headed from the shots. "How
many of them lived?" he mumbled vaguely.

"One. We got him off in time. Made them pay in advance of course."

At first Jason thought the Pyrran was joking. Then he remembered they
had very little interest in humor of any kind. If one-half of what Meta
and Kerk had told him was true, six to one odds weren't bad at all.

There was a bed in the next room and Brucco helped him to it. Jason felt
drugged and probably was. He fell into a deep sleep and into the dream.

Fear and hatred mixed in equal parts and washed over him red hot. If
this was a dream, he never wanted to sleep again. If it wasn't a dream,
he wanted to die. He tried to fight up against it, but only sank in more
deeply. There was no beginning and no end to the fear and no way to
escape.

When consciousness returned Jason could remember no detail of the
nightmare. Just the fear remained. He was soaked with sweat and ached in
every muscle. It must have been the massive dose of shots, he finally
decided, that and the brutal gravity. That didn't take the taste of fear
out of his mouth, though.

Brucco stuck his head in the door then and looked Jason up and down.
"Thought you were dead," he said. "Slept the clock around. Don't move,
I'll get something to pick you up."

The pickup was in the form of another needle and a glassful of
evil-looking fluid. It settled his thirst, but made him painfully aware
of gnawing hunger.

"Want to eat?" Brucco asked. "I'll bet you do. I've speeded up your
metabolism so you'll build muscle faster. Only way you'll ever beat the
gravity. Give you quite an appetite for a while though."

Brucco ate at the same time and Jason had a chance to ask some
questions. "When do I get a chance to look around your fascinating
planet? So far this trip has been about as interesting as a jail term."

"Relax and enjoy your food. Probably be months before you're able to go
outside. If at all."

Jason felt his jaw hanging and closed it with a snap. "Could you
possibly tell me why?"

"Of course. You will have to go through the same training course that
our children take. It takes them six years. Of course it's their first
six years of life. So you might think that you, as an adult, could learn
faster. Then again they have the advantage of heredity. All I can say is
you'll go outside these sealed buildings when you're ready."

Brucco had finished eating while he talked, and sat staring at Jason's
bare arms with g