"Danger? From a small boy?"
"Deadly danger—danger of infection that might threaten every intelligent race in the galaxy and even spread across the great gulfs of space beyond—"
"All this from poor little Timmy?"
"From what he might thereby become."
"I'm licked." Phil threw out his hands angrily. "I try to get a straight answer and all I get is implications. You tell me an outrageous story, and I believe you. You tell me you've neatly arranged to break the hearts of two of my best friends, and I respect your good intentions in doing so. Why? I love you like a brother, but I'm ready to take a rock and crush your skull in for a monster. I mean it! I could kill Homer with a single kick! I could—"
"I know, and I'm afraid of that hysterical impulse. I know the nature of the struggle going on in your mind better than you do, but only you can fight for control. I must wait for the outcome. When you have control of yourself—"
"You're so bloody sane and smug you with your secondhand suit and hand-me-down knowledge!" He jumped up in a fury and turned his back on Timmy, addressing himself directly to Homer whose patient, pain-filled eyes held undeniable understanding. "Look at you! The telepathic genius with personal immortality—at a price only you could stomach! Too bad you got caught short and had to live in a cur! Tough, isn't it, having to wait for a mere moron to get control of himself! You know all the answers—why don't you control the situation?"
"Because the hand-me-down knowledge is no longer backed by the mental capacity of a Challon."
Phil stiffened as Tim's answering voice sounded behind him, quiet and friendly. Against his will, he turned back to the boy and seated himself again on the log. The boy's eyes caught and held his.
"The morality and outlook of the Challon are my morality and outlook, whether I wish it so or not." Tim might have been making a pleasantly inconsequential remark about the weather for all the importance he seemed to attach to his statement, yet his eyes held the strained, tight-lipped face. "The insight and understanding bequeathed by the Challon are sufficient to keep Homer's mind sane under long stress, and of course—"