A measure of color had returned to her wan features and her heart was beating with greater strength. Bill thought of administering the restorative _Sulfalixir_, but he dared not risk removing the Energon screen headpiece. Freml, the Panadur, caught his urgent thoughts, drained of life energy to the point of exhaustion, Margalida might not survive. And she must live, _she must_! Was Bill's intense thought. Behind that alabastrine brow lay the knowledge of a thousand mysteries that must be cleared up. "I will aid her," Freml telepathed with a tired sigh. He went close to the girl, and his fragile hand stroked her throat, then quietly he placed his face close to the faltering heart and transmitted some of the precious energy that still remained to him. Slowly, imperceptibly at first, the exquisite bosom beneath the tunic of a material sheer as dim blue fog, began to rise and fall with regularity. Into the exquisite face, the delicate nacre hue with gold highlights crept slowly. Not until then did Freml rise. "Danger's past," he telepathed laconically. "Hurry, Bill! I shall need to borrow energy from my people ... soon!" And indeed there was a need for haste, for at last the hidden enemy had decided to strike in person. All else had failed despite machiavellian plans. This time they meant to stamp out of existence these presumptuous creatures that had blasted one of their kind--an overlord. Besides in the unconscious mind of the _Aurean_ girl, their hellish secrets lay. Out of the foamless waves of the strangely shining sea, immense iridescent globes floated upwards swiftly, gaining altitude and then deploying into a triangular formation like an inverted pyramid. It was an awesome sight. In a frenzy for foreboding, Bill gave the Z-Auxiliary its maximum acceleration. He knew it was a race with time, and time was on the wing. Ahead of them the super-spacer loomed glistening in the fantastic light, and short as the distance was, it seemed as if they would never make it in the face of that swooping formation of menacing globes. Out of the foremost sphere, a lengthening finger of livid fire pointed directly at their tiny, hurtling craft. Bill Nardon maneuvered in a wide zig-zag then aimed for the yawning auxiliary lock of the Spacer, and hurtled within to a jarring, crashing stop in the mesh of synchronized magnetic fields that achieved degravitation, arresting mass and speed synchronously. The huge lock clanged shut instantly, and with what breath remained in his battered body, Bill Nardon managed to shout into the communication system: "Inner and outer Energon screens ..." he gasped. "Man all emergency and battle stations.... Prepare to launch, we're going up!" Blood was seeping a scarlet thread out of his ears and nose. Freml, the Panadur, was a limp heap on the auxiliary's floor, as energy drained, the sudden acceleration had blanked out even his stupendous mind.