"Well, then." Lansing crossed his long legs, glanced nervously about the room, and said, "The world as we know it is done with. Finished. In another week it will be completely uninhabitable." [Illustration] "Hey," grunted Slade. "You Lansing, the physicist?" "That's right, doctor." "Didn't place you at first. Well, what's going to end this lousy old world of ours?" "Well," Lansing answered, "we wiped out our late antagonists with skill and dispatch. But, in the end, they outsmarted us. Left behind some sort of radioactive dust which ... _spreads_. It's rolling down on us from Chicago and up from Texas. God knows what other parts of the country are like--we haven't had time to discuss it with them on the radio." Goldsmid muttered something in Hebrew. "Isn't that lack of communication rather odd?" asked the warden. "Not so very. We've been too busy building rocket ships." "Rocket ships!" Court was jarred out of his icy calm. "You mean spaceships?" cried the doctor. "Yes, Slade, they do," murmured the warden. "Precisely," Lansing said. "When it looked as if the cold war would get rather warm, the allied governments faced up to the fact that our venerable planet might become a ... ah, a battle casualty. So, in carefully selected regions, rather extensive preparations were made for a hurried departure from this sector of the universe." "Oh, come to the point!" Knox exploded. "All you people need to know is that one of those regions is this area of the Rocky Mountains, that the ships are built and ready to go, and that you're to get aboard. Fast!" "That," nodded Lansing, "is it." * * * * * The four prison officials looked at each other. Halloran and Court sat quiet; Goldsmid slowly dropped his eyes to the ground and his lips moved. Slade scratched his chin. "Going to Mars, hey?" he asked abruptly. "That's our destination." The doctor chuckled. "Comic-book stuff," he chortled. "No, it isn't," Halloran said. "We've been expecting something like this for a long time. Haven't we?" "Indeed we have," Goldsmid said. "Expecting, but not quite believing." Halloran looked thoughtfully at the physicist. "Dr. Lansing, these ships of yours ... they're pretty big, I take it?" "Not as big as we like. They never are. But they'll do. Why?" "I should remind you that we have well over two thousand inmates here." "Inmates!" barked the general. "Who the devil said anything about your inmates? Think we'll take a lot of convicts to Mars! Populate it with killers, thieves--" "Who does go, then?" Halloran did not raise his voice but Knox looked suddenly uneasy. "Why ... uh, your operating personnel," he replied gruffly. "Your guards, clerks ... hell, man, it's obvious, isn't it?" "I'm afraid that is out," Goldsmid said. "For me, that is." He stood up, a heavy-shouldered middleweight running a little to fat. "Excuse me, warden, my counseling period's coming up."