IV

He couldn't have been out for more than a second. He blinked his eyes

shook his head slightly when he saw the tiny box of the gravity-rotor

over his head, shifted a bit so that he gazed squarely at Jim Palmer.

He laughed then, feeling the tight control-band gone from his mind,

sensing the advantage that had come back to him. He twisted a bit,

still not understanding all that had happened, and his mouth opened in

surprise at what he saw.

There were two of them, two grub-like slugs resting quiescently on the

metal floor, each of them the exact duplicate of the thing he had shot

upon landing on Venus.

All of the maelstrom disappeared then from his mind, and his thinking

grew crystal clear. He saw Jim Palmer bending toward him, and then the

ati-guns were in his hands, and their wailing crescendos of unleashed

power filled the _Comet_ with screaming echoes.

For an interminable instant, the slugs seemed to absorb the ati-rays,

then they collapsed into puddles of obscene flesh that disappeared into

charred flakes of ash.

Don Denton lay where he was, the guns silent in his hands, seeing the

intelligence that flashed into Jim Palmer's eyes.

"Oh, my God!" Jim Palmer said stupidly, stared at the strap he still

held in his heavy hand.

Don Denton rolled from beneath the gravity-rotor, came to his feet,

dodged around the dazed man, tugged open the nearest panel in the wall.

He took two small, belt gravity-rotors from a shelf, handed one to

Palmer, buckled the other about his head.

"Put that rotor about your head, Palmer," he ordered. "We've got some

work to do."

He switched on his own rotor, felt nausea cramp at his stomach when the

gravity field pulled at his neck muscles. Hooking his foot beneath the

ship's rotor, he helped Palmer fasten the rotor over his greyed hair,

then handed the older man one of the ati-guns.

"Come on," he said. "We've got some hunting to do."

He led the way, jumping from the port-door, the gun blasting in his

hand, conscious of the _Lanka_ manager's bulky body at his side.

They went side by side down the field, the wailing roar of their guns

screaming in the air, the slugs dying hideously, one by one.

And then Jean was in Don Denton's arms, her slender shoulders shaking

in a torrent of sobs, and he was soothing her with a clumsy gentleness

that felt strange and good to him.

* * * * *

They sat in the control room of the great freighter, _Moonstone_, their

faces were turned to where Don Denton stood at the control panel.

The trouble shooter grinned at the fifteen people that made up his

audience, and he summed up all of his thoughts and theories.

"Those slugs," he explained, "were little more than animated brains.

They lived somewhere in the oceans, and probably discovered the

_Lanka_ camps by accident. They had no ways of subduing you men by

physical means, because of their grub-like bodies, so they took control

of your minds. Unluckily, they failed to gain control of one of you men

and of both of the freighter pilots; and the three men tried to escape

in a small rocket. The rocket crashed, killing all three of the men."

Jim Palmer nodded. "That's what I've got figured out," he said, "But

I've just got a hazy memory of the past three months."

"Well," Don Denton continued, "these slugs must have got the idea of

going to Earth and the other inhabited planets, and taking control of

them. But they needed your help and a space pilot to transport you and

them. They put all of you in a cataleptic state, while waiting for some

space pilot to appear. They left a guard, the slug I shot down the

moment I begin searching the camp. But before he died, he sent out a

call that brought a single slug into camp."

Jean Palmer shivered, held tightly to the trouble shooter's hand. "I

know," she said, "I took off my helmet to adjust the oxygen valve, and

I looked up to see that whitish thing at the corner of the hut. Before

I could call out, something seemed to grab my mind--and then I was

running toward the jungle. I tried to scream to you, when you found me

gone, but I couldn't move."

Don Denton smiled, tightened his strong fingers over the girl's. "It's

fairly easy to reconstruct from there on," he said carefully. "The

slugs tried to get control of my mind. But because thought is of an

electrical nature, absolute control wouldn't pass through the copper of

my oxy-helmet. They set a scene to make me think I was crazy, and sent

Palmer to take off my helmet."

"I remember that," Jim Palmer said thoughtfully.

Don Denton nodded. "Well," he went on, "their mental control was

enough that it played tricks with my mind. They blanked out my vision

when I looked at them, and later, they blacked out the sight of the

freighters, trying to make me think that I was so crazy I should take

off my helmet for an examination."

"I escaped from Palmer, went back to the _Comet_, then raced out of

the ship to save Jean from a beating." He shook his head slightly when

he saw the pain on Palmer's face. "Of course it was just a trick to

get me outside without my helmet. Well, I fell for it; and the slugs

took control, making me believe that Jim Palmer was the master mind

engineering everything. But on entering the _Comet_, I slipped and

fell beneath the ship's gravity-rotor. The field of gravity-energy

neutralized the electricity of the thought waves--just as it blanks out

the power of a flashlight--and I was able to think again. I blasted the

slugs, got two portable rotors and fastened them to Palmer and myself,

and the two of us cleaned out the slugs."

Don Denton flicked his gaze about the room. "Now, if you men intend

to stay, you've got to wear tiny gravity-rotors on your heads. It

apparently isn't the quantity of power put out that blankets the

thought waves, it's possible to use a very weak power. I don't think

the slugs will try anything again, but if they do, you shouldn't have

any trouble getting rid of them."

"We're staying on," Jim Palmer said grimly, nodded approvingly at the

confident glances given him by his men. "And I hope those damned things

show up again. I'd like nothing better than to take an ati-blaster to a

bunch of those uncanny devils."

He grinned suddenly, looked squarely into Don Denton's eyes.

"How about staying on for awhile?" he asked, "There might be a little

excitement on this planet that you could dig up?"

Don Denton shook his head. "Sorry," he said, "but I've got a date with

some friends of mine on Mars; we're going to explore some of the new

tombs they discovered two months ago. I guess I'll be getting along."

He felt the insistent tugging of Jean's slender fingers on his. A smile

lifted the corners of his lips, and he bent over, kissed her with a

quick possessiveness.

"My mistake," he said warmly, "_we'll_ be getting along!"

He and Jean were smiling into each other's eyes then, reading there a

future that held many promises of adventure and love and--and things

that would be utterly nothing to others than themselves.