There was a fluttering of vanes and the copter with the instruments mounted on it came down in the middle of the street, between Haendl and the Eye.
It was all very rapid from then on.
The Eye swooped toward Haendl. He couldn't help it; he ducked. That was useless, but it was also unnecessary, for he saw in a second that it was only partly the motion of the Eye toward him that made it loom larger; it was also that the Eye itself was growing.
An Eye was perhaps the size of a football, as near as anyone could judge. This one got bigger, bigger. It was the size of a roc's egg, the size of a whale's blunt head. It stopped and hovered over the helicopter, while the man inside frantically pointed lenses and meters—
Thundercrash.
Not a man this time—Translation had gone beyond men. The whole helicopter vanished, man, instruments, spinning vanes and all.
Haendl picked himself up, sweating, shocked beyond sleepiness.
The young man named Frampton said fearfully: "Haendl, what do we do now?"
"Do?" Haendl stared at him absently. "Why, kill ourselves, I guess."
He nodded soberly, as though he had at last attained the solution of a difficult problem. Then he sighed.