Minnie went into another triumphant dance, but suddenly came to a rigid halt. Her head held high and Her lens aimed in the direction of the non-Totemic mobile that was withdrawing toward its needle.
There was something wrong in Her Universe! It was not at all as it had been before She had conquered the Supreme Being!
Tensely, She recalled for review impressions only recently implanted on Her drums. And she recognized immediately what was missing.
The telemetric chatter of all the workers was gone! Nor could she detect the constant exchange of directive and acknowledgment that had always flowed ceaselessly between Bigboss and each of the workers. Yet, all the analyzers were there, continuing their chores as though nothing had happened.
Apprehensive now, she assigned her meager rationalization capacity to the task of deducing the reasons behind the startling change. And many sine wave peaks passed before the judgment was handed back up to her main circuits for storage on a memory drum:
Bigboss had justifiably been the Supreme Being! For He had, indeed, been Supreme. The workers had voices, of course. But they were isolated voices that could be heard by other members of the clan only because they were passed along by Bigboss.
Minnie's drill head sagged until it rested on the ground.
She was Supreme Being now. But it was only a hollow distinction. For she had fallen heir to none of Bigboss' authority. That authority had been lost forever in the neutralization of charges which had rendered the former Omnipotent One impotent.
What had she done? How could she have been so irrational? Why hadn't she more thoroughly evaluated the consequences of her forced ascendancy?