searching the building, on all sides of me, as I plodded toward the exit. One of them glanced up and I actually did three paces more before he reacted.
“He is there, trying to escape,” he said in a dull monotone.
“Doing it too!” I shouted and rushed through the door, right over the man coming in. Then it was just a matter of stepping into the skis and zipping away.
Of course this did no good at all, other than put off the inevitable for a few more minutes. The fence had been repaired, the entrances were guarded—and my tool kit was back in the armory. As I rushed around, wondering what to do next, I heard the car engines starting up. Grab one of them? Rush the gate. Then what? One man against an entire world wasn’t going to do me much good on this planet. Maybe I could find another hiding place in the city.
Why? I couldn’t escape these people. Why put off the inevitable? I stopped to think about this, then remembered what they could do with the axion feed and I started up again. Maybe Hanasu was right and suicide was the only answer. But I rejected this out of hand; I’m just not the suicide type, as I keep telling myself.
All of this kept me occupied. Rushing about the spaceport with the pursuit hotting up behind me, having a good suffer over my approaching fate, racking my depressed mind for a way out. With my attention wandering like this I wasn’t aware of the sound of the rocket until it was right overhead. Like everyone else on the field I stopped and looked up and gaped.
Out of the low cloud it dropped, riding its flame to the ground, a small scout ship.
With the joined rings of the League upon its flank.
“It worked!” I shrieked and went straight up in the air. I landed on the move and made wow-wow sounds with my hand over my mouth as I streaked for the landing pad. The spacer was still bouncing on its landing shocks when I came rocketing up. Needless to say no one followed me since the locals were not as enthusiastic about this arrival as I was. When the hatch ground open I stood below it.
“Welcome to Kekkonshiki,” I said to the man who emerged, squinting in the reflected glare. “Claim this planet for the League, oh conqueror.”
“I don’t know anything about that,” he said. A young man with an awful lot of hair and beard, wearing a soiled and patched shipsuit. “I got a message to pick up one James Bolivar diGriz.”
“You are looking at him.”
“So are the locals. Only they are coming this way with a lot of guns. Get aboard.”
“Not until I make it plain to these types just what has happened.”
I was happy to see a familiar face in front of the pack. Kome, the commander and captain of the ship who had brought me here. “Drop the gun,” I told him. He raised it instead.
“You will come with me. Both of you.”
I saw red. These people were so dense it sickened me. What they had done, the untold number dead because of their infernal plans, sickened me even more.
“Don’t shoot, I beg of you!” I cried, hands in the air, stumbling toward him. Kicking up hard on his wrist so the gun went flying, I caught it, grabbed his arm, twisted him around and ground the gun into the side of his neck as hard as I could.
“Listen to me, you ice-cold idiots!” I shouted. “It’s all over, finished, through. You have lost. You will cause no more trouble in the galaxy. Your only strength was secrecy, so you could work away like roaches inside the wall. But that’s over now. Don’t you see the insignia on this ship? It’s a League ship. They
“Have I?” the pilot gasped.
“Shut up, you dumbhead, and do your job.”
“My job was to get you.”
“You’ve been promoted. Take their guns.”
There was a little edge of desperation in my voice because they were raising their guns. Knowing their attitudes I knew they would calmly shoot Kome in order to get me. I gave his arm an extra twist and pressed the muzzle of the gun deeper into his flesh.
“Come on, Kome, tell them to put their weapons away and surrender. If one shot is fired I’ll see that you are all tortured to death with hot pokers.”
Kome thought and thought in his plodding Kekkonshiki way. Then made his mind up.
“The presence of this ship might be an accident.”
“No accident,” the pilot said. “I’ll show you the message I received. It went out with a general alarm ordering all ships in the area to this planet. We’ve been looking for you people for some time. I’ll get the message.”
“There is no need for the message. Kill them both,” Kome ordered loudly. “If they lie it will be the end of them. If they do not lie it will make no difference for we are as dead.”
“Move aside, Kome,” the nearest man said, sighting his gun. “Or I must shoot you.”
“Shoot me,” was the toneless answer.
“Stop it!” I ordered, shooting the man in the arm so his gun went flying. “It’s no use.”
They thought otherwise. The guns were swinging about when the pilot delivered the message he had been talking about. Not the one they had been expecting. He wasn’t too stupid; scout pilots rarely are.
The nose turret whipped about swiftly and explosive shells rained down on all sides. I wasted no time, rapping Kome on the skull with the gun so he would come along quietly, then adding a few shots of my own at the others to keep their heads down. Into the airlock and finger on closing button. Kome wasn’t quite unconscious but a kick in the side of the head fixed that. Normally I am not vicious, but this time I enjoyed the sadistic pleasure.
“Get flat, this will be a 5G takeoff,” the pilot said.
It was too, and I clunked the last centimeters to the deck and got a good slam on the back of my head. By the time I stopped seeing unusual colors the pressure eased and I floated up.
“Thanks,” I said with all sincerity.
“A pleasure. Those were some nasty-looking friends you had down there.”
“Those were the loonies who started this whole war. And, dare I ask, how is it going?”
“We’re still losing it,” he said with black gloom. “There is just nothing we can do.”
“Don’t say that, it’s bad luck! And head for the nearest station with a psiman because I have some urgent business to transact. You wouldn’t happen to know if a load of prisoners escaped from the aliens?”
“The admirals, you mean? They’re back, and a sorry lot they are too. I mean, normally you don’t care what happens to senior officers, like they’re different life forms or something. But this was a not-too-nice thing.”
“They’ll be cured. Excuse me smiling but my wife and sons were responsible for that escape so it means they are safe.”
“You got some family.”
“You can say that again!”
“You got some family.”
“Don’t take me too literally, though I enjoy hearing it. Now will you please pour the juice to this thing and get us to the psiman. There is much to be done.”
By the time we rocketed into the satellite station I had my messages all written. Something big with a lot of guns and a full complement of troopers would be spared from the war to bring civilization to the Kekkonshiki natives. There were exact instructions on how they were to find Hanasu and put him in charge of the pacification. Justice, revenge and everything else could come later. Right now it was important just to neutralize the gray men to guard our flank. The war still had to be won. I read all the reports in the ship and by the time I had reached the Special Corps Main Base I had a number of plans made. All of them were driven from my mind by the sight of the svelte figure of the woman I loved.
“Air…” I gasped after a number of minutes of close and passionate embrace. “It’s nice to be home.”
“There’s more in store, but I assume you want to look after the war a bit first.”
“If you don’t mind, precious mine. Did you have any trouble admiral-saving?”
“None. You had everything in a lovely turmoil. The boys learn fast and are very good at this sort of job. They are also off now in the navy, doing important things. I worried about you.”
“You had very good reason to—but it’s all over now. You didn’t, by chance, happen to pick up any souvenirs
