XI

Glayne sat alone in the pilot's massive shock seat of the _Algol_. The

instruments rose about him on all sides in terraced banks with the

battle screen directly in front of his eyes. Tentatively he reached for

the firing studs, accustoming his fingers to their shape. When he saw

that the last of the _Algol's_ lifeboats had been picked up he realized

that the time had come.

He transferred his gaze to the discoid that was vague and indistinct

beneath its anti-energy shield. Fastening his eyes to the armored outer

lock doors of the landing dock, he gently fed power to the drivers. The

_Algol_ shuddered and gradually picked up speed. Glayne dropped the

anti-shield, realizing that he would never get through the barrier with

the energized shield functioning. But once he was through, it would

have to go up quickly or his ship would be shattered by the roving

secondaries. Hand hovering tensely over the shield control, he guided

the ship toward the landing dock.

His speed increased; at twenty kilometers he was streaking

toward the discoid in a free fall, all energy sources quiet.

Fifteen--ten--five--and the _Algol_ was boring through the energy

barrier, stormed and buffeted as it sought to impede the passage of

the individual circuits. Suddenly she emerged _inside_ the shield and

Tjadlinn was rushing upwards.

Like lightning Glayne's fingers stabbed at the shield control and fed

power to the drivers. He braked the ship crazily to avoid the lashing

secondary beams that reached hungrily for him. Once ... twice--and yet

a third time the Kellander beams found the cruiser and slashed through

her half-formed shield, dealing terrific blows to the plummeting ship.

Then the massive beralloy doors of the landing stage were expanding

hugely in his screen and he braked with all the power he could shunt

into the straining drivers. Somehow his clutching fingers found the

Kellander firing studs and he lashed out repeatedly against the outer

lock. It whitened, ran into slag, crusted, and flared again and again

as the ravening bolts struck it. Desperately Glayne fought to prevent

blackness encroaching on the corners of his vision.

Suddenly a rending, thundering roar filled the _Algol_ and she was

crashing headlong through the weakened beralloy doors of the landing

dock. But even above that deafening roar, Glayne could hear the scream

of twisted and tortured metal. Then the big ship stopped moving and all

was quiet except for the shriek of air escaping through the crevices

around her mangled hull.

Groggily, Glayne shook his head in an effort to shake off the black-out

which had engulfed his vision. In spite of his circulation exercises he

couldn't see anything. Then a glimmering of the answer occurred to him

and with wild surmise he experimentally flicked the firing stud of the

ship's Kellanders.

Nothing happened.

Then Glayne understood. Every bit of the ship's power was cut off,

including the lights and the battle screen. Obviously the Jewel power

was cut off. Evidently the impact of the _Algol's_ crash had jarred the

delicate power drains so that Tjadlinn was once again without power.

But he'd have to make sure.

Heartened, he rose and took a space suit from the locker, checking

to see if its light torch was operating. As he turned away, a vague,

ridiculous hope struck him. He took a second suit from the locker.

* * * * *

Twisted and buckled beralloy plates had sheered long, jagged gashes in

the equally tough armor of the cruiser, Glayne saw, as he clambered

from the emergency lock. A little air still sighed through the huge

rent which the cruiser had smashed in the skin of the discoid. The

gigantic landing dock was dwarfed by the three hundred meter bulk of

the cruiser. Small Delban craft had been flung violently on either side

and now littered the walls with their battered bodies. One or two of

the Delban technicians had been caught by the crash and were either

smeared thinly along the blastway or turned inside out as their bodies

exploded from lack of air pressure.

Hurriedly Glayne flashed his torch about, trying to find the mono-car

which his party had used to get to Selzi-Narfid's quarters. The car

itself was gone but he found the gleaming mono-rail and followed it at

a rapid trot. Fortunately the passage was well-equipped with automatic

air-locks, one of which had whipped in place when the air pressure

dropped suddenly. When he came to the first of these, he found that the

dilator was without power. He fumed at the wasted time as he burned

around the lock with his torch and triggered the mechanism with his

finger.

After he closed it behind him, Glayne picked up his jogging pace down

the mono-rail passage. He felt a kind of grim, ruthless hatred when

he thought of Bro-Doral. He hoped wistfully that he would find the

sneering sadist before Garstow's energy beams ripped the discoid to

pieces.

He wondered what had happened to Niala Chodred. During the battle he

had consciously held his thoughts away from her and the dull ache of

her memory. A chill loathing spread through him as he thought of the

Vibra-Death. He knew of the agonies of that nerve torture; it produced

not one slow death but thousands. More passionately than ever he longed

to find the Bro.

Suddenly Glayne felt the floor of the discoid tremble under his feet.

At first he ignored it, but it grew persistently stronger and he

realized that the fleet was again hurling its energy beams at the

discoid--but this time they were penetrating because there was no

shield to stop them. He quickened his pace, rounded a long curve, and

found that he had reached his goal.

He vaulted the high curbing and pounded down the tapestried corridor to

the wide entrance stage. The dilator stud refused to operate, so Glayne

burned into the lock to operate the stud. He discovered that the port

itself was locked and a sudden unreasoning hope blazed up in him. With

rapid movements he burned the lock out altogether and threw his weight

against the door. With a wheeze it dilated and he staggered into the

luxurious apartment, stumbling from the force of his own momentum.

He was scrambling to his feet when something hit him. It was soft with

rounded contours which he perceived even through the unsympathetic

thickness of his spacesuit. And it had red hair and green eyes.

It was Niala.

"Glayne ... oh, Glayne," she murmured, clinging tightly to him.

"But ... but you're not hurt," he stammered, his mind striving to

adjust to the realization of a hope which it had long rejected.

"I thought they had killed you," she sobbed happily. "But you got away."

"Yes, he did," remarked a third voice, familiar and hated. "It was

unfortunate."

Glayne whirled. Gort Bro-Doral stood inside the entrance stage, a black

Cardy gun in his hand.

"Without you in the audience, Captain, I didn't see much point in

amusing myself with the girl. But now that you have returned, Glayne--"

The big Guardian crouched to spring at the Delban, gathering his legs

under him.

"I shouldn't do that, Captain," Bro-Doral observed sharply, waving the

Cardy menacingly. "Life is too sweet to throw it away so rashly, isn't

it? Besides, such refined methods require time and I fear your leader,

Admiral Garstow, doesn't propose to give us that commodity."

It was true, Glayne realized. The energy beams of the assaulting fleets

were smashing tremendous blows at the discoid so that it shuddered

violently. The shocks increased in strength even as he turned his

attention to them. Somewhere deep in Tjadlinn air was escaping with a

screaming whistle where the skin was ruptured.

"You seem to have no idea how hideous Death is, Glayne," said the

Delban, approaching them slowly. "Out here on the periphery of the

galaxy we like to make some sort of a ceremony of his coming--you see,

he is always hovering around us." The Delban produced his explosive,

nasal snicker. "Death is a fascinating subject; I have often wondered

why you people in the Main Galaxy ignore him. Ever present, you know.

And always waiting for you to step into his dark embrace."

Glayne watched Bro-Doral narrowly. He was but a couple of meters

away. As the blows of the Kellander beams smashing into the discoid

increased, he became more preoccupied with his subject and his grip on

the Cardy grew lax. Glayne's hand tightened imperceptibly on the spare

spacesuit.

"--out here on the Edge," Bro-Doral was saying, "Life is considered

only a prelude to Death. Personally--"

* * * * *

Glayne lunged, flinging the extra spacesuit to one side. Bro-Doral

alerted instantaneously, but his Cardy wavered for a fraction of an

instant toward the empty space suit. Before he could recover his

mistake Glayne's flying body had struck him. The two went down together

in a thrashing tangle. Glayne's movements were hampered by the bulky

spacesuit and he felt his desperate grip on the Delban slipping. Out of

the corner of his eye he saw Bro-Doral extending his long fingers for

the Cardy which he had dropped. Frantically he sought to restrain the

Delban's long arm, missed, and saw the Delban slither from his grasp

and reach for the gun.

Glayne scrambled to his feet just in time to see Niala snatch up the

weapon a split second ahead of Bro-Doral. For a brief instant the Ruler

of Ten Thousand Suns stared into the muzzle of Death. Then it wrapped

him in its dark embrace forever as Niala fired.

Glayne retrieved the spacesuit and hurriedly helped her don it.

The screaming whistle of escaping air formed a mad symphony with

the rumbling crashes of corridors and whole levels caving in upon

themselves. They raced from the apartment, through the tapestried

corridor to the mono-rail which twisted like a live thing under the

impact of the blasting energy beams. Jolt after jolt shook the discoid

as torpedoes and mines exploded with devastating energy concussions

deep within its entrails.

It was uphill all the way as the tremendous mass of the Tane Jewel

dragged at their flagging steps. Niala fell a half a dozen times from

the smashing shocks that shook the discoid. Glayne helped her to her

feet, only to be thrown down himself the next instant by the concussion

of an energy torpedo. Huge seams opened in the tough beralloy sides of

the mono-rail passage as the mammoth support beams fractured.

Panting, they finally reached the point where the air-lock had fallen

in place automatically. Glayne pushed at the port, expecting it to

dilate. It didn't move a fraction of a centimeter. A rapid examination

showed that it was sprung. Feverishly he felt for his torch to cut it

down.

But it was gone!

He suddenly felt sick, realizing that he had lost it in the struggle

with Bro-Doral. Now he would never be able to find it again. They were

trapped. Waves of defeat swept over him as he crouched in the darkness.

Suddenly he heard a new sound in the mad cacaphony of destruction that

raged about them. It was the tortured scream of rending, snapping

beralloy. And along with it came the sensation of increased weight.

The Tane Jewel!

The huge beams which had anchored it in place had evidently collapsed

under the impact of the assault and now the Jewel was falling freely

through space, crashing through everything that stood in its path. And

it was falling toward them!

Glayne's weight grew unbearable as it approached. Vaguely he could make

out its steady gold brilliance behind him in the passage. Grimly he

clung to a projection in the wall with one arm and hung onto Niala with

the other.

Then the miraculous happened.

The air-lock door which had been sprung now dilated under its own

tremendous weight and the air pressure which remained in the passage

flung Glayne and Niala through the lock.

Summoning the last reserves of his diminishing strength, Glayne put his

arm around her body and half-supported her, half-dragged her up the few

remaining steps of the mono-rail passage to the landing dock. Forty

meters separated him from the emergency lock of the _Algol_. Thirty

meters. His straining muscles groaned in anguish. Twenty meters. Niala

was unconscious and her slight form was an unbearable weight to him as

he dragged her with painfully slow steps. Ten.... Five ... he reached

the lock.

[Illustration: _The battle raged on across the stars!_]

He heaved her bodily into the lock and clambered in himself. Then

through the inner door. Across to the elevator. His muscles were a

symphony of agony. Slowly, slowly the elevator climbed. The discoid

was splitting and breaking up around the _Algol_--or was it wedging

the cruiser more firmly than ever in the vise grip of the beralloy

outer portals? The elevator door quivered for a moment, then dilated

in a series of little shudders. Ever so slowly Glayne crawled across

the bridge deck, dragging the girl. A shock seat ... a surette of

verchromynal into the blue vein inside her elbow.

The crescendo of destruction reached new heights. The Tane Jewel was

following him, splashing its insidious yellow radiance through the

glassene window of the navigation bridge. It dogged his footsteps ...

closer ... closer. The pilot's seat. The surette. Blackness encroached

upon his vision. Dimly he was aware of his arm; it moved

instinctively ... slowly ... slowly. The regular driver atomics began

to shriek. His arm made another movement, flicking jet studs. Power

suddenly sang in the forward jet chambers and ejected itself in a

great, mushrooming flame. The _Algol_ lurched backwards ... another

lurch ... straining ... a third. And the _Algol_ was suddenly free.

The yawning pit of blackness closed its gaping maw on Glayne and he

slid down, down, down....

* * * * *

It occurred to Glayne, when he woke up, that his quarters in the

_Algol_ had a changed appearance. He climbed from his acceleration

hammock and bounded to the shower.

"Terran Standard!" he snorted to himself. "What the hell is Harbin

doing puttering along like that?"

As he dried himself from the tingling shower he tried to put his finger

on the change that had come over his quarters. For one thing, he

couldn't find what he wanted. But an even worse defect was the absence

of his dust.

Flag officers in the Stellar Guardians were generally conceded some

slight idiosyncrasy through which they could assert their individuality

in a service where individuality was otherwise rigorously suppressed.

Glayne's own idiosyncrasy was dust. After five long years as a Dorleb

training-cadet without a speck of dust to his name, Glayne felt he had

earned his right to wallow in a bit of dust. But now it was all gone.

His quarters were spotless.

He had finished dressing when a cautious knock sounded on his entrance

portal; then it dilated before he could answer. Harbin's face appeared

in the opening.

"Oh! I'm sorry, sir. Didn't think you were awake yet," Harbin said

apologetically.

"Forget it," grunted Glayne. "Come in."

Harbin entered the room and fidgeted nervously for a moment. "Sir!" he

finally burst out, "I ... we're sorry about that unpleasantness. I want

to apologize on behalf of--"

Glayne snorted and cut him off with a wave of his arm. "What I want to

know," he said with deceptive calmness, "is, where the hell is my dust?"

Harbin grinned. "Lieutenant Chodred. I advised her against it--told her

it was one of your peculiarities. But she wouldn't listen."

"What 'she' is this?" inquired a new voice, pleasantly husky.

Glayne turned and saw Niala leaning in the entrance stage. "You know

damned well whom we are talking about," he said ominously. "Why did you

take away my dust?"

"Oh, is that all?" she laughed. It was a deliciously cool and tinkling

laugh. Harbin foresaw an imminent explosion. Being a discreet warrior

who longs to fight another day, he fled from the room.

But it never quite jelled. Glayne extended his arms to the laughing,

green-eyed Niala. But she stood her ground.

"No," she teased. "Not when you have a beard like that."

Glayne swore and reached for his depilatory. He was going to set a new

galactic speed record for shaving.