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supervisor, correct?”
    “Damn straight. It’s his idea, after all. I got mad and took off my helmet and ripped out the wires, but then I had to hear communications over the pod speakers, which aren’t worth a damn. So I decided to come over here straightaway and, uh, take this up with Wallace himself.”
    Doc Felapolous shrugged. “Somehow I can’t argue with the principle of the idea, to tell you the truth. I don’t particularly like that stuff myself. That’s why I have a tape deck in my office, so I can play my Mendelssohn and Mozart tapes. I have my wife send up cassettes every month or so.”
    “Yeah, good idea. Except my weight allowance when I came up here wouldn’t let me bring up a deck. So I gotta listen to this wimpy stuff all the time.”
    “Hmm. Yes. I suppose I can see your problem.” Felapolous stroked one waxed end of his mustache. “All right, Mr. Neiman, I’ll give you your choice of prescriptions.”
    He had been holding his left hand close to his body throughout the conversation. Now he raised his hand, displaying the syringe he had kept hidden in his palm. “This is filled with enough happy juice to keep you sedated long enough for Phil to get you to a restraining bed in sickbay. I ought to give you that prescription, considering that our friend here doesn’t seem too happy with your attitude or your previous assessment of his physique.”
    Mr. Big smiled humorlessly again; his expression tacitly said that he would have liked nothing better but to have a doped-up Virgin Bruce strapped down on a couch for a couple of hours, at his disposal.
    “The alternative,” Felapolous went on, “is for you to get another helmet from a locker, have this poor fellow whom you’ve frightened half to death refuel your pod, and go back to work at Vulcan, where by your own account you’re too valuable to have missing for very long.”
    “Yeah, uh-huh.” Virgin Bruce crossed his arms. “And what about my complaint?”
    Felapolous gave a little smile. “My profession decrees that I must remedy pain, so I’ll take your complaint into consideration. I have an extra cassette player in sickbay, a small pocket version which was supplied to me so that I could take verbal notes. Since I generally write everything down, I wouldn’t miss it. I could give it to you on an indefinite loan. You may install it in your pod. You’d have to find your own tapes, though. I won’t lend you mine, and besides I rather doubt you’d enjoy listening to Italian opera or ‘Tales From the Vienna Woods.’”
    “Uh-huh, I see.” Virgin Bruce nodded his head slowly. “And about my idea to take this up with Wallace?”
    “Not part of the prescription, sorry. I never recommend that my patients attempt to treat themselves for their complaints.” He cocked his head toward Mr. Big. “Anyway, the difficulties you might have in that treatment could be detrimental to your health.”
    Virgin Bruce glared at Mr. Big. “I doubt it.”
    Mr. Big spoke up. “Hey, listen, Doc, I was told to…”
    Doc Felapolous silenced him with a wave of his hand. “Mr. Bigthorn, concerning matters medical, I have the last word on Olympus, not the Project Supervisor. You’ve just heard me give Mr. Neiman treatment for his complaint.”
    “Yeah? I haven’t seen you give him any medicine.”
    Felapolous reached into a pocket of his shorts, fished out a tin of aspirin and opened it. He handed two tablets to Virgin Bruce. “Take these with water and get out of here,” he said. “Come back for a checkup when you get off your shift and I’ll fill out the rest of your prescription for you.”
    He turned to Bob Harris. “Son, if you can quit grinning like a jackass, you can get Bruce’s pod refueled and ready to go. Also, please have Mr. Chang come to see me about his back problems.” He turned to leave. “I think he’s missing a spine. Come along, Phil.”

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Tall Tales
    E VERY JANUARY 28TH AT about 11:30 A.M. EST, regardless of how much