u that
your insults have no basis in reality, otherwise my intellect could
not have claimed ascendancy over the immediate urges of my tortured
sense of extreme disgust. Be wise, say I, knowing I request the
impossible, and irk me no more!"

"'Y God, I reckon you don't think you rile me up, too, with all that
high falutin' jabber of yours!" Jacob snapped back.

"As I speak, so speak the mighty Zoz," replied the Weapon in high
dignity. "They are great and noble beings, given to poetic flights and
magnificent deeds. To them, your puny opinions would not even be
recognized as thought."

"If they talk in that puttin'-on, play-actin' way you do, they are a
bunch of phony show-offin' hypocrites!" sulked Jacob.

Several things happened too quickly for Jacob to follow. The color of
the energy globe dropped to absolute black. The metallic cylinder
swung up to point at Jacob. A thin ringing "_Ping!_" sounded in the
cylinder. A killing wave of pure hate struck Jacob.

He had just enough time to know he was a dead man before he blacked
out.

* * * * *

It came as a surprise, when Jacob regained consciousness, to find that
he was stretched out on purple grass with the Weapon still hovering
over him.

"You missed, 'y God!" he mumbled, sitting up.

"I regained my sanity in time, Master Technician," the Weapon replied
pleasantly.

"Huh?"

"Ah, day of un-containable joy!" sang the Weapon, flaming pure white.
"Day of glorious release to continue the grandeur of old! As the past
eons of futility passed over me, I sank to the conclusion that I was
forever condemned to my useless existence on this planet, with nothing
to sustain my spirit other than the sense of beauty given me by
masters to fill my leisure hours! But now, Master Technician Jacob,
you have found me and corrected my malfunction, long after I had
surrendered all hope!"

Still dazed by the nearly fatal wave of mental energy the Weapon had
directed at him, Jacob could not understand what had happened. Instead
of talking contemptuously to him, the Weapon was now addressing him as
Master Something-or-other, and....

"What did you say I done?" he asked.

"You corrected my malfunction," repeated the Weapon. "That is to say,
you purged my mechanism of the inhibition against joyful slaughter
that has plagued me for a billion years. Ah, you are a clever
Technician, Jacob! But I comprehend it all now. By arousing within me
an overwhelm