"It's all so logical, sir," the first officer told Iversen. "The individuality or the soul or the psyche—however you want to look at it—starts the essentially simple cycle of life as a greech—"
"Why as a greech?" Iversen asked, humoring him for the moment. "There are lower life-forms on Flimbot."
"I don't know." The first officer sounded almost testy. "That's where Harkaway starts the progression."
"Harkaway! Is there no escaping that cretin's name?"
"Sir," said the first officer, "may I speak frankly?"
"No," Iversen said, "you may not."
"Your skepticism arises less from disbelief than from the fact that you are jealous of Harkaway because it was he who made the great discovery, not you."
"Which great discovery?" Iversen asked, sneering to conceal his hurt at being so overwhelmingly misunderstood. "Flimbot or mpoola?"
"Both," the first officer said. "You refuse to accept the fact that this hitherto incompetent youth has at last blossomed forth in the lambent colors of genius, just as the worthy greech becomes a zkoort, and the clean-living zkoort in his turn passes on to the next higher plane of existence, which is, in the Flimbotzik scale—"
"Spare me the theology, please," Iversen begged. "Once a greech, always a greech, I say. And I can't help thinking that somehow, somewhere, Harkaway has committed some horrible error."