“I hope to Klono you know what you’re doing, chum,” the Chickladorian remarked conversationally as the fortress below leaped upward with appalling speed. “I’ve made hot landings before, but I always had a hair or two of leeway. If you don’t hit this to a couple of hundredths we’ll splash when we strike. We won’t bounce, brother.” “I can compute it to a thousandth and I can set the clicker to within five, but it’s _you_ that’ll have to do the real hitting.” Cloud grinned back at the iron-nerved pilot. “Sure a four-second call is enough to get your rhythm, allow for reaction time and lag, and blast right on the click?” “Absolutely. If I can’t get it in four I can’t get it at all. Got your stuff ready?” “Uh-huh.” Cloud, staring into the radarscope, began to sway his shoulders. He knew the exact point in space and the exact instant of time at which the calculated deceleration must begin; by the aid of his millisecond timer—two full revolutions of the dial every second—he was about to set the clicker to announce that instant. His hand swayed back and forth—a finger snapped down—the sharp-toned instrument began to give out its crisp, precisely-spaced clicks. “Got it!” Cloud snapped. “Right on the middle of the click! Get ready, Thlaskin—seconds! Four! Three! Two! One! Click!” Exactly with the click the vessel’s brakes cut off and her terrific driving blasts smashed on. There was a cruelly wrenching shock as everything aboard acquired suddenly a more-than-three-times-Earthly weight. Luda and her fellows merely twitched. The Tomingan, standing behind the pilot, supporting and steadying his wounded head in its rest, settled almost imperceptibly, but her firmly gentle hands did not yield a millimeter. The Manarkan sank deeply into the cushioned bench upon which she was lying; her quick, bright eyes remaining fixed upon her patient. The Chickladorian girl, in her hammock, fainted quietly. The Vegian, who had flashed one hand up to an overhead bar at the pilot’s first move, stood up—although she seemed to shorten a good two inches and her tight upper garment parted with a snap as back- and shoulder-muscles swelled to take the strain. _That_ wouldn’t worry her. Cloud knew—what _was_ she stewing about? Oh—her tail! It was too heavy for its own strength, great as it was, to lift! Her left hand came down, around, and back; with its help the tail came up. To the bar above her head, around it, tip pointing stiffly straight upward. Then, smiling gleefully at both Thlaskin and the Blaster, she shouted something that neither could understand, but which was the war-cry of her race: “Tails high, brothers!” Downward the big ship hurtled, toward the now glowing screens of the fortress. Driving jets are not orthodox weapons, but properly applied, they can be deadly ones indeed: and these were being applied with micromatric exactitude.