Then quickly he stepped into the small changing room in one corner of the chamber and stripped himself to the skin. Just as quickly, but much more carefully, he smeared himself all over with foul-smelling, black, greasy cream. Then he pulled on a loincloth and stepped back out into the chamber.

The rubber seat and back of the chair were as chilly as ever against his bare skin. Lord Leighton bustled about, busily attaching the mass of cobra-headed electrodes whose multicolored wires linked Blade to the computer. There seemed to be more of them than usual. Or was it just his impatience to be off that was making the wiring-up process seem longer?

Eventually there were no more. J raised his hand in a final salute to Blade, then withdrew to the small folding chair that had been installed on the wall for him. Lord Leighton stepped up to the main control panel, lifting his hand over the red master switch.

Blade suddenly felt an impish and almost uncontrollable desire to say something memorably scandalous, something that would have turned Lord Leighton's remaining hair white if it hadn't been white already. Then he fought down the desire. They didn't know much about Dimension X. But they had begun to suspect that what Blade was thinking about at the moment of transition might be connected with where he wound up. So it might not be wise to go sailing off into Dimension X with a bawdy joke on his mind.

Then Lord Leighton drew the master switch downward in its slot. The chamber vanished.

For a moment the after-image lingered in Blade's vision. It lingered so vividly that for another moment he doubted whether he had even started the transition. Something had gone wrong; he was still in the chamber below the Tower, and Lord Leighton-

Then he realized that he was standing alone and naked in the middle of an immense, dark red plain. As far as his eyes could reach it was the color of old blood and as featureless as a tabletop. Above it arched a totally black sky, without a single star. There was no wind, no feeling of, either heat or cold, and a silence that could not have been more complete if Blade had been marooned in outer space.