"My father discovered its presence, Cragin. I helped him with the latter stages of his calculations; accompanied him out here. He discovered its presence and he discovered its function. And they—"
"Function? You mean it's a mine of some sort? Water crystal?"
"No, Cragin. It wasn't built to serve men. It rules them. For want of a better term, call it a control point. Because the machine-planet has absolute control over the axial rotation and orbital revolution of every planet in the solar system; over the heat emitted from its sun; over the physical laws which are peculiar to each of its planets. Father was trying to learn how to use it. He thought if he could discover how it worked he could readjust Earth, replenish the sun, remake—"
"I don't believe you, Lin Griffin. It's a ruse—"
"I will show you the mark where he died. They killed him, and let me go, half-crazed as I was, to keep men forever in fear of passing through the Barrier. I think they underestimate us psychologically, and that is why—"
"They? Who?" Cragin cut in, disbelief still welling in his brain, edging the tone of his voice.
"The—Owners, I call them, Cragin. They told us they own the universe."
III
It was as gray as the sand-blown skies of Earth in every direction; once past its artificial veil of luminescence, the machine-planet was a colder, more sterile thing than the widest valley on the dark side of the moon. His mind refused to believe what it knew to be true—that the surface of the sphere was hard, unyielding metal, worked in some gigantic factory on some impossible world to an almost frictionless smoothness. After he touched down, Cragin had to keep his forward jets checked in at almost ten times their normal landing thrust to bring the SP-15 to a skittering halt.