The supervisor stood and watched while he transferred the gnawing at his knuckles to his fingernails.
He waited, with apprehensive satisfaction, for some angry colonist to come through and scream at them to turn off that unprintable-phrases siren. He braced himself and worked up some choice phrases of his own to scream back at the colonist for neglecting his duty—getting Extrapolation Headquarters here on Earth all worked up over nothing. He wondered if he dared threaten to send an Extrapolator out there to check them over.
He decided the threat would have no punch. An E would pay no attention to his recommendation. He knew it, and the colonist would know it too.
He began to wonder what excuse the colonist would have.
"Just wanted to see if you home-office boys were on your toes," the insolent colonist would drawl. Probably something like that.
He hoped the right words wouldn't fail him.
But there was no response to the siren.
"Lock the key down," he told the operator. "Keep it blasting until they wake up."
He looked down the room and saw that a couple of the near operators were now frankly listening.
"Get on with your work," he said loudly. "Pay attention to what you're recording."