Anita safe! All four of us here on the Earthlit rocks, close outside
the brigand ship.
"Anita!"
She held me, lifted me. I was uninjured. I could stand: I staggered up
and stood swaying. The brigand ship, a hundred feet away, loomed dark
and silent, a lifeless hulk, already empty of air, drained in the mad
blast outward. Like the wreck of the _Planetara_--a dead, useless,
pulseless hulk already.
We four stood together, triumphant. The battle was over. The brigands
were worsted, almost the last man of them dead or dying. No more than
ten or fifteen had been available for that final assault upon the camp
buildings. Miko's last strategy. I think perhaps he had intended, with
his few remaining men, to take the ship and make away, deserting his
fellows.
All on the ship, caught unhelmeted by the explosion, were dead long
since.
I stood listening to Snap's triumphant account. It had not been
difficult for the flying platforms to hunt down the attacking brigands
on the open rocks. We had only lost one more platform.
Human hearts beat sometimes with very selfish emotions. It was a
triumphant ending for us, and we hardly gave a thought that half of
Grantline's men had perished.
We huddled on Snap's platform. It rose, lurching drunkenly barely
carrying us.
As we headed for the Grantline buildings, where still the rift in the
wall had not quite broken, there came the final triumph. Miko had been
aware of it, and knew he had lost. Grantline's searchlight leaped
upward, swept the sky, caught its sought-for object--a huge silver
cylinder, bathed brightly in the white searchbeam glare.
The police ship from Earth.
* * * * *