"I follow you, T.L., but I don't understand you."

"Near here—funny that it is near here—is a sanitarium. Folcroft Sanitarium. It has the 385, 971 and the 842 computer systems."

"The 842 is part of a new generation of computers that isn't supposed to be on the market for two years."

"Correct. They own it."

"But we only lease our computers. We never sell them."

"They own it and they have some of our top-flight research people working on it, a concentration of talent we never allow out of IDC."

"How could that happen?"

"Do you remember in one of your early training sessions you learned that you could, if you had enough money and talent, put an entire country, its main sources of power, all on a computer system?"

"Yes."

"Folcroft Sanitarium in Rye, New York, has done it. You will be the next senior vice president in charge of policy planning because you are the only vice president we have with special forces training and I wouldn't give this to anyone else. This should give you an inkling of where we wish you to set your parameters on this assignment."

"What I understand, T.L., is that there are none. I should stop at nothing."

"I didn't hear that, Corbish."

"What will happen if I fail?"

"Then we will have to commit a broad-scale executive thrust in that direction."

"Wouldn't IDC be wiser to just write me off if I fail and continue business as usual?"

"These people at Folcroft, I believe, don't just forget about people, corporations or organizations that threaten them. They would come after us, I believe."

"Then, T.L., I must ask you one more question. Why not leave them alone if the risk of failure is so great? There is a point of diminishing returns. I'm afraid my input has got to weigh on the side of another look-see in depth. IDC comes ahead of my personal advancement from my view strata, T.L."