THE COSMIC COMPUTER

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telecast screens. A music program was just ending; there was a brief
silence, and then a commentator appeared, identifying his news-service.
He spoke rapidly and breathlessly, his professional gravity cracking all
over.

"The hypership /City of Asgard/, from Aton, has just come into telecast
range," he began. "We have received an exclusive[Pg 163] Interworld News
Service story, recently brought to Aton on the Pan-Federation Spacelines
ship /Magellanic/, from Terra.

"News of revived interest in the Third Force computer, Merlin, having
reached Terra by way of Odin, representatives of Interworld News, to
which this service subscribes, interviewed retired Force-General Foxx
Travis, now living, at the advanced age of a hundred and fourteen, on
Luna. General Travis, who commanded the Third Fleet-Army Force here
during the War, categorically denied that there had ever existed any
super-computer of the sort.