The Game of Stars and Comets Read Free Page A

them was a name: STEEL.
    For a long moment he weighed the package in his hand. But the communication was not personal. And officially the contents might well be his business. He smothered a small twinge of guilt and stripped away the wrapping, eager to discover what had been so important that Jon Steel had sent to Base for aid.
     

Chapter 2
    Sample submitted has the following properties, Kade read in the code-script of the Service. There was a listing of chemical symbols. It will therefore ably nourish and support Terran herbivores without difficulty, being close in structure to the grama grass of our western continental plains.
    Grama grass, suitable nourishment for Terran herbivores—Kade read the symbols a second time and then studied in turn the two accompanying enclosures, each sheathed in a plasta-protector. Both were wisps, perhaps a finger long, of dried vegetation carrying a seed head. One was a palish gray-brown. It could represent a tuft of Terran hay. The other was much darker, a dull, rusty red, and Kade thought it might have been pulled from roots in the plain stretching away beyond the outer wall of the Klorian post.
    So, Steel had sent a selection of native grass to be analyzed. And, judging by the wording of this report, analyzed with a purpose in mind, to see if it could nourish some form of Terran animal life. Why?
    Kade pulled down one of the wall-slung seats and sat before the desk, laying the grass on its surface. He knew this must be important. Important enough to be paid for by a man's life? Or did the report have anything at all to do with Steel's death? And how had he died? So far, none of the men Kade had met here had mentioned his predecessor. He must get access to Steel's report tapes, discover why a finger-thick roll of Klorian wild grass had been sent to Prime Base for analytical processing.
    The clear chime of the mess call sounded and Kade unsealed his tunic, tucking the contents of the packet into his inner valuables belt for the safest keeping he knew.
    To join any established Team was never easy for the newcomer. In addition Kade knew that Abu had been duly warned concerning his glaring misdeed of the immediate past. He would need strong self-control and his wits to last out the probationary period the others would put him through. And, had he not had this private mystery to chew upon, he might have dreaded his first session with his new Teammates more.
    But there was no outward strain in the mess hall where the odors of several exotic dishes mingled. Each man ate rather absently while he dealt with his own newly arrived pile of private message flimsies, catching up with the concerns off Klor which had meaning for him. And Kade was free to study the assortment of Terrans without having to be too subtle in appraisement.
    Commander Abu ate stolidly, as an engine might refuel, his attention held by the reader through which a united strip of flimsies crawled at a pace which suggested that either the Team leader was not a swift-sighter, or else that there was enough solid meat in his messages to entail complete concentration.
    On the other hand, Che'in's round face betrayed a variety of fleeting emotions with the mobility of a Tri-Vee actor as one flimsy after another flicked in and out of his reader. Now and then he clucked indignantly, made a sound approaching a glutton's lip-smacking, or chuckled, entering all the way into the spirit of his personal mail.
    The third man, Santoz, had yet another method. Reading a flimsy selected from one pile before him, he would detach it from his machine, place it on a second heap, and stare at the wall while he chewed and swallowed several mouthfuls before beginning the process all over again. Kade was trying to deduce character traits from the actions of his three tablemates when one of the Ikkinni materialized by the door. Without turning his head Abu asked in the Trade speech:
    "It comes. Why?"
    "It has concern." But no inflection of that slurred