"Whichever way we look there are too many 'ifs' and 'buts' to suit me," Kinnison summed up the situation finally. "If we can find them, and if we can get up close to them without losing our minds to them, we could clean them out if we had some power in our accumulators. So I'd say the first thing for us to do is to get our batteries charged. We saw some cities from the air, and cities always have power. Lead us to power, Worsel—almost any kind of power—and we'll soon have it in our guns."
"There are cities, yes"—Worsel was not at all enthusiastic—"dwelling places of the ordinary Delgonians, the people you saw being eaten in the cavern of the Overlords. As you saw, they resemble us Velantians to a certain extent. Since they are of a lower culture and are much weaker in life force than we are, however, the Overlords prefer us to their own slave races.
"To visit any city of Delgon is out of the question. Every inhabitant of every city is an abject slave and his brain is an open book. Whatever he sees, whatever he thinks, is communicated instantly to his master. And I now perceive that I may have misinformed you as to the Overlords' ability to use weapons. While the situation has never arisen, it is only logical to suppose that as soon as we are seen by any Delgonian the controllers will order all the inhabitants of the city to capture us and bring us to them."
"What a guy!" interjected VanBuskirk. "Did you ever see his top for looking at the bright side of life?"
"Only in conversation," the Lensman replied. "When the ether gets crowded, you notice, he's right in here, blasting away and not saying a word. But there's one thing we haven't thought of: power. I've got only eight minutes of free flight left in my battery; and with your mass, you must be about out. Come to think of it, didn't you land a trifle hard when we sat down here?"
"Practically inert."
"That means we've got to get some power. Well, it's not so bad, at that; there's a city right close."
"Yes, but as far as I'm concerned it might as well be on Mars. You know as well as I do what's between here and there. You can take my batteries and I'll wait here."
"On your emergency food, water, and air? That's out!"
"What else, then?"