The sparkling fog is mind stuff.
I will not defend that statement. I will not rationalize it. But I will seek explanations; consider possibilities.
Known: This sparkling fog through which we drift is intelligent matter; the stuff of thoughts; the basic material from which consciousness springs. It is consciousness itself.
Supposed: It is probably electronuclear in composition, and appears to be completely innocent. By that I mean it has no intention to harm, perhaps because it does not understand the difference between good and evil, harm and help, pain and pleasure.
It has only one urge; the basic urge of all creation. To evolve, to develop. As the tree has but one basic urge—to grow and greaten; the flower but one desire—to bloom, to improve; to assert itself through evolution and become better.
Perhaps—and who can successfully deny it?—this great space cloud could be a storage place of the Creator Himself; a storage place for mind stuff. When an infant or an animal or a plant is touched with the magic thing called life—where does that magic come from? Is it created at the very moment or does it come somehow from a source-pile? Is this cloud a source-pile of life itself? No one can say. But I think I've hit on a limitation of this mind stuff. I'm going to try an experiment and pray to God it works.
I'm going to find Murdo and knock him unconscious.
I have solved the mind-stuff. What just happened is the last bit of proof I need. I went to the galley. Murdo had wandered away. I found him in the lounge. I stepped casually in front of him, set myself, and drove a straight right to his jaw. He went down like a log.
I closed my eyes and counted to twenty praying to God to make me right in my belief—in the crazy theory I evolved. I opened my eyes and turned to the storage locker. I looked inside.
The dead leopard was gone.