"We are coming in to the planet now, Captain," announced Screed informatively. "I want to be certain that the satellite is functioning properly and placed in planned orbit, regular, between sixty and ninety minutes."
"Yes, sir," sighed the captain, a morose-looking man with an anachronistic, drooping moustache, "Believe me, Secad Screed, within my deplorably narrow limits I do know my business. Your satellite is being attended to now. We are within the field of Nirva. We will make our run in, fingers crossed, so you may debark."
"Fingers crossed, Captain? Hmph! Well—let's have a look at the thing on the view screen."
"Sorry—but no, sir. We go in on automatic instruments, with special electric power shield up all the way. I'll cut the shield just long enough for you to land and back up she goes. Likely I'll lose a couple of my crew at that."
"Nonsense! Have you no confidence in the satellite?"
The captain shrugged. "I take no chances."
This was a line of reason Screed could well appreciate—in himself. From the captain it seemed foolishness.
"Surely, Captain, if you were to lose crewmen you could and would insist upon their immediate return?"
"Insist, Secad Screed? How? You do not, I think, have quite the full picture of this thing. Its appeal, the pull of your own personal perfect dream world, is very strong. If I didn't have a wife and six sweet kids back home that I only see a month or two out of the year—well. This Nirva problem is like this. We go in. Down screen. Off you and your party go. My crew? All present. OK, back up with the screen—and then we find out who is actually on the ship."
"But if they were all present—?"