Part 24

1

At the American minesite, Day 92 had dawned windy and cold. And then in midmorning, four hours before the firing time, it had begun to snow. It was not too late for snow, but this snow was a heavy one. It came down in huge soft flakes that swirled here and there in the wind puffs.

Terl did not care. He was jubilant. This would be his last day on Earth.

So far things had gone smoothly. From sunup to the moment it started to snow he had been outside, checking the wiring and cables. Almost lovingly, he had put a final polish on the firing points on the poles, the points which would change space and transport him once again to his homeland.

He had a wonderful story all made up. He would come in with the tale of a mutiny, of a sellout to an alien race. And how he, Terl, fighting hard, had saved the company technology and was forced, alas, to use the ultimate bomb to make certain the company was not further betrayed. They would believe him on Psychlo. They would, of course, fire a camera back and check, but it would record a black smudge.

Then he would retire, saying that the strain of it all had been too much. And one fine night, he would go to a cemetery and do a bit of quiet digging and become richer by ten gold coffin lids and two billion credits that he would expose bit by bit, saying he had profited on the exchanges of the various universes.

It was a perfect plan.

He had been idling about for a few minutes wondering when the Brigante special squad would come down from the mountains. He didn’t like to stay outside. He hated this planet too much. But today, the breathe-gas didn’t seem to make him ill, and after all, it was a great day.

And here they were, the Brigante special squad. They had their bundle with them just as ordered. It was long and made to look like baggage. Just before the firing, Terl would open the end of it and one of Snith’s bodyguards would pop an air mask on it. And anybody seeing it would think twice about charging the platform!

He told the special squad to just dump it on the middle of the platform and then stand by.

Now for the next step. Terl went back into the compound and got the small forklift he had had parked there in the corridor, got on it, and went into his office.

It was really a tossup whether he took the coffins first or the console. The coffins could stand the weather better. With a Brigante squad there, nobody could come up and steal them. They were too heavy.

He paused for a moment, looking at his rug. There was a dust tread mark there. But then he thought he must have made it himself. His X mark was there on each coffin.

With four rapid runs and very expert machine handling, he got the four coffins outside and dumped them on the platform—four trips. On each trip he cautioned the squad to be alert and watch them.

Now for the console. He tipped it up on edge to get at the hollow bottom. He unlocked a cabinet and got the booby trap and put it under the front edge of the bottom. He would not set it yet. He would give it ten minutes from when he operated the console at firing time. The length of the firing would be three minutes—he had decided to take it easy on himself—and the recoil time would be about forty seconds later. So six minutes and twenty seconds after he fired—bang! No console!

He took it out and put it down on the oversized metal platform made for it, a platform about ten feet by seven feet, just inside the atmosphere-armor zone. All nicely figured out. The big bus bars which operated the atmosphere-armor cable had long since been installed on a raised board. He hadn’t expected snow but he had put a weather shield on the cable board. He hadn’t put a shelter for the console itself, so now he had to throw a piece of tarpaulin over it to keep snow off the buttons.

Terl adjusted the console’s position and then got the forklift out of there. He simply dumped it. What did it matter? Those animals had left machinery all over the place—big magnetic cranes, blade scraper, diggers. What a mess!

He got busy connecting the power cables from the poles to the console. It was quite a massive lot of cables. He didn’t want to trip on his way from the console, when he punched in the coordinates to the platform, so he bundled them all together. It made a snake about six inches in diameter.

Terl double-checked the color codes. Yes, he had them all correct.

He checked the armor cable by turning it on. A lot of new snow flew into the air in a circle. Yes, it worked. He turned it off.

He checked the juice input to the console. All live.

Terl looked at his watch.

It was a full hour to firing time. Time to go in for a mouthful of kerbango.

He surveyed the office. Last time he would ever see this place. Thank the devils!

Terl opened his cabinets and began to dump anything and everything into the recycling bin. He opened the false backs and bottoms and consigned anything in them to oblivion. The habits of a security chief were too strong. He dumped all his reams of notes and formulas into the maw of the recycler. Then he noticed it wasn’t running. Ah, of course, he must have blown the compound fuses when he put that armor cable on. Who cared? This planet was going up in smoke anyway.

He went to his closet and got his dress uniform and boots out and quickly changed. He put on his parade cap. He looked at himself in the mirror. Pretty good!

Terl threw a few things in a travel bag. He looked at his watch. Twenty minutes to go.

The snow, he could see through the compound roof, was coming down even heavier. Who cared?

He put on a breathe-mask with a fresh pair of cartridges, picked up the beautifully wrapped—and very difficult to unwrap—ultimate bomb, picked up his travel kit, and left his office for the last time.

All was ready outside!

Five hundred Brigantes, bows protected from the weather, looking a bit huddled and cold even in their buffalo coats, had been marched up and now stood in the formation he had carefully pointed out. A total ring with its back to the atmosphere cable, a nearly solid wall of Brigantes.

Captunk Arf Moiphy seemed to be the officer in charge of them all. Terl addressed him sternly: “Now you and your men all understand that you are only to use bows and poisoned arrows and knives or bayonets. There must be no firing of powder or blast weapons.”

“We’s gart orl dat!” called General Snith.

Ah, good! General Snith and an honor guard of six Brigantes, all of them in air masks, were on the platform, armed with bows which they were protecting from the snow.

Terl looked around. It was a bit hard to see through these snowflakes and gusts of wind. He had heard a chattering from somewhere.

What was that? By the crap nebula, the whole Brigante tribe was gathered down by the morgue to see General Snith off! Amazing! The women were all bundled up against the snow and off-duty mercenaries were in among them. What a filthy mob! Good thing he was wearing a mask, for he knew they smelled awful.

And there was Brown Limper Staffor and Lars Thorenson. They had come up on the plateau with a ground car and were standing there. The very people he wanted to see.

Terl walked over to them.

Instead of saying “Goodbye” or even “Nice to have known you,” Brown Limper Staffor said, “I don’t see Tyler.”

Terl stopped before him. Brown Limper was all bundled up in some kind of expensive fur. Snow was falling upon his hair and collar. His eyes looked feverishly overbright.

“Oh, he’ll be here,” said Terl. “He’ll be here.”

Terl looked down at Brown Limper’s feet. There was a case there, a fat case about three feet long. Aha! Terl stooped and before Brown Limper or Lars could stop him picked up the case and, with a cuff of his paw, broke the locks.

A Thompson submachine gun! So he was right to distrust this animal. One shot from this thing during a firing could blow up the platform!

Terl took the weapon by the barrel and with his paws bent it in a half-circle. He threw it aside. “That was not nice,” said Terl. “You could have blown up the whole place!”

Brown Limper didn’t seem upset. His eyes still looked furtive.

Terl took Lars’s belt gun, took the cartridge canister out of it, and threw it fifty feet away. “No firing!” said Terl, waggling a cautionary claw in front of their faces. Did Brown Limper have something else? Terl wondered. He looked quite unhinged but not about the guns.

“Here,” said Terl, in a cajoling tone of voice, “here is a nice present to make it up to you.”

He handed Brown Limper the thoroughly wrapped ultimate bomb. It weighed about eighty pounds, and as Brown Limper took it, he almost dropped it. Terl, in some apprehension, caught it before it could fall. Terl managed a smile as he restored it to Brown Limper.

“It’s a nice gift,” said Terl. “Open it when I’m gone and you’ll find the answer to your most golden dreams. Something to remember me by.” No danger in giving it to them: it would take them an hour to get the wrapper off. Then one lift of the lid and bang—no planet!

Terl patted Brown Limper on the head. He glanced at his watch. Still plenty of time. He walked over toward the platform. Captunk Arf Moiphy called his men to attention. Terl marched on by.

With a bold and martial step, Terl walked to the console.

He reached down and closed the bus bar on the atmosphere-armor cable. Snow flew up all along its length. Good! He was now safe! A solid wall enclosed the console and platform and beyond that a solid wall of armed bodies.

He glanced at his watch. He had plenty of time. He walked over to the baggage and kicked his own kit into the pile. The Brigantes had brought quite a mound of air bottles for themselves.

General Snith, militarily dressed in a buffalo coat, his “diamond” in his cap, his crossbelts jammed with poisoned arrows, gave him a chest-pound salute. But he asked, “You gonna change de money fer tsure?” He pointed to a huge mound of money, Brown Limper notes.

“Absolutely,” Terl reassured him. “Credits go where credit is due! Besides, you have me hostage, don’t you?”

Snith was reassured.

And speaking of hostages, Terl leaned over the long bundle and opened the top of it. Black, glaring eyes pierced him. He beckoned to the Brigante so assigned and the man pushed an air mask on the face and shoved the bottle onto the chest. He buckled the bottle on. He had almost gotten bit!

Terl looked at his watch. The time was coming up. He walked over to the console.

He moved the toggle switch in the upper left-hand corner to the up position. He threw on the activating bus bar. The console’s top buttons glowed.

Terl sat there counting down the seconds. Then he punched in the long-since-memorized coordinates. He checked his watch for the exact instant. He punched the firing button.

He reached down and activated the ten-minute time bomb.

The wires began to build up a hum.

Out of the tail of his eye he saw a man rise up beyond the Brown Limper car. Somebody jumping up. Somebody in a radiation suit. Terl looked hard and suddenly realized it looked like and must be the animal.

Ha! Brown Limper had gotten his Tyler after all.

Terl walked over to the center of the platform.

The hum was building up. What joy to think of being safe on Psychlo in just under three minutes!

2

Brown Limper Staffor had seethed when Terl discovered the submachine gun. But the sight of the barrel being bent almost double had caused him to hold his peace. This huge monster was strong.

So he stood there and accepted the gift. Actually it must be gold, it was so heavy. He had no qualms about accepting gold even if it looked like a bribe. He had earned it. But his mind was only slightly on all that. He was still looking avidly for Tyler.

But he decided he would wait until Terl was safely at that console.

He saw Captunk Arf Moiphy salute. Saw the Brigantes draw up and begin to take poisoned arrows from the crossbelts. Saw the performance on the platform. Terl had somebody else there in the bundle. Tyler? No, it couldn’t be Tyler or Terl would have called out. Maybe it was Tyler. Maybe Terl was double-crossing him! No, it couldn’t be Tyler. Who was it? But yes, it might be Tyler. They put an air mask on whoever it was. They meant to take somebody to Psychlo!

No, it couldn’t be Tyler.

But maybe it was.

When the snow had jumped up from the ground, Brown Limper had been slightly startled. But nothing had happened except that Terl went over to that bundle.

Ah, finally Terl was going back to the console. Brown Limper had been told the wires would begin to hum.

He would wait for that.

It was hard to see in this snow. The white glare of it and the swirls in the wind gusts kept blanking out things.

But he could listen.

He thought he heard the hum start. He couldn’t be sure. The wind was making sounds and that Brigante mob was yelling goodbyes to General Snith. Brown Limper thought he had better wait until Terl walked back to the platform center before he moved.

In the back of the car was another submachine gun. Brown Limper had thought of everything.

The moment Terl reached the middle of the platform, Brown Limper would dive into the back of the car, get the Thompson submachine gun, load it, and race to that platform edge and spray the whole place. It must be Tyler in that bundle!

Brown Limper stood there, holding the “gift,” waiting for Terl to walk away from the console. The yells of the Brigante tribe and the whir of the wind made it impossible to tell whether the hum had started. He would have to be sure.

He had better wait for the last moment. Then Terl couldn’t rush off the platform to stop him.

He didn’t hear the thud of running feet behind him.

Suddenly two hands reached out and grabbed at the “gift!” A radiation-masked face and an air mask under the radiation mask.

Then he saw the blond beard through all that leaded glass.

Tyler was right on top of him!

“Run!” yelled the face.

The hands whipped the “gift” away from Brown Limper.

“Run for your life!” came from the half-hidden face.

Then the man turned and, carrying the package, sprinted toward the hangar side of the compound. The figure was growing thinner in the snow, hard to see.

“Shoot him!” screamed Brown Limper to Lars.

He whirled. Lars was running away! He was already a hundred feet away and half-hidden in snow flurries. He was running as hard as he could toward Denver.

But then something registered with Brown Limper. That voice! He knew Tyler’s voice. Even through masks and shields he did not think it was Tyler’s voice. It had sounded Swedish.

But Tyler must be around. Around someplace.

Brown Limper tore his way to the door of the car to get the other gun. The door on that side was locked.

With the whimper of despair, Brown Limper raced around the car. He had to get to that other gun.

And even as he went, above the snow, above the yells, he heard Tyler’s voice from the platform. Unmistakable! He must hurry.

3

Dwight rose cautiously just behind the lip of the ravine. He was dressed in a radiation camouflage suit with an air mask behind its lead-glass faceplate.

As Terl first entered the platform area, Dwight held the mine radio close to his shield glass and said, “First alert!”

Dwight had been chosen as officer of the outside raiders because he could be depended upon to follow orders exactly, without deviation, and as one of the lode mine crew chiefs, he could handle men.

They had lain since shortly after midnight in the lead coffins buried at spaced intervals around the platform’s perimeter.

The coffins had been positioned long since by Ker and cadets in the night while they laid the armor cable. They had been covered with dirt and now were also covered by a layer of snow.

It had been no trick to slip in last night. The Brigante guards, drunk on drugged whiskey as they had been every night for two months, had detected nothing.

Dwight had a streak of superstition. It all had gone almost too smoothly. Jonnie was inside that atmosphere cable area, buried in a coffin just at the edge of the firing platform. Fire from outside would not hit him: they had tested that. But the thought of Jonnie in there, alone with those savage beasts, made Dwight numb. He had tried to get Jonnie to let somebody else do it, but Jonnie had said no, he would not put a man to that risk: somebody had to be in there to shut off the armor cable, use a remote control to complete the action of the crane, and lower an armored dome down over the console to protect it. The crane could not get the dome cover through the atmosphere armor unless it was shut off. Something about a switch position that had to be determined at the firing, a switch that might automatically shift once the humming stopped. And somebody had to cut the cables away from the console. Dwight had wanted to send three men in—Jonnie had said that many wouldn’t fit in the dome with the console.

Terl had now walked to the console. Dwight said, “Second alert!” into the mine radio. The third would come when Terl pushed the firing button. Action would be called when he was at the platform center and the wires had begun to hum.

Dwight and his team had only one and a half minutes to do their entire job. They had drilled and drilled in Africa. But one never knew.

The snow flurries made the visibility sporadic. But he could see what he had to see. My God, that was an awful lot of Brigantes! They were a solid line all around the perimeter of the platform, backs right up against the atmosphere-ionization cable. They looked lumpy in buffalo coats. They were protecting their bow strings but their crossbelts bristled with poisoned arrows.

Dr. Allen had briefed them on those arrows. The poison was slow but deadly. It caused the nervous system to speed up faster and faster until it killed. He had developed an antidotal serum for it. He had given them all a small shot of it, but he said any wound would need speedy treatment, all the same. They each carried a small ampule of the serum. Dwight hoped it worked.

Then he saw that there would be seven Brigantes on the platform. Was that the one they called General Snith? And a squad? They had not counted on that. What a fool Snith must be to permit himself to be fired to Psychlo. But Jonnie! He wouldn’t have added that into the plans. Was it too late for Dwight to do something? His orders were very positive. To do nothing but his job.

They had somebody else on the platform, bound. Who was that? My God, Jonnie’s plan wouldn’t work! He would be in there all but defenseless! Dwight gritted his teeth. His orders were to do his job only. He would. But he had a feeling of despair for Jonnie.

The Brigante tribe was noisy and cheering over there by the morgue. They were no problem. Dwight turned his attention back to Terl. The Psychlo pushed the firing button.

“Third alert!” said Dwight into the mine radio.

The weapons they would use would not interrupt the firing. They had tested them. They also had nuclear weapons in case Psychlos came in on the platform afterward from Psychlo.

Terl walked over to the center of the platform. He halted. The humming had begun, heard above the shouting and wind. Dwight heard Jonnie’s voice in that enclosure. That was not on schedule.

Dwight would do his job.

“Action!” barked Dwight into the mine radio.

Thirty Scots threw off their coffin lids. Twenty-five hit their igniters. One made ready to rush for the crane. Four were up to form a reserve.

Flash! In a ragged outer ring, pointing in at the massed Brigantes, twenty-five Russian flamethrowers spewed out their deadly orange spray.

Like twenty-five hoses, the roaring inferno slashed into the Brigantes. “For Allison!” came a Scot battle cry.

“For Bittie!”

“Scotland forever!”

Dwight hit the button of a planted loudspeaker. It was a recording of charging, trumpeting elephants, the sound that would bring terror to the Brigantes.

The mercenaries surged forward, trying to get their bows into action. Scything flame shriveled the bowstrings. The Brigantes were drawing bayonets to charge.

The tribe by the morgue screamed, adding to the din. They turned and ran with all their might out into the plain, trampling one another as they sought to get away.

A Scot had a flameout. A group of Brigantes were charging him with bayonets.

“Cover Andrew!” barked Dwight.

The Scots on either side of the dead flamethrower widened their arcs. Andrew had a claymore out. He cut down the Brigante officer and then he himself went down.

Two of the reserves hacked their way into the mess with Lochaber axes and slaughtered the Brigantes stabbing at Andrew.

Dwight glanced at his watch. Fifty-eight seconds to go.

Flamethrowers were sending boiling flame into Brigantes. Their buffalo coats and monkey-skin suits were balls of fire. Another attempted charge by them.

Dwight tried to see through the flame and snow. The crane. It should be moving now!

Yes, the operator had gotten to it. One of the reserves was protecting him with a flamethrower.

They had buried the dome cover for the console in the ground with the cable already attached. It was evidently frozen in. It was made of the armor from a discarded tank. The bottom of it was equipped with plane skids which would anneal to the metal on which the console sat and seal it.

Dwight could see the top of the crane dipping. The operator was rocking it to break the dome loose from the ground.

There it came.

It rose with a rush. It swung. The operator steadied it.

Brigantes were rushing the crane. The Scot there blasted at them with a roaring flamethrower.

The operator was coolly swinging the dome over to position. It could not go further than the atmosphere-armor screen. Dwight could see the operator throw the controls over to remote. Jonnie had the remote there in the cage and would have to do the rest of it if and when he shut off the current to the armor cable.

Dwight tried to see what was happening on the platform. Snow flurries, smoke, and roaring arcs of savage orange flame barred his view. He was sure Jonnie needed help. He gritted his teeth and did his job.

Here and there along the perimeter the flamethrowers were now off. Changing bottles? No. The Brigantes within their reach were burning piles. Black, greasy smoke was rising up through the white snow.

Dwight glanced at his watch. They had time. His own cue to dive back into cover was when Jonnie turned off the cable and the dome began to lower. Then he was under orders to get back in protective cover in the coffin.

Scots were mopping up with flamethrowers. Two of the reserves were speedily putting Andrew in his coffin. They were shoving wound pads hastily under the radiation suit.

A Brigante rose out of a pile of corpses. He had a bayonet. He charged. A thrown dirk hit him. A flamethrower erupted and he went forward as a spinning ball of fire.

The crane operator was out of his crane and running back to his coffin foxhole.

“Ten seconds to withdraw!” said Dwight into the mine radio.

It was suddenly quiet except for flame crackles and the wind. Nothing was moving in the Brigante ranks but smoke and small tongues of fire. Allison and Bittie had been avenged.

The fleeing remains of the tribe were way out on the plain, still running.

The smoke was very thick. Dwight could not see what was happening on the platform.

Numbers were coming back to him from his mine radio; a number was a signal that a man was back in his lead coffin in a foxhole and had fastened the lid down from within. Dwight was checking them off. All reported except Andrew and he knew he had been put inside his coffin. Dwight hoped it wasn’t his coffin for real.

Dwight couldn’t see the platform for the smoke.

He watched the crane.

Wires were still humming. They must all be under cover before the recoil, Jonnie had said.

Dwight looked at his watch. The armor curtain had not gone off. The top of the crane had not begun to move.

He was in an agony of indecision. But he could not get inside that cage with the atmosphere-armor curtain still on. He wanted to disobey orders. He knew Jonnie was in trouble, for the curtain had not gone off on time.

But he had been chosen because he would obey orders. Time was up. The humming had almost ended. Dwight crawled back to his coffin foxhole, scrambled in, and fastened down the lid from within.

4

When he heard, “Alert three!” from the mine radio in his belt, Jonnie had slid out of the coffin buried close by the platform and inside the atmosphere-armor curtain. He was dressed in a camouflage radiation suit and wore an air mask under its face shield. His pouch was hanging from a wide belt. He was armed with three kill-clubs, a dirk and a flamethrower. He had a couple of other things for contingencies.

He had not expected the Brigantes to be inside on the platform. Six guards and General Snith! He hadn’t thought even a Brigante would be crazy enough to let himself be fired to Psychlo. Money! They had bundles of money on the platform.

They were all looking at Terl. Terl was turning away from pushing the firing button. The Brigantes had not noticed Jonnie thirty feet away and slightly behind them.

Well, it would not matter. Jonnie started to ignite the flamethrower.

And then he saw a movement. They had something in a long bundle. The end of it was open. They had somebody there. A hostage they were taking to Psychlo? Gray hair, the scrap of a cloak.

Sir Robert!

Jonnie had to abandon any thought of using the flamethrower. It would kill Sir Robert as well!

Terl was walking easily and confidently back from the console to the platform center. The wires were humming. He halted, thunderstruck. Just a moment ago he had seen what he had thought was the animal, outside. Way over by the car.

And here he was inside the armor curtain!

Was the curtain off? No, he could see it shimmer through the snow. How had the animal gotten through it?

Just as Terl was about to charge, he saw the animal drop a long rod weapon he carried. The animal’s hand darted toward a pouch at his belt.

Jonnie withdrew the contracts Terl had signed. He skimmed them to the platform center, the red seals glaring in the falling snow. Unmistakably the contracts Terl had signed!

Jonnie shouted as loud as he could to be heard through masks and faceplates: “Don’t forget to record these on Psychlo!”

Terl was horror-struck. The last thing he wanted to appear on Psychlo’s platform were those phony contracts! Terl started to dive toward them and pick them up. He collided with Snith just as the general sought to give orders to his bowmen.

Reaching down, Jonnie picked up a beryllium ultimate bomb. He had intended to just throw it on the platform. It was wrapped with a cord. The golden glow of its metal, its size, and its hexagonal shape made it totally recognizable. The cord was not a fuse. The fuse was inside it, set for eight minutes by a timing device on the top. It had an access plate in the bottom that was purposely jammed.

Jonnie touched the igniter he still held to the carrying-cord end. Two poisoned arrows whizzed by him.

“Grenade!” shouted Jonnie.

He pitched the eighty-pound weight straight at Terl. It struck the Psychlo a glancing blow and bounced down under his feet.

One glimpse of a lit grenade, their own favorite weapon, caused the Brigantes to run. At that moment trumpeting elephants sounded outside. The Brigantes hit the atmosphere-armor curtain and were thrown back from it.

Terl took one look at the bomb and any thought he had about papers fled as his horror turned into terror.

It was the bomb! But it had a time fuse. How had the animal gotten it away from Brown Limper, unwrapped it, and changed the fuse all in no time at all?

But Terl knew what he had to do. He had to get rid of it fast!

He was about to pitch it off the platform when the Brigantes came thudding back in recoil off the curtain. He knew that if he threw it, the bomb would just bounce back.

The wires were humming! Terl knew he had to get that access plate off and remove the core and do it fast! He could even see the time fuse closing.

He crouched down and began to claw at the access plate in the bottom. It was stuck! He fought with it.

Jonnie sprinted past Terl. He had to get Sir Robert and get him over to the console.

A Brigante was up on one knee. A poisoned arrow slapped past Jonnie’s head.

Jonnie dragged Sir Robert clear of the long case. His hands and feet were tied. Sir Robert was shouting something, something like, “Leave me and save yourself!”

All chaos had broken out beyond the curtain. There were Scot battle cries, and the roar of stampeding elephants.

Flame splashed against the other side of the atmosphere armor. The falling snow, even inside the platform, was converting to rain. Heat!

Terl was clawing at the access plate. He had no annealing knife to cut the metal. He was trying to scrape a circle and cut it with his claws. He was bellowing in frustration and adding to the uproar.

Two Brigantes charged Jonnie. He let go of Sir Robert, snatched a kill-club from his belt, and struck twice. They went down.

He was able to drag Sir Robert a bit further. It was a long way to that console!

Another Brigante was up. Jonnie threw the kill-club. It hit the mercenary’s forehead and his head went back at an incredible angle.

Snith was up, shouting and pointing at Jonnie.

The din was deafening outside this cage.

A Brigante tackled Jonnie in the legs. Jonnie got another kill-club and smashed his brains out. He got Sir Robert a little further. The Scot was heavy!

Snith was trying to get the last two of his guards to fire. Their bow-strings were too wet. They snatched out bayonets and charged.

Jonnie threw a kill-club and one Brigante was catapulted backward. The other came on. Jonnie took his last kill-club from his belt. He parried the bayonet and struck the Brigante alongside the head. The kill-club flew out of his hand.

He got Sir Robert a bit closer to the console. He was trying to pick Sir Robert up and carry him.

For a moment Jonnie’s back was turned. General Snith snatched a poison arrow out of his crossbelt and rushed.

The heavy impact of the body hit Jonnie’s pouch. General Snith raised the poisoned arrow and drove it into Jonnie’s upper left arm, drove it in through the radiation suit, and deep into the flesh.

Jonnie went down. He rolled, pulling a dirk. He came up and drove the knife into Snith’s heart.

The pain of the wound was savage. Jonnie grasped the arrow shaft and pulled it straight out. But he knew the damage was done. The ferocious fire in the wound was almost more than he could bear.

He gritted his teeth and rallied his strength. They had said it was a slow poison. He still might have time to save Sir Robert and the console.

He grabbed the hilt of the knife and tried to yank it out of Snith’s heart. It was stuck. He looked at Terl.

The Psychlo, still raving, was clawing at the access plate. Tearing his claw points he was actually cutting into the hard metal to make a circle and remove the core.

It was quieter outside. Dwight’s voice came out of the mine radio at his belt, “Ten seconds to withdraw!”

Jonnie knew he was late.

The wires were still humming.

Jonnie made himself concentrate. He still had a job to do. He could feel his heart revving up.

He got a hand under Sir Robert’s armpit and dragged him through the slush. He got to the console. He knew it had a bomb in it he would have to disarm fast.

But he tucked Sir Robert in close to the console so the dome coming down would not amputate his arms or legs.

He glanced at the console. The switch was in the up position. It would have to be in the down position when next this was fired. He wished he had time to tell somebody.

He fumbled for his remote control box. There was broken glass in his pouch. His arm felt like it was on fire. That broken glass was the serum ampule! He had no serum.

The remote shook. No, it was his hand shaking. He threw the switch and swung the crane. No. He had to turn off the armor curtain first. He was getting flashes of blackness. His heart was beating faster and faster.

The armor curtain! He crawled to the bus bar and got it off. Back at the console he looked up at the dome. He operated the remote, positioning the dome exactly above them so it would come down correctly. He threw the switch to lower it. It was coming down too slowly. The cables must be stiff. He could not help that.

He got a hatchet out of his belt for the cables. He would have to be ready to hack them off the instant the humming stopped.

Jonnie lost track of time. He could still hear the humming of the wires.

He looked toward Terl over on the platform. The monster seemed to have succeeded in opening the access plate. He was handling the bomb with great care, extracting the heavy metal core.

Suddenly Jonnie knew what Terl was going to do. He would throw that core at him. It would travel like a bullet! It could go straight through him.

Abruptly Jonnie saw something else.

Brown Limper!

He was rushing forward with a Thompson submachine gun in his hands. He had gone through where the armor curtain had been at the far end of the platform. He was trying to get so close to Jonnie he couldn’t miss.

The dome was not yet down.

Terl had the core in his paw now. He was going to throw it at Jonnie.

It was quieter. There was only smoke and falling snow and the creak of the cables lowering the dome. Jonnie pointed at Brown Limper.

“Terl! He’s going to shoot!” he shouted. Terl spun around and saw Brown Limper. He saw him raising the Thompson to aim it. One shot at this moment would shatter the firing.

Terl threw. He threw with all his strength.

The core hit Brown Limper in the side. It ripped through and hit his spine. The Thompson clattered to the ground.

Brown Limper fell in a jerking tangle of arms and legs, screaming: “Damn you, Tyler! Damn you!” He lay still.

The wires were still humming.

Terl yelled at Jonnie, “I still win, rat brain!” He knew better than to move now.

Jonnie’s head was pounding. His heart was going too fast. But he could shout back. And he felt he had to pin Terl there, distract him.

“Those coffins are full of sawdust! They were changed in your bedroom this morning!” shouted Jonnie.

Terl whirled to look at them.

“And the gold never went to Psychlo! We changed those too!” yelled Jonnie.

Terl opened his mouth to shout.

The platform cargo shimmered. The coffins full of sawdust shimmered. The Brigante corpses on the platform shimmered. Terl shimmered. And it was all gone. The platform was empty, clean even of slush.

The humming stopped. Jonnie took his hatchet and slammed the blade down across the cables. It wasn’t a full severance. He struck twice more. All the cables parted.

Things were going blacker. No, it was the dome.

The reworked plane skids on the bottom of it hit the metal. Jonnie reached out to the dome interior and pulled closed the locking lever which annealed them to the metal the console sat on.

It was very dark.

He felt his time sense must have gone out and then a fleeting thought that maybe Terl had extended the time for his own firing.

Jonnie had had a small mine lamp in his pouch. He made an effort to reach it. His whole body was beginning to shake as if everything was drawn too taut.

A voice was talking to him. It was Sir Robert. “Hurry. Cut my hands loose.”

Jonnie had the hatchet. He made himself feel about for Sir Robert’s hands. The blade was dull, the cord was resistant.

Then he remembered with a surge of panic there must be a time bomb under that console. It would blow Sir Robert to bits. He dropped the hatchet and put his hand to the console side. It was terribly heavy. He only had one working arm but he put his agonizing shoulder against the metal. He got the bottom of the console lifted.

He fished along the lower edges. Then a little higher. He felt it. It was taped on. Working with one hand he got it loose and pulled it out. He let the console tip back in place. In the dark he extracted the fuse from it.

Jonnie felt he was going unconscious. His heart was revving up. Faster and faster.

He had one more thing to do. The switch. The position of the switch.

Jonnie felt like he was being torn to pieces by his nerves pulling tight.

“Sir Robert! Tell them the switch . . . the switch has to be in a down position . . . a down position for the next . . .”

The outside of the dome was struck a blow so hard the whole platform rocked!

It was as though a dozen earthquakes had hit at once. As though the planet had been torn apart.

Jonnie stiffened out into blackness. He no longer heard the chaos going on outside.

5

About an hour before the firing, the orbiting group of ships had just come over the horizon that put them into position to view the American compound.

A small Hawvin spycraft in the orbit ahead of them had already reported some activity there earlier in the day. The report had only said that in the middle of the night a group had been seen on infrascreens entering the compound area and that the group had vanished, leaving only the usual sprawled about and apparently asleep night guards.

The scanners of the orbiting combined force were now picking up something unusual down there on the approaching horizon. There seemed to be a more than normal number of people at the site.

There was a local snowstorm in progress down there and infrabeams were a bit blurred.

The attention of the combined force was not yet fixed on the compound as it shortly would be. The command network of viewscreens was occupied by an interview that was going on.

When Half-Captain Rogodeter Snowl had gone back to Tolnep for reinforcements he had contacted his uncle, Quarter-Admiral Snowleter. Rogodeter believed in keeping profit in the family. The quarter-admiral had come along gladly with a flotilla of five ships, the largest of which was the Terrify-class, battle-plane-launching capital ship Capture. Snowleter had not become a quarter-admiral without some skill and he had brought part of that skill with him: a reporter.

Roof Arsebogger considered himself the ace reporter of the Tolnep Midnight Fang. Even among news media of other systems, the Fang was envied as the very epitome of inaccuracy, corruption and biased news. It always printed exactly what the government wanted even while pretending to be antigovernment. And Roof Arsebogger enjoyed the reputation of being the most poisonous reporter on a staff that specialized in them.

The interview was being conducted by Arsebogger on the Capture and was addressed to Half-Captain Rogodeter Snowl. It was just a background interview and things were dull so others were listening in. They had various opinions. The quarter-admiral was not well liked. Other commanders contested Snowleter’s contention that he was the senior commander and therefore the head of the combined force. And that he was the uncle of the even less popular Rogodeter Snowl made him even less acceptable. They detested Snowl.

“Now getting back to the man on this counterfeit one-credit bank note,” Arsebogger was saying, “would you say that he was dishonest?”

“Oh, worse,” replied Snowl.

“Would the description, ‘He is a known pervert,’ fit him?”

“Oh, worse,” replied Snowl.

“Good, good,” said Arsebogger. “We must keep this to a totally factual interview, you understand. How would ‘He steals babies and drinks their blood,’ do?”

“Fine, fine,” said Snowl, “exactly.”

“I think you mentioned,” said Arsebogger, “when you filed dispatches, that you had several times met this . . . what is his name . . . this defiler of established governments . . . er . . . Tyler? Yes. That you met him in personal combat.”

Other commanders were hearing this and Rogodeter had not thought it would become public property. He had reckoned without the publicity hunger of his uncle. “Not exactly,” said Rogodeter quickly. “I meant to say that I tried but he always ran away.”

Quarter-Admiral Snowleter’s voice came from the background behind Arsebogger, “But he won’t get away again!”

“Now in your opinion, Rogodeter, do you truly think this is the one?”

The small gray man had been watching all this on his viewscreens. He detested reporters and this Roof Arsebogger had earned his particular dislike: the reporter’s fangs were stained nearly black, there were blotches of some disease on his face, and one could almost smell his unwashed condition over the viewscreen.

Unfortunately or fortunately, whichever way you looked at it, his courier ship had come in just yesterday. It had brought lots of odds and ends but among them was the clear-cut statement that the one had not been found.

Along with that, there was a prize addition. The one hundred million credits originally offered by the Hawvin Interrelated Confederation of Systems had been doubled by the Bolbod Equality Empire. The small gray man did not know what was going on in other sectors, much less other universes, but he could suppose that the same mad scramble was in progress.

The courier dispatch box contents, when viewed as a whole, said that these were indeed very strange and troublesome times, that a problem like this had not existed in any past history they were aware of. And there had been some hints about the vital necessity of his presence “where he could do some good” instead of out here sailing around “a twelfth-rate rim star’s only planet.” There was no direct criticism, of course. There were just hints, an undertone.

But actually, it would not matter whether he were home or not. Unless some solution presented itself, the chaos that was going to ensue would be so vast that neither he nor others could hope to control it.

He was going on listening absently to this asinine reporter interview an asinine military mind when his bridge buzzer sounded and his watch officer’s face appeared on the screen.

“Your Excellency,” said the watch officer, “there is something going on down in that capital city area. The infrabeams are scrambling. We cannot tell what is happening. There are no clear pictures.”

The “interview” cut off suddenly. Other commanders seemed to have noticed it.

The Hockner commander appeared on the small gray man’s screen. “Your Excellency, I believe you said that was the central seat of government. We are getting pictures of massed troops and recordings of excessive heat. In your opinion, is this political?”

The small gray man looked at his own screens of the area.

Bad as they had been before, due to a local storm, they were incredibly bad now. One couldn’t make out a thing. Some sort of interference was blasting them off the air.

Wait! That jagged traveling line on the screen.

A teleportation trace.

Hastily the small gray man thought of an answer. “I believe,” he said conservatively to the Hockner, “that it is probably political in some connected way. All the information that—”

His screens almost caved in!

There was a tremendous flare, then nothing.

A squawk horn was going. “Screen overload! Screen overload!”

Good heavens, you never got that except in a major battle area.

The small gray man rushed to his port as he knew the commanders must be doing.

He stared down. There was a babble of incredulity on the remaining voice channels from the other ships.

The storm there had almost been exploded away.

A fireball was climbing heavenward. Spreading, rolling masses of coiling smoke and flame were rising to incredible heights.

Daylight was dimmed by the flash.

It looked like the world had been torn apart!

6

Sir Robert hardly waited for the earth to cease rumbling. He did not even ask himself what it could be. He had only one idea in mind: to get his hands loose and help Jonnie.

He had seen the arrow strike Jonnie. He had seen the lad pull it out. Sir Robert knew it was a poisoned arrow and he had some idea of the consequences. After such venom entered, physical exertion would spread it all through the body much more quickly. And Jonnie had been moving violently.

When the hatchet had cut the cord, it had not gone all the way through. Sir Robert strained every sinew to part the remaining strands. It was dark as pitch in this dome. He could not even see where Jonnie had fallen or which way he lay. But these confines were very close. He could and must get to him! Even though it was probably already too late.

He almost tore the skin off his wrists. The cord parted!

In feverish haste he reached out, felt around, and found Jonnie’s arm, the wounded arm. Sir Robert closed his huge hand around it just below the armpit and held it tight, shutting off the blood flow.

The hatchet had fallen here somewhere. The rocking must have sent it skidding. Moaning with urgency, Sir Robert felt around the metal floor, under the console, under Jonnie. Suddenly his fingers contacted its handle in a corner.

He got hold of the head just back of the blade. He tried to cut through Jonnie’s radiation suit sleeve. It was so hard to work with just one hand.

And in the dark.

He was also trying desperately not to cut into Jonnie’s flesh.

He got a fold of the suit and sawed through it. The hatchet had been dulled and chipped while cutting the cables. The leaded sleeve material was very resistant. He was not making it. Not with one hand.

Suddenly he remembered that Jonnie always had thongs in his pouch. It lay under his body but he got it loose. He reached in and found broken glass that sliced his fingers. He paid it no attention.

He found the end of a long thong and drew it out.

He put a piece of twisted mine lamp metal under the arm and against the artery and wrapped it around and in place with the thong. He drew the thong as tightly as he could and tied it.

Now he could work.

He cut the radiation suit sleeve away just below the tourniquet. He stripped it off the arm. The cloth was matted with blood. The arm was slippery with it.

It was hard to find the wound because of the blood.

He found it.

He took the edge of the hatchet blade and cut an X across the wound hole.

He got out of his air mask and put his mouth to the wound. Anything to get all the poison out that he could.

Time and time again he sucked the wound dry and spat. The taste of the blood was stinging and bitter. There was venom in it all right.

Finally he thought the blood was cleaner. He did not know how deep the arrow had gone but there was no way to probe.

He worked the flesh of the arm in a way he thought would force more poison up to the surface of the wound. He again applied his mouth to it. Yes, there was more bitterness. Then it seemed cleaner.

Sir Robert felt around Jonnie’s belt for a wound compress pack. He didn’t find one. Well, the bleeding was slightly less now. Maybe no vein had been hit. It was probably better without a compress.

He felt the pulse of Jonnie’s other wrist.

Devils in hell! It was racing! The pulse was way above anything he could count.

Jonnie’s body was stretched taut. There was a tremble in the limbs.

Sir Robert, in the dark, tried to find the ampule in Jonnie’s pouch. Planning dictated there should be one. That broken glass might have come from the mine lamp. He found the bottom half of the ampule.

Although he couldn’t see what he was doing and it was just a gesture more than anything else, he opened the wound and upended the broken bottle over it, close to it, pouring in anything that might be in it. He held and massaged the flesh in such a way as to let any liquid drop lower in the wound. It was probably just his imagination, he thought, but the arm area felt slippery.

He felt the pulse. It was racing faster if anything, and the limbs were trembling more.

Had he done all he could? He couldn’t think of anything more.

The air was getting used up in this close space and he put his air mask back on. Jonnie’s radiation mask was in the way and he took it off and checked the air mask under it. The flutter valve was moving slightly but very rapidly. In briefing, they were supposed to put in a new bottle just before the first alert. If Jonnie had done that, he had two hours of air.

Sir Robert sank back. He worked the bonds off his ankles and then straightened Jonnie’s body out and raised Jonnie’s head to his own knee to keep the head higher. Double devils in hell but the limbs trembled!

He thought the situation over. He had not been in on the last briefings; he did not know whether there had been anything he should know now.

Bitterly, Sir Robert cursed his own stupidity. Since things had been going so smoothly with the Academy move, one night he had walked by himself—like a daft sheep—to a knoll to look at the compound. Not really any purpose in it. Just a review of a field where a battle would soon be fought. And Brigantes had grabbed him. They must have been watching him for days.

They had trussed him up and kept him in a cavern. They had tried to interrogate him and had beaten him. His nose was broken and full of dried blood even now. But he was too old a campaigner to talk. He did not know what they wanted with him until they brought him into the compound area and dumped him.

He had not really thought they would take him to Psychlo until they put the air mask on him. The thought had made even him sweat. He had an excellent example of how the Psychlos interrogated—Allison.

Sir Robert had been braced to stand up to it. He had known of this attack but he could not see how he could be fished out. A flamethrower was supposed to sweep that platform clean.

And then this lad had thrown his flamethrower down and attacked! It looked like such a hopeless effort.

Because of Sir Robert, this lad had thrown away his own chances. His own life?

Sir Robert felt the pulse again. Good God, how long could a pulse race like that without a person dying?

He began to get uneasy about the silence outside. There was supposed to be a standby rescue crew deep in the old compound, waiting with flatbeds and planes with both Dr. Allen and Dr. MacKendrick. All in radiation suits and air masks.

It was so silent in here. Was that a slight crackling sound?

Jonnie would have had a mine radio. Sir Robert felt around Jonnie’s belt and then scrabbled around the floor.

He had it! A crackling sound was coming out of it. It was live, but no voices.

Were they all dead out there?

He pressed the transmit button. “Hello. Hello.” Not clever to say more. Who knew who might be out there?

Silence.

“Hello, hello.” Then he thought he better give them a location. Not clever but he had to do it. “Console talking.”

Was that the click of a transmit switch?

Then a voice in a whisper as though from far away, “Is that you, Sir Robert?”

It was Thor’s voice! Sir Robert almost wept with relief.

“Thor?”

“Yes, Sir Robert.”

“Thor, Jonnie is in here. He has had a poisoned arrow in him. You’ve got to get him out quick!”

Then Dr. Allen. “Sir, do you have a radiation suit on?”

“No, blast ye! I’ve no suit! To heil wi’ thet! Get the lad out!”

“Sir, is his suit whole?”

Sir Robert realized he had torn the sleeve off. “No.”

“I’m sorry, sir,” whispered Dr. Allen over the mine radio, “to open that dome would kill you both. Have a little patience. We’re trying to find out what we can do.”

“Patience be domned!” stormed Sir Robert. His extreme urgency was throwing his speech into dialect. “Git th’ lad oot!”

There was no answer. Sir Robert was about to start banging on the inside of the dome. Didn’t they realize Jonnie was probably dying in here?

Then a tiny, piping, whispering voice took over. “Sir Robert?” It was one of the young Buddhist communicators. Probably the youngest they had. They had turned him over to a child!

The war chief was about to thunder a damnation at them when the child whispered, speaking Psychlo, “Sir Robert, they’re doing all they can, honored sir. It is pretty bad out here.”

“Where are you?” demanded Sir Robert, reverting to Psychlo.

“I am just outside the dome, honored sir. My mine radio is inside my air mask under my radiation face shield. Excuse me that I whisper. We want nothing picked up by the visitors above. They can’t hear this and the mine radio won’t reach them.”

“What are the visitors doing?”

“I don’t know, Sir Robert. The snow clouds have closed in again. I see a pilot communicator. I will ask. I will be right back.”

There was a long pause. Then the tiny, shrill little voice, “Sir? The pilot communicator says they have moved in orbit and are somewhere above us. They have this place being looked at. But our battle planes are standing by. Dunneldeen is up there. He wants to know how we are. How is Lord Jonnie?”

Sir Robert felt the shaking limbs of the body resting against him. But he knew morale was a factor up there in the sky. He could not tell them he thought Jonnie was dying. But Jonnie was still alive. “Tell them they should not worry just now.”

The child was gone for a bit.

Then the tiny whispering voice, “The pilot communicator passed it on.”

“What are they doing here to get us out?” demanded Sir Robert. What hell it was sitting here in the dark waiting. Jonnie’s breathing was too rapid, too rapid by far!

“It’s very bad out here, Sir Robert. Very bad. If you hear crackling, it’s the power lines. They are all shorted out and burning on the ground, throwing sparks.”

“Are there any casualties in the raiding party?”

“Oh, we don’t know that, Sir Robert. The rescue team is using blade scrapers to uncover the coffins. I’m standing beside a hole where the platform used to be. It’s smoking. Is it hot in there?”

Sir Robert had not noticed. Then he realized that the dome was warm to the touch. He said so.

“I’m told to tell you not to release the annealing lever on the dome skids. It is a wonder that they held. So don’t release the lever. They will move the whole metal platform.”

Somebody else was coming through on the channel. “Dwight? Can you hear us? Dwight!”

The tiny voice of the child said, “They found his coffin under the ravine bank just now. The bank caved in on it. They have found a forklift in the garage that operates and they are lifting the coffin. They are opening the lid. Dwight looks stunned but he is sitting up.”

“They should be working on this dome!” raged Sir Robert.

“Oh, there’s a whole other team working on it, honored sir. They are bringing a small crane out of the lower levels of the compound now. I see a man throwing clamps on the big crane. It is on its side and they have to lift it upright.”

Sir Robert was getting an idea of what it was like out there.

“We were down in the sixteenth level,” said the tiny voice. “The concussion was bad. It grabbed air out of the place but nothing was heard.”

“Well, what was it? What happened?” demanded Sir Robert.

“We don’t know, honored sir.”

“They had some nuclear weapons on standby. Did they explode?”

There was a pause. The child had gone off somewhere. He came back. “No, sir. Thor says they are intact and he is awfully relieved. They didn’t explode.”

“Then what was it?”

“I am so very sorry, sir. None of us knows. Oh, here comes a blade scraper to loosen your platform so it can be lifted. The first one they had broke down after they got the fire out of it. I am told you must be patient, sir. We are doing all we can.” Then, “They’ve got three more coffins out now.” A pause. Then sorrow. “The one they call Andrew is dead.”

The platform gave a jolt as a blade scraper seemed to pry under it. Sir Robert could hear a motor roar.

There was a shout of alarm and then a crash.

Then the piping little voice, “One of the poles fell in the crater. No one was hurt. Here comes your flatbed truck, sir.”

“Flatbed!” barked Sir Robert. “It’s supposed to be a plane! We’re supposed to airlift out of here!”

There was a pause. The Buddhist communicator had gone off somewhere. He came back, “They have found a river to the south. It is the Purgatoire. The pilots told us.”

Sir Robert felt Jonnie’s pulse. Racing!

“I don’t understand!” cried Sir Robert. “Time is everything here! I need serum! Can’t we lift this dome and push some serum in here?”

“I am sorry, Sir Robert. The Purgatoire is one hundred twenty miles south of here. It’s on an ancient man-highway.” He rushed on so Sir Robert wouldn’t interrupt. “They have mine pumps out. All our equipment and planes are contaminated. They have to be hosed down to get rid of radiation. When that’s done they can open the dome.”

Sir Robert clenched his fists. One hundred twenty miles! How long would that take?

The child must have been reading his thoughts. “I’m told they will drive very fast; they can on the ancient highway. Thor himself will drive your flatbed. They know how important it is. Your flatbed will be the first to leave. They have your crane standing up now.”

There was another chunk from the blade scraper. Something under the platform seemed to tear loose.

“They have found fifteen coffins now,” said the child. “The Scots in them were all alive except one. The coffin was blown into the air and smashed his skull. The lead on the outside of the coffins is all melted. The tops, I mean. They’re hot to the touch and it’s hard to handle them.”

There was a groan and a squeak as the crane hook on top of the dome tightened. They were being very careful from the sound of it not to drop the lower platform off.

The annealing skids held. Sir Robert felt them swinging in the air. Then a thump as they hit the top of the flatbed body. They picked it up again to let it drop down more squarely.

The child must still be standing on the platform overhanging. The tiny voice calmly came through. “I can see better from here. It’s not snowing. Way out on the plain over there I see some bodies. Must be the Brigante tribe. And I can see more coffins.” He yelled to someone and must be pointing. “The whole top of the old compound had blown off. It’s wide open to the winds.”

Sir Robert was feeling Jonnie’s pulse. Was it weaker?

“Thor is turning over to someone. He is climbing in your truck now. He says he’s a good driver, don’t worry. He will go as fast as he can. Excuse me but I am supposed to get in the cab and tie a seat belt.”

The flatbed started up with a roar. It jolted and banged over the uneven terrain. Sir Robert steadied Jonnie’s head. Was he still breathing?

They hit the ancient man-highway. The engine revved into a high-pitched scream.

Sir Robert remembered Jonnie had had a watch. He tried to find its illumination button. The numbers were rolling.

They were driving so fast Sir Robert could hear the wind roaring outside the dome.

Time, time, time! Fifty minutes. Fifty-two minutes. Fifty-nine minutes!

The flatbed abruptly slowed. It jolted down some rough ground. It halted with a surge. It dropped to the earth.

The small piping voice again: “We are at the riverbank. There is plenty of water. They are rigging a mine pipe. I must get away from the dome while it is washed down. I have to get washed down myself and so do the others. Then they will test with breathe-gas.”

Water was suddenly pounding against the dome. It roared and reverberated inside. The sound went all around. And then the water went all over the flatbed, apparently.

There was silence then. Then the piping voice. “Sir Robert? The truck with the small crane has arrived and has been washed down. So have I. Can you find the release lever in there? The one outside is bent.”

Sir Robert had already located and indeed had been on the verge of pulling it an hour ago. He yanked it open. There was a roar and a clank as a crane was moved closer and connected. The dome lifted!

Murky daylight hit his eyes. Jonnie was lying there. Was he breathing?

The owner of the small voice was standing there, dripping water, visor and air mask off. He was about thirteen. “My name is Quong. Thank you for being so patient with me, Sir Robert. I was as worried as you.”

Dr. Allen jumped up on the flatbed. He had a syringe in his hand and was grabbing Jonnie’s arm. A woman nurse took over. She was holding Jonnie’s head.

Sir Robert stood up unsteadily. He was drenched with sweat and the wind was cold.

He looked to the north.

The sky was glowing there.

“What’s that?” he demanded.

Thor was there. Another member of the rescue team. More trucks were arriving further downstream.

Thor said, “That’s Denver.”

Sir Robert stared. They had just come from hell.