Commander General Adstrom was confronted with a serious problem. Marmaduke Karns represented a one-man revolution that could not be suppressed. The commander general might call out the army, the navy, the airforce and the spaceforce, but not a human being would kill Karns, because the gland extract had made it psychologically impossible for one human being to kill another. As long as Karns were alive, whether he be in jail or free, Karns was bound to climb to the top of the heap.
The commander general played his final trump.
"I plead with you in the name of human progress," he said, "to thrust aside your personal ambitions and put your self-bestowed gift of individuality in the service of mankind!"
"When you put it that way," Karns said, "I'd be a heel to refuse."
"Ah!" Commander General Adkins drew a deep sigh.
Briefly he explained his proposition. He told of the radio reports received from the Burnt Atom indicating that a creature existed in the middle of The Black Hole that blocked progress in developing Chaos.
"There was an interruption of signals and then silence," Adstrom continued. "We have not heard from the Burnt Atom since and there's no doubt that this terrible creature, Limio, destroyed the ship. Now we human beings have learned a few lessons in our millions of years of existence. One of them is that a rotten place on the world or in the universe spreads. We must someday come to death grips with Limio and we believe we can tackle him better now than later on."
"Why now?"
"At present he is confined to only one planet—or star, for we believe Chaos is simply a burnt-out star. As he grows he will become desperate, just as mankind grew desperate when the earth became overpopulated. Limio, sooner or later, will find a way to move Chaos out of The Black Hole. By that time he will be large enough to join other planets to his own. The eventual conclusion will be that Limio will absorb every atom of carbon in the universe, including the human race, and the whole universe will be occupied by a single living creature."
"It sounds rather absurd," Marmaduke said.