“This is an outrage!” Danchekker, who was still standing by the screens, shaking with indignation, found his voice at last. “Do you. imagine for one moment that bringing your guttersnipe politics in here is going to make the slightest-”

“Save it, Chris,” Hunt said resignedly. “This isn’t the time or place.”

While Garuth stood staring helplessly at gunpoint, the others began filing toward the door between the impassive, yellow-uniformed police.

Meanwhile, throughout the building other groups of police and disguised Jevlenese auxiliaries had begun rounding up bewildered Ganymeans from their workstations and offices. In Del Cullen’s office, Cullen stood, hands raised with two Jevlenese covering him while a police lieutenant scanned through status displays on his desk. side screen. Outside, Koberg and Lebansky had also been taken by surprise and were being disarmed and searched. Through the doorway, Cullen could see Koberg measuring up times and distances with his eyes.

“Don’t try anything, Mitch,” he called. “It won’t change the war.”

One of the guards jabbed him in the ribs with a gun. He winced

“Shut up,” the lieutenant in the chair at the screen told him over his shoulder.

And then, strange things began happening.

The sounds of running feet and confused shouting came from the corridor beyond the outer room where Koberg and Lebansky were. The guards who were with them looked around, startled. Langerifs voice came from somewhere outside the door. “Quick! Get out here, all of you. Never mind them. Lieutenant Norzalt, Pascars, and Ritoiter, stay there and watch the prisoners.”

The guards in the outer room rushed into the corridor. As the last one disappeared, the automatic door slammed shut behind them. At the same instant, a cry of pain came from the door into Cullen’s office. The two guards who had been left turned their heads instinctively-which was all the distraction that Koberg and Lebansky needed.

Inside the office, Cullen stared in bewilderment as the Jevlenese police lieutenant fell from the chair, writhing and clawing the phones of the Ganymean communications kit from his ears. A high-pitched shrieking noise was coming from the phones, painful even from where Cullen was standing.

“Go for it, turkey,” a voice said in his own ear. Shaking himself into life, Cullen seized the lieutenant by the collar before he could recover, lifted him up and took his weapon, and then laid him out with a couple of fast cracks to the jaw. He went through the door and came into the outer room just as Koberg and Lebansky were straightening up over the limp forms of the two guards who had been left.

“What in hell’s going on?” Cullen demanded, still at a loss as the other two retrieved their guns.

The door from the corridor opened again, and three more Jevlenese police rushed in, coming to a confused halt when they saw the Americans covering them and their two unconscious colleagues on the floor. Cullen and his two men disarmed them, then went outside. There was no sign of Langerif or what had caused the pandemonium. Two Ganymeans were standing, stupefied, by one of the walls.

“What in hell’s going on?” Cullen asked again.

“We don’t know,” one of the Ganymeans answered. “We were being arrested. Then the police were ordered away and left us here. They’re running all over the place. They seem to be getting conflicting orders.”

“Was Langerif here?”

“No. We heard his voice, but we didn’t see him.”

Just then, two more Jevlenese police came running around a corner. Koberg and Lebansky stopped them and relieved them of their guns. The door into Cullen’s office opened obligingly, and the latest additions to the catch were shoved through to join the six already inside. Then the door closed again.

“Those voices were coming out of the walls,” Koberg said, looking around, mystified. “The place is running itself. It’s isolating them in small groups.”

And suddenly, Cullen realized what was happening. “It’s ZORAC!” he exclaimed. “The goddamn computer’s doing it!”

“What did you expect?” the familiar voice said in his ear. “Langerif is in Garuth’s office, making a move to take over. We’ve been infiltrated. There’s a confused situation in security. Most of your men are still with you, but some are on the other side. There are six more police heading your way along R-5.”

“Let’s check that first,” Cullen said, and hurried away with Koberg and Lebansky following.

The lieutenant in Cullen’s office was not the only Jevlenese equipped with a Ganymean communicator to have been overwhelmed by a loud, high-frequency tone suddenly injected into the audio. Elsewhere in the building, other squads were running this way and that to contradictory orders. Half a dozen were trapped in an elevator that had stopped between floors. In the lobby area, a contingent that had gone outside to investigate a nonexistent threat were stranded there when the doors closed, and more than a few in various places were stuck in half-closed doors that refused to budge. From the numbers, it was evident that additional forces had been let in by confederates already inside.

In Garuth’s office and the room outside, the lights had gone out. Hunt, who had worked himself as far as the doorway, heard muted, high-pitched tones in the darkness, and then confused yelling. He dropped to the floor and moved through to just beyond the door.

There was scuffling and confused mutterings. Then Langerifs voice called out something in Jevlenese from inside the office-he had evidently disposed of his Ganymean communicator. The translation came through the earpiece that Hunt was wearing: “Spread out. Cover all the exits. Abrintz, take three men out to the concourse and secure the elevators.”

Another voice responded. “Werselek, Quon, Fassero, come with-“

Then Langerif again, from inside the office. “I didn’t say that. It’s some kind of trick. Stay where you are.”

Only to be countermanded by, “This is Langerif speaking. Do as I say.”

“Don’t listen. That’s a fake.”

“No, I’m not. He is.”

“What do we do?” a voice pleaded somewhere in the blackness.

Then ZORAC’s voice said quietly in Hunt’s ear, “Move about eight feet to your right along the wall, and then across an alcove to a door in the far wall. It’s open, and leads into an equipment room.”

Hunt began worming his way along the base of the wall as ZORAC had indicated. Sounds of shooting and cries of panic came from the direction of the doorway leading out to the elevator concourse, accompanied by Terran voice shouting commands. A Jevlenese voice shouted, “All right, we surrender!”

“Come out with your hands up,” a Terran voice ordered. “Is that all of them in there, Sergeant?”

“All cleared here, sir. Three hostiles dead.”

“What’s going on out there?” Langerifs voice demanded.

“PAC security is outside,” a voice replied. “They’ve taken over the whole floor. We’re trapped.”

“That’s impossible.”

“That wasn’t me speaking,” Langerif’s voice said again.

Reaching the door that ZORAC had indicated, Hunt felt his way through. Del Cullen’s voice called out, “You calculated wrong, Langerif. Half your men were working undercover for us. We’ve got the rest of the building tied up. It’s over. Throw down your guns and come out.”

“Do as he says,” Langerifs voice instructed.

“Take no notice,” another Langerif said.

Hunt bumped his head painfully on an edge of projecting metal. Feeling ahead with his fingers, he hauled himself carefully to his feet, tracing the shapes of equipment racking and supports around him. It came to him then, what was happening. ZORAC was a ship’s computer. Its first priority was the safety of the Shapieron’s crew. Seeing them being rounded up at gunpoint had spurred it into the only action that it was capable of.

Langerif had grasped it, too. “Very clever, for a machine,” his voice snarled in the darkness. “But if the idea is to protect your Ganymeans, you’d better quit right now. We’ve got two of them here and a bunch more outside the door. If the lights aren’t back in five seconds, we shoot.”