For a moment, Houston"s mind was a meaningless blur.

_Dorrine!_

And then another voice broke through his shock.

"Dear me, sir! Calm yourself! You"re positively fizzing!"

Houston jerked. Standing in the doorway of the office was Norcross La.s.ser, with a benign smile on his face and a deadly-looking .38 automatic in his hand. Behind him stood John Sager and Loris Pederson, their faces wary.

"Please drop that stun gun, Mr. Cop."

In those few moments, Houston had regained control of himself. He realized what had happened. The interruption of his thought-probe had startled him just a little, but that little had been enough to warn the Controller.

He wondered which of the three men was the actual Controller.

He began to lower his weapon, then, suddenly, with all the force and hatred he could muster, he sent a blistering, shocking thought toward the man with the gun.

La.s.ser staggered as though he"d been struck. His gun wavered, and Houston fired quickly with his stun gun. At the same time, La.s.ser"s automatic went off.

The bullet went wild, and the stun beam didn"t do much better. It struck La.s.ser"s hand, paralyzing it, but it didn"t knock out La.s.ser.

The mental battle that ensued only took a half second, but at the speed of thought, a lot of things can happen in a half second.

Houston realized almost instantaneously that he had made a vast mistake.

He had badly underestimated the enemy.

There was no need to worry, now, about which one of the men was a Controller--_all three of them were!_

As soon as Sager and Pederson realized what had happened, they leaped--mentally--into the battle. La.s.ser, already weakened by the unexpected mental blow from Houston, lost consciousness when the others let loose their blasts because his mind was still linked with Houston"s, and he absorbed a great deal of the mental energy meant for Houston"s brain.

Houston, fully warned by now, held up a denial wall which screened his mind from the worst that Sager and Pederson could put out, but he knew he couldn"t hold out for long.

"Come in--_now!_" he said hoa.r.s.ely into the microphone.

"Stupid swine!" Sager susurrated sibilantly.

Pederson said nothing aloud, but his brain was blazing with fear and hatred. His gun hand jerked towards a holster under his arm. La.s.ser was still crumpling towards the floor.

The entire action had taken less than a second.

Houston tried to fire again with his stun gun, but it required every bit of concentration he could sum up to hold off the combined mental a.s.saults of Sager and Pederson.

But they, too, were at somewhat of a disadvantage. In order to keep all their efforts concentrated on the PD policeman, both Controllers had to refrain from putting too much attention on their bodily motions.

Pederson was still fumbling for his gun, and Sager hadn"t yet started for his.

La.s.ser barely touched the floor before his consciousness began to return. The resulting fraction of a second of mental static afforded Houston a brief respite; it disturbed Pederson just as he was getting his fingers on the b.u.t.t of his weapon.

Both Controllers were focusing their mental energies on Houston"s brain, and during the brief respite, Houston made one vital mental adjustment.

He allowed both thought-probes to fuse in a small part of his consciousness. They went _through_ him and lashed back at the two Controllers.

Both of them had had their minds tuned to Houston"s, and in that instant they found they, were also attuned to each other.

The resultant of the energy was shocking to Houston, but it was infinitely worse for Sager and Pederson, since neither of them had been expecting it. Pederson, who had already been slightly distracted, got the major brunt of the force. He managed to jerk his gun free, but his brain was already lapsing into unconsciousness.

Houston"s fingers tightened on his own weapon. It fired once at La.s.ser, who was trying to lift himself from the floor. Then it swept up and coughed again, dropping Pederson. His pistol barked once, sending a singing ricochet along the hall.

Sager, who had staggered to one side when he and Pederson had short-circuited each other, had time to get behind the protection of the office door. He couldn"t close it because La.s.ser"s and Pederson"s inert forms blocked the doorway, but at least it afforded protection against Houston"s stun gun.

His thought came through to Houston: _So the stupid Normals have a Controller working for them! Traitor!_

_You"re the traitor_, Houston thought coldly. _You and your megalomaniac friends. It"s madmen like you who have made telepaths hated and feared by the Normals._

_And so they should hate and fear us_, came the snarling mental answer.

_Within a few generations, we will have supplanted them. We will control Earth--not they._

The exchange had only taken a fraction of a second. Houston was already charging toward the open door, hoping to get inside before Sager could reach a weapon.

_You call me a traitor_, Houston thought, _but you have been framing innocent Controllers, putting them into the hands of the PD Police_.

_That"s a lie!_ the reply came hotly. _We would never betray another telepath to the stupid Normals! If a telepath were so bullheaded as to get in our way, we"d dispose of him. But it would be Controller justice; we wouldn"t turn him over to animals!_

In one blazing moment, Houston realized that the Controller was telling the truth!

No mental communication can be expressed properly in words. In, behind, and around each statement, other, dimmer nuances of thought gleam through. Each thought tells the receiver much more than can be put down in crude verbal symbols.

Thus, Houston already knew that La.s.ser, Sager, and Pederson were the three top men in a world-wide clique of megalomaniac Controllers. This was the top of the madmen"s organization; these three were the _creme de la creme_ of the Normal human"s real enemies.

He knew that there were twelve others scattered over Earth, and he knew where and who they were. That brief exchange had brought all the information into Houston"s own mind as it leaked from the minds of the others. He knew it without thinking about how he knew it.

And they were _not_ the ones who had been turning the sane Controllers over to the Psychodeviant Police!

Then who was? And why?

Houston was right back where he had started.

But that brief instant of confusion was Houston"s downfall. Sager instantly realized that he had delivered, inadvertently, a telling blow to Houston"s mind.

Physically, Houston had been propelling himself toward the open door. At the instant of the revelation, he had been part way through it. And at that moment, Sager acted.

He slammed all his weight violently against his side of the door, knocking Houston off balance as the door swung and struck him. He went down, and Sager was on top of him before he struck the floor.

It was the weirdest battle ever fought, but its true worth could only have been detected by another telepath. It was intense and brutal.