Battlefield Earth

In this way, after the first one, each Psychlo entering would see another Psychlo lying there, unconscious, getting his teeth fixed on another table. The metal analyzer on the first table was explained as necessary to find cavities.

They rolled up their sleeves and began to roll.

The assembly line went off without a hitch. A Psychlo would come in, get the metal removed from his brain, be shunted over to get his teeth fixed, and then be wheeled back on a mine cart to the Psychlo area of the compound to recover.

It took one hundred forty-four working hours, twelve days, to get the whole lot through.

The early ones were all up and about before the last one was finished. They had had a lot of cavities, even some minor extractions. But their gleaming fangs! My, were they impressed. Walking about, whenever they passed a reflective surface, they could be seen holding their breath, lifting their breathe-masks, and inspecting anew their beautiful new “smiles.”

A Psychlo admiring beauty was a major change in itself.

They did not become more polite. But they became more pleasant and agreeable.

Ker couldn't stand the others getting all this without himself getting into the scene. He didn't even know he didn't have any capsules, but he did know his fangs weren't shiny bright. So they had to pull him in, put him under, and polish his teeth. And that finished the lot.

The medical team took the cricks out of their backs and began to pack up.

“It’s all over to you now, Jo

And the team went back to Aberdeen. Jo

Chapter 3

Chirk collected the company perso

Jo

But there was more in the record. Since the age of fifty, Soth had never returned to Psychlo. He had been shipped all over the universes, serving two years here, four years there. But never a return to Psychlo. He had even been cross-fired on rigs every time, a thing that was very unusual as almost all cargos went via Psychlo and Jo

Jo

It was an oddity. Jo

That little slip of paper had condemned a being to obvious exile for a hundred thirty years! No other black marks evident. Always seemed to have done his work, nothing negative otherwise. Instead of going straight to Soth, Jo

Remembering the Chamco brothers,

Jo

Maz's teeth were gleaming behind his faceplate. He sat down easily enough. He was a bit surly.

“I hear that Ker clown has been saying I won't work,” began Maz with no preliminary. “Contract or no contract, if you think you can put a midget operations officer over the head of a pla

“He just wants to get the tungsten mine going,” said Jo

“What's the point? You can't ship it to Psychlo. You finished that!”

Jo

Maz scowled. Jo

“Somehow,” said Maz, and his scowl deepened, “I don't think I’m supposed to talk mathematics with an alien.” He thought it over. He lifted a back strap of his breathe-mask and scratched under it.

A considerable time passed.

“I can't think where I got that idea. Mine school? Yes, mine school. Say, this is fu

“Showing me how to do mathematics,” said Jo

Maz shrugged. “Why bother? Take a lot less time for me to do the calculations myself. What's he going to do with the ore?”

“Cross-fire it to other planets,” said Jo

“That's kind of illegal. How much bonus? For me, I mean.”

“The usual,” said Jo

“Tell you what. You tell that Ker he ain't no boss of mine and mind his ma

Jo

Jo

He went down to Salisbury and, with Thor to back off the elephants and black mambas, dug into the man-books trying to find anything about “whirling spirals” being held in front of people's faces.

He found one reference to it in a booklet named, “Hypnotism for the Millions.” Seemed kind of silly. He made one and, with Thor holding a small deer, spun it in front of its face and all the deer did was stare at it.

Thor said to try it on him and he did, but Thor just went into gales of laughter.

According to the book, you put people to sleep and told them things and then the people would do them afterward without knowing it was an order. Jo

What a weird world those Psychlos had lived in! imagine putting a whole population under a mental cloud! But the idea wasn't solely Psychlo's, for there it had been among the spider webs of the old man-library! And it had been a man-book which had led him on to the capsules.

How could any being consider itself so right to think it should make all other beings into robots to do its bidding? He thought of Lars. Had Hitler been doing things like that?