Don Denton tried to think, but a soft impenetrable band of nothingness seemed to absorb all of his thoughts. His only thought was of the command he had just received, and, strangely, that thought seemed to be a perfectly natural thing. "You go in first, Denton," Palmer said quietly. The trouble shooter obeyed silently, climbing through, standing rigidly until the other had joined him. Then he turned, stepped forward. His breath whooshed in a startled gasp, as his right foot stepped squarely on the dropped oxy-helmet, and then he was falling forward, his hands outstretched in a futile effort to regain his balance. He felt his head strike the wall, struggled vainly to get back to his feet. Then dull blackness wiped all consciousness from his brain. 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.