than a man, despite the
three pairs of limbs. And then Temple had time to gape no longer, for
the creature, whatever it was, flashed past him at what he now had to
consider a gallop.

More followed. Different. Temple stared and stared. One could have
been a great, sentient hoop, rolling downhill and gathering momentum.
If he carried the wheel analogy further, a huge eye stared at him from
where the hub would have been. Something else followed with kangaroo
leaps. One thick-thewed leg propelled it in tremendous, fifteen-foot
hopping strides while its small, flapper-like arms beat the air
prodigiously.

Legions of creatures. All fantastically different. _I'm going crazy_,
Temple thought, then said it aloud. "I'm going crazy."

Theorizing thus, he heard a whir overhead, whirled, looked up.
Something was poised a dozen feet off the ground, a large, box-like
object seven or eight feet across, rotors spinning above it. That, at
least, he could understand. A helicopter.

"I'm lowering a ladder, Kit. Swing aboard."

Arkalion's voice.

Stunned enough to accept anything he saw, Temple waited for the rope
ladder to drop, grasped its end, climbed. He swung his legs over a
sill, found himself in a neat little cabin with Arkalion, who hauled
the ladder in and did something to the controls. They sped away.
Temple had one quick moment of lucid thought before everything which
had happened in the last few moments shoved logic aside. What he had
observed looked for all the world like a foot-race.

"Where the hell _are_ we?" Temple demanded breathlessly.

Arkalion smiled. "Where do you think? Journey's end. Welcome to
Nowhere, Kit. Welcome to the place where all your questions can be
answered because there's no going back. Sorry I set you down in that
field by mistake, incidentally. Those things sometimes happen."

"Can I just throw the questions at you?"

"If you wish. It isn't really necessary, for you will be indoctrinated
when we get you over to Earth city where you belong."

"What do you mean, there's no going back? I thought they had a
rotation system which for one reason or another wasn't practical at
the moment. That doesn't sound like no going back, ever."

Arkalion grunted, shrugged. "Have it your way. I _know_."

"Sorry. Shoot."

"Just how far do you think you have come?"

"Search me. Some other star system, maybe?"

"Maybe. Clean across the galaxy, Kit."

Temple whistled softly. "It isn't something you can