Johnny Mayhem awoke.

Awakening came slowly, as it always did. It was a rising through infinite gulfs, a rebirth for a man who had died a hundred times and might die
 
a thousand times more as the years piled up and became centuries. It was a spinning, whirling, flashing ascent from blackness to coruscating colors, brightness, giddiness.

And suddenly, it was over.

A needle spray of ice-cold water beat down upon him. He shuddered and reached for the water-taps, shutting them. Dripping, he climbed from the shower.

And floated up—quite weightless—toward the ceiling.

Frowning with his new and as yet unseen face, Johnny Mayhem propelled himself to the floor. He looked at his arms. He was naked—at least that much was right.

But obviously, since he was weightless, he was not on Deneb IV. During his transmigration he had been briefed for the trouble on Deneb IV. Then had a mistake been made somehow? It was always possible—but it had never happened before.

Too much precision and careful planning was involved.

Every world which had an Earthman population and a Galactic League—now, Galactic Federation—post, must have a body in cold storage, waiting for Johnny Mayhem if his services were required. No one knew when Mayhem’s services might be required. No one knew exactly under what circumstances the Galactic Federation Council, operating from the Hub of the Galaxy, might summon Mayhem. And only a very few people, including those at the Hub and the Galactic League Firstmen on civilized worlds and Observers on frontier planets, knew the precise mechanics of Mayhem’s coming.

Johnny Mayhem, a bodiless sentience. Mayhem—Johnny Marlow then—who had been chased from Earth a pariah and a criminal seven years ago, who had been mortally wounded on a wild planet deep within the Sagittarian Swarm, whose life had been saved—after a fashion—by the white magic of that planet. Mayhem, doomed now to possible immortality as a bodiless sentience, an elan, which could occupy and activate a corpse if it had been preserved properly … an elan doomed to wander eternally because it could not remain in one body for more than a month without body and elan perishing. Mayhem, who had dedicated his strange, lonely life to the services of the Galactic League—now the Galactic Federation—because a normal life and normal social
 
relations were not possible to him….

It did not seem possible, Mayhem thought now, that a mistake could be made. Then—a sudden change in plans?

It had never happened before, but it was entirely possible. Something, Mayhem decided, had come up during transmigration. It was terribly important and the people at the Hub had had no opportunity to brief him on it.

But—what?

His first shock came a moment later. He walked to a mirror on the wall and approved of the strong young body which would house his sentience and then scowled. A thought inside his head said:

So this is what it’s like to have schizophrenia.

What the hell was that? Mayhem thought.

I said, so this is what it’s like to have schizophrenia. First the world’s worst headache and then I start thinking like two different people.

Aren’t you dead?

Is that supposed to be a joke, alter ego? When do the men in the white suits come?

Good Lord, this was supposed to be a dead body!

At that, the other sentience which shared the body with Mayhem snickered and lapsed into silence. Mayhem, for his part, was astounded.

Don’t get ornery now, Mayhem pleaded. I’m Johnny Mayhem. Does that mean anything to you?

Oh, sure. It means I’m dead. You inhabit dead bodies, right?

Usually. Listen—where are we?

Glory of the Galaxy—bound from Earth to Mars on perihelion.

And there’s trouble?

How do you know there’s trouble?

Otherwise they wouldn’t have diverted me here.

We’ve got the president aboard. We’re going to hit the sun. Then, grudgingly, Larry went into the details. When he finished he thought cynically: Now all you have to do is go outside yelling have no fear, Mayhem is here and everything will be all right, I suppose.

Mayhem didn’t answer. It would be many moments yet before he could adjust to this new, unexpected situation. But in a way, he thought, it would be a boon. If he were co-inhabiting the body of a living man who belonged on the Glory of the Galaxy, there was no need to reveal his identity as Johnny Mayhem to anyone but his host….

 
“I tell ya,” Technician First Class Ackerman Boone shouted, “the refrigeration unit’s gone on the blink. You can’t feel it yet, but I ought to know. I got the refrigs working full strength and we gained a couple of degrees heat. Either she’s on the blink or we’re too close to the sun, I tell you!”

Ackerman Boone was a big man, a veteran spacer with a squat, very strong body and arms like an orangutan. Under normal circumstances he was a very fine spacer and a good addition to any crew, but he bore an unreasonable grudge against the officer corps and would go out of his way to make them look bad in the eyes of the other enlisted men. A large crowd had gathered in the hammock-hung crew quarters of the Glory of the Galaxy as Boone went on in his deep, booming voice: “So I asked the skipper of the watch, I did. He got shifty-eyed, like they always do. You know. He wasn’t talking, but sure as my name’s Ackerman Boone, something’s wrong.”

“What do you think it is, Acky?” one of the younger men asked.

“Well, I tell ya this: I know what it isn’t. I checked out the refrigs three times, see, and came up with nothing. The refrigs are in jig order, and if I know it then you know it. So, if the refrigs are in jig order, there’s only one thing it can be: we’re getting too near the sun!” Boone clamped his mouth shut and stood with thick, muscular arms crossed over his barrel chest.

A young technician third class said in a strident voice, “You mean you think maybe we’re plunging into the sun, Acky?”

“Well, now, I didn’t say that. Did I, boy? But we are too close and if we are too close there’s got to be a reason for it. If we stay too close too long, O.K. Then we’re plunging into the sun. Right now, I dunno.”

They all asked Ackerman Boone, who was an unofficial leader among them, what he was going to do. He rubbed his big fingers against the thick stubble of beard on his jaw and you could hear the rasping sound it made. Then he said, “Nothing, until we find out for sure. But I got a hunch the officers are trying to pull the wool over the eyes of them politicians we got on board. That’s all right with me, men. If they want to, they got their reasons. But I tell ya this: they ain’t going to pull any wool over Acky
 
Boone’s eyes, and that’s a fact.”

Just then the squawk box called: “Now hear this! Now hear this! Tech/1 Ackerman Boone to Exec’s office. Tech/1 Boone to Exec.”

“You see?” Boone said, smiling grimly. As yet, no one saw. His face still set in a grim smile, Ackerman Boone headed above decks.