"Emergency call, eh? That'll be paras. They're better organized than we thought, if they picked up your landing request! There's an emergency, all right! It's the devil of an emergency—it looks like devils! But this is the spaceport. Will you come in?"
"Naturally," said Calhoun. "What's the emergency?"
"You'll find out...." That was the professional voice. The other snapped angrily, "Cut your signal!" The professional voice again: "... you land. It's not...." "Cut your signal, you fool! Cut it...." The other voice again.
There was confusion. The two voices spoke together. Each was on a tight beam, while Calhoun's call was broadcast. The voices could not hear each other, but each could hear Calhoun.
"Don't listen to them! There's...." "to understand, but...." "Don't listen! Don't...." "... When you land."
Then the voice from the spaceport stopped, and Calhoun cut down the volume of the other. It continued to shout, though muffled. It bellowed, as if rattled. It mouthed commands as if they were arguments or reasons. Calhoun listened for fully five minutes. Then he said carefully into his microphone:
"Med Ship Esclipus Twenty calling spaceport. I will arrive at given co-ordinates at the time given. I suggest that you take precautions if necessary against interference with my landing. Message ends."
He swung the ship around and aimed for the destination with which he'd been supplied—a place in emptiness five diameters out, with the center of the sun's disk bearing so-and-so and the center of the planet's disk bearing so-and-thus. He turned the communicator volume down still lower. The miniature voice shouted and threatened in the stillness of the Med Ship's control room. After a time Calhoun said reflectively:
"I don't like this, Murgatroyd! An unidentified voice is telling us—and we're Med Ship personnel, Murgatroyd!—who we should speak to and what we should do. Our duty is plainly to ignore such orders. But with dignity, Murgatroyd! We must uphold the dignity of the Med Service!"
Murgatroyd said skeptically: