"Life and death are not yours to direct," the voice said. "That lies solely with the Owners. That is universal."
"By what universal right?" The girl's voice rose to the pitch of half anger, half contempt.
"How?" Cragin's voice was touched with the mixed overtones of curiosity and incredulity.
"By their own right. Through methods of their own."
"That's a hell of a scientific answer," Cragin said.
"It is no answer at all!" the girl said. She took a step forward toward the intruder, and there was high color in her cheeks. Only his cloak moved. "Perhaps you control your own destinies, if that is what you care to think. But not ours! For the use of your machinery, we will gladly repay you, in any medium that you desire that we are capable of supplying. But our role isn't that of intruder or wrong doer; it is simply one of desperation. With your machines, our planet, its life, might be saved. If you know of life, you know of the high value men put upon it. If you believe in—"
"Save your breath, honey. I think the bull of the woods here is trying to work up an angle. He's a phony. All he's got here are a bunch of damn good telescreens, and they've never moved anything yet.... Right, Buster?"
The figure in scarlet mail moved then. There was no sound, and hardly a show of motion as his fingers played over a switch-studded panel. The telescreens came to life. In each were pictured solar systems, some binary; one with three suns. All were circled about with planets turning in a precise geometry of motion. With barely a nod, the figure singled out the screen in which the binary and its brood of planets shown like so many pin-points of light rolling in eerie slow motion through Infinity. A finger flick that Cragin could not follow and—
Three planets suddenly plunged headlong; in seconds there was a blinding flash. Even as he shielded his eyes, Cragin knew that he had been witness to the destruction of an entire system. Although it had been light-years distant, and the telescreen had relayed the coruscations of its destruction instantaneously, Cragin knew that there was no way to deny what he had seen.