The voice of her supervisor, SEN 5241, cut in: “Scan inspectors are on their way. Be on the lookout, check back.”

“Yessir,” she said.

But THX was still on her top left main screen, still working steadily, intently.

LUH never saw the explosion in the assembly bay on the screen next to THX’s image. She never noticed the bay blow out in a shower of sparks and sudden choking billows of white smoke, men running, danger lights flashing balefully.

“Monitor concourse 5, cross three… 3417… emergency… emergency!”

She snapped out of her trance, eyes widening at the sight of the accident. Her hands worked the keyboard automatically and all four of her main screens showed the scene. LUH began frantically punching response keys.

A deep, calm, male voice said: “You are a true believer. Blessings of the State, Blessings of the masses. Thou art a subject of…”

Startled, she hit another sequence of keys. The screens showed men crawling through the smoke, others lying sprawled inert, broken. Flames licked evily through the area. Still no sound. Then:

“Eject… eject… evacuate all personnel…”

“There’s thirty-eight men trapped in there…”

“Seal all blast hatches! Mark!”

“Stay calm. Correct procedure is essential. Do not fail to remove auxiliary command circuits before evacuation. Vacuum detail…”

“Turn that damned tape off and get those men clear before the whole area goes up!”

“Mercicontrol! Emergency…”

LUH patched the pictures and sound directly to Mercicontrol. Involuntarily, she looked up at the screen where THX’s image had been transferred. It was a small screen, up at the top row, but she could see him still working. In her earphones she heard what he was hearing:

“There has been an accident in Blue sector, 1-14. Do not abandon your post. Repeat, do not abandon your post. There is absolutely no danger of radiation leakage. Repeat …”