Tragor awoke with a start from a dream transcending in splendor anything his waking mind could have imagined. In his dream Tragor had been surrounded by the wisest and boldest of his people. He was standing on the heights looking down on a planet ripe for plunder.
The green hills and valleys of the planet Earth stretched out beneath him, with its golden harvests, winding waterways and populous cities stretching away for miles.
"It must be a bitter blow to you, Tragor," the voice which had awakened him went on relentlessly. "Frankly, I couldn't live with myself if I had to tear up a Plan I had worked on for a third of a lifetime. But no matter. Coordinator Kraii insists on seeing you immediately. It's a command."
Even before he opened his eyes Tragor knew it was Sull's voice he heard. Sull was standing there quietly looking at him. Sull the fox, bland of voice and gesture, but with cruel, shrewd eyes that saw too much.
Sull was looking at him derisively, his lidded eyes gleaming with triumph. Yes, the crafty wretch did look remarkably like a fox—that cunning little animal of Earth that scurried in and out of burrows on the new planet, waiting for just the right moment to bite and draw blood.
But with an effort Tragor controlled himself. "Thank you, Sull," he said. His voice was satirically polite, edged with contempt. But Sull managed to look guileless, as if anger verging on violence between two similarly dedicated Martians would have been unthinkable.
Tragor knew that the interview with the Chief Coordinator was going to be unpleasant. Mortally dangerous and unpleasant. He was sure of that. He might not even return from it alive.
He went to his dressing compartment first, and put on his most resplendent uniform, carefully assembling on his chest the many decorations he had earned by risking his life in a hundred Martian conflicts. He arranged the medals painstakingly, with just the right indifference to precise spacing, so that the most important ones were half obscured by the overall glitter of the rest. It was just the kind of negligence which a truly modest Martian might be expected to display. Then he inspected himself in a mirror and was satisfied with what he saw.
Kraii was waiting for him in the central coordinating compartment, his huge taloned hands, blue-veined, in ominous repose on his knees. Kraii was at his dangerous worst when he appeared to be completely relaxed. He sat before a black metal document stand which shone with an ebon lustre in the cold light which streamed down from above.
"Sit down, Tragor," he said.