formation it would need in hypno-sleep
while the frozen body was thawed out. Sometimes, however, he came the
normal way in a body which still had some of its thirty days left, as he
had come to Ophiuchus IX in the Sirian gentleman.

Darkness. The body felt young and healthy. Mayhem wondered vaguely how
it had died, then decided it did not really matter. For the next thirty
days the body would live again, as Johnny Mayhem.

Recessed lighting glowed at the juncture of walls and ceiling. Mayhem
was reclining on a cot. A loin cloth and a large shawl had been laid out
for him. On the far wall of the room was a tinted mirror. Mayhem got up
and went over there.

What his new body looked like hardly mattered, he told himself. Youth,
health, strength--these were important. He could sense them internally.
He could....

He stared at the image in the mirror. His face turned beet red. He went
for the shawl and the loin cloth and put them on. Cursing, he went to
find Kovandaswamy.

"Is this supposed to be a joke?" Mayhem demanded.

"You never asked what the--" Kovandaswamy began.

"How am I supposed to find out anything--like this?"

"It's a young body, a healthy body. It is also the one we were given
when the Galactic League first came here. It is the only one we were
given."

"Take it or leave it, eh?"

"I'm afraid so, Mayhem."

"All right. All right, I guess I shouldn't complain. It could probably
outrun and outfight and outthink the dyspeptic old Sirian gentleman, and
things turned out well enough on Sirius III. But it'll probably take
most of my time just getting used to it, Kovandaswamy. I'm supposed to
be conducting an investigation."

"At least as an Ophiuchan you won't arouse suspicion."

Mayhem nodded slowly, with reluctance. There was nothing else to say. He
shook hands with Kovandaswamy and, wearing the loin cloth and the shawl,
left the Galactic League building.

With, of course, a completely new identity.

Mayhem walked a mile and a half through hot, arid country. The League
building was isolated, as if its inmates might contaminate the native
Ophiuchans. Along the dusty road Mayhem passed a _guru_, the name for a
wise man or a holy man first in India and now here on Ophiuchus IX. The
guru sat in contemplation of the tip of his nose, legs crossed, soles of
feet up, eyes half-closed. The guru remained that way, without moving,
until Mayhem was out of sight. Then the guru behaved in a very
un-guru-like