frantically for a door or some kind of exit, even a window. There was nothing.