Vampires of Space

Sometimes, I know, I must seem a crotchety old man. "Old John Hanson,"
they call me, and roll their eyes as though to say, "Of course, you have
to forgive him on account of his age."

But the joke isn't always on me. Not infrequently I gain much amusement
observing these cocky youngsters who strut in the blue-and-silver
uniforms of the Service in which, until more or less recently, I bore
the rank of Commander.

There is young Clippen, for instance, a nice, clean youngster; third
officer, I believe, on the _Caliobre_, one of the newest ships of the
Special Patrol Service. He drops in to see me as often as he has leave
here at Base, to give me the latest news, and to coax a yarn, if he can,
of the old days. He is courteous, respectful ... and yet just a shade
condescending. The condescension of youth.

"Something new under the sun after all, sir," he commented the other
day. That, incidentally, is a saying of Earth, whence the larger part of
the Service's officer personnel has always been drawn. Something new
under the sun! The saying probably dates back to an age long before man
mastered space.

"Yes?" I leaned back more comfortably, happy, as always, to hear my
native Earth tongue, and to speak it. The Universal language has its
obvious advantages, but the speech of one's fathers wings thought
straightest to the mind. "What now?"

"Creatures of space!" announced Clippen importantly, in the fashion of
one who brings surprising news. "'Electites,' they call them. Beings who
live in space--things, anyway; I don't know that you could call them
beings."