ength in an attempt to stand up.

For a moment the machine teetered, its wheels spinning wildly. Then it
flipped over on its back. Barrent collapsed beside it.

When he could see again, the machine was still on its back. It was
extruding a set of arms to turn itself over.

Barrent threw himself on the machine's flat belly and hammered with his
fists. Nothing happened. He tried to pull off one of the wheels, and
couldn't. Max was propping itself up, preparing to turn over and resume
the contest.

The girl's motions caught Barrent's eye. She was making a plucking
motion, repeatedly, insistently.

Only then Barrent saw a small fuse box near one of the wheels. He yanked
off the cover, losing most of a fingernail in the process, and removed
the fuse.

The machine expired gracefully.

Barrent fainted.

Chapter Eleven

On Omega, the law is supreme. Hidden and revealed, sacred and profane,
the law governs the actions of all citizens, from the lowest of the low
to the highest of the high. Without the law, there could be no
privileges for those who made the law; therefore the law was absolutely
necessary. Without the law and its stern enforcement, Omega would be an
unthinkable chaos in which a man's rights could extend only as far and
as long as he personally could enforce them. This anarchy would mean the
end of Omegan society; and particularly, it would mean the end of those
senior citizens of the ruling class who had grown high in status, but
whose skill with a gun had long passed its peak.

Therefore the law was necessary.

But Omega was also a criminal society, composed entirely of individuals
who had broken the laws of Earth. It was a society which, in the final
analysis, stressed individual endeavor. It was a society in which the
lawbreaker was king; a society in which crimes were not only condoned
but were admired and even rewarded; a society in which deviation from
the rules was judged solely on its degree of success.

And this resulted in the paradox of a criminal society with absolute
laws which were meant to be broken.

The judge, still hidden behind his screen, explained all this to
Barrent. Several hours had passed since the end of the Trial by Ordeal.
Barrent had been taken to the infirmary, where his injuries were patched
up. They were minor, for the most part; two cracked ribs, a deep gouge
in his left shoulder, and various cuts and bruises.

"Accordingly," the judge went on, "the law mu