He opened them, and the spaceport of Senya Dik lay black and deserted around him, and Karlovic was gasping to him for help. Together they pulled down the lever that stopped their conveyance. They scrambled down and ran out toward the small lifeboat, slipping and stumbling, dying inside their suits. They fell into the airlock, and Durham slammed the door and spun the wheel, waiting out the agonizing seconds while the tiny chamber cleared and then refilled, and they could tear off their helmets and breathe again. They looked at each other and laughed, and hugged each other, and laughed again, and then went in to the cabin. The communicator was flashing its light and burring stridently. Durham switched it on. Jubb's face appeared in the tiny screen. "You are safe? Good, good. For a moment I thought--! Listen. I have word from my patrol that Morrison has other ships with him now, spread out to catch you if by chance you get through. That is what decided me to use the Bitter Star. I am angry, Karlovic. I am tired of mockery and lies and secret violence. I am tired of peace which is only a cloak for another man's aggression." A darkbird came into the cabin and hung over Durham's shoulder. "It will carry your messages," said Jubb. "I am leaving now for the port, and my own flagship. We go together. Good luck." The screen went dead. Durham said, "Strap in, we're taking off." * * * * * The Star, with its herding pack of shadows, set a course that took them steeply up out of Senya Dik's shadow, into the full flood of the green sun's light. The darkbird spoke by Durham's shoulder, and Karlovic said, "The Star must feed--or recharge itself, as you would say, with solar heat. Watch it, Durham. Watch it grow." He watched. The Star spread out its misty substance, spreading it wide to the sun, and the soft shining of it brightened to an angry glare that grew and widened and became like a burning cloud, not green like the sunlight but white as pearl. Far off to one side of it Durham saw the glinting of a ship's hull. He pointed to it. Karlovic worked with the communicator. In a minute the screen lit up, and Morrison's face was in it. "Hello, Morrison," he said. "Hello, thief." Morrison's face was as hard and white as something carved from bone. "It wasn't just an old wive's tale, Morrison," he said. "It was true, and here it is. The Bitter Star, Morrison." Karlovic reached over and shook him, pointing out the viewport. Coming swiftly in toward them was a small ship, curiously shaped before. "Space-sweep," Karlovic said. "Those funny bulges are torpedo tubes, and the torpedoes carry heavy scatter charges to clear away debris so the ore ships can come in." Durham said to the image in the screen, "Call him off." Morrison showed the edges of his teeth, and asked, "Why should I?"