* * * * *
At their appearance, some creature set up an excited yap-yapping.
Joel stared around trying to locate the beast. Then he swallowed. The
yapping noise was issuing from a plant in a green tub!
"Thank you, Peg," Priscilla said. "That's all."
Peg curtsied, backed out.
"What is that thing?" Joel demanded.
"It's an Asgardian lung beast." Priscilla went to the excited plant,
stroked it gently. The yapping ceased. "See. It's not a plant at all.
It's one of the three known species of Asgardian rooted mammals."
Joel put his hand on the creature. It was like a lump of flesh covered
with soft brown hair! He shuddered, snatched his hand away.
Priscilla laughed. She was wearing a short yellow smock and sandals.
She said, "Sit down, Joel. I want to talk to you."
He sank into the relaxer she indicated. Instantly, flexible metal
bands whipped about his throat, his biceps, his wrists and ankles. He
wrenched convulsively, squirmed.
The more he fought the tighter the bands contracted. He couldn't
breathe. A red haze swam before his eyes.
"Relax!" he heard Priscilla's voice coming from a great distance.
He slumped in the seat. The bands slacked off. He could breathe again.
"Damn you! Damn you!" he rasped. His throat was raw.
"I'm sorry, Joel!" she said in a scared voice. "I have to know
something!"
Sitting stiffly in the chair's metal embrace, he watched her from the
corner of his eye. She was wheeling a machine onto the terrace. Wires
sprouted from it like the ganglia of the nervous system. Each wire
terminated in a tiny saucer-shaped disk. She fastened them to his
temple, the base of his skull, his solar plexus, his spine. Sweat burst
out on Joel's face.
Priscilla finished attaching the sucker discs. Then she sat down at the
machine, began to fiddle with a dial.