Akars shut off power, held the tender immovable by a weak repulsion field, and freed the navigator's feet. "You get in a suit--and don't try any tricks or I'll beam you." He watched sharply as Jordan meekly obeyed and climbed into the stiff canvas garment. Akars set the helmet over his head and fastened the rim studs, tearing off the collar bridge bearing the legend "_SS Cinnabar_." "If you ever are found, you won't be recognized. They say a body loses heat slowly enough for decomposition to make a good start, in one of these suits. When we land, you close your face plate and go out through the lock." He watched Jordan narrowly as he jockeyed the ship closer to the tiny asteroid. Without knowing why, he was uneasy. Jordan was a fighter. Funny he'd go out like this, the hard way, without a scrap. But what could he do? If he didn't march out of the lock under his own power, Akars could beam him and throw him out through the loading port. Asteroid H277 plus swam up to meet the ship. Akars picked his landing spot and reduced his repulsion field carefully. The ship settled. Jordan seemed to stiffen expectantly. Akars lifted the paralysis gun from its holster. Directly beneath the basalt blackness of the asteroid shimmered oddly with a strange translucent light. Akars swore softly. There couldn't be anything down there. A trick of the sunlight--perhaps the shadow of the ship? But it was queer. Maybe he shouldn't land--just make Jordan jump from the ship. That was it. His eyes flickered to the navigator, stiff as a ramrod now, with that tense air of waiting for something to happen. Akars tightened his grip on the gun, jerked his eyes back to the asteroid--and froze with fear. From the basalt surface leaped a fountain of fire--cold leaping fire licking upward at the ship. He jerked the controls over to full repulsion, screamed in terror as the ship dipped further instead of rising. An electrical flame sprang to meet it--a snapping, snarling fury of saw-edged lightning. Incredulously he saw it leave the prow of the vessel, flicker back to strike white flame from the hull plates just over the fuel tanks forward. A muffled roar beat upon his ears. Flame billowed forth before the pilot glass. The ship trembled and shuddered to the force of unleashed gases; acrid fumes swirled over the control board and seeped from the very floor plates beneath his feet. Through drifting smoke he saw the deck curl back, white hot, and drift lazily out of sight like a burnt leaf. His ear drums snapped as air fled into space. Vaguely he saw the black surface of the asteroid fly upward, felt a crunch and crash of metal as it exploded in his face, and fell through senseless darkness.... * * * * * "So you're alive?" It was Box Jordan's voice, Akars realized as he awoke to painful consciousness. Parts of him seemed to be on fire. He was wearing a space suit, as Jordan was, and they were no longer in the ship, but on the asteroid.