He sat down on a massive boulder and tried to think. There wasn't much to think about. Everywhere his thoughts met black walls. The situation, he told himself, was hopeless. If only he hadn't come to Asteroid City in the first place! Or having come, if he had only minded his business, this never would have happened. If he hadn't been so anxious to show off what he knew about card dealing tricks. If only he hadn't agreed to be sworn in as marshal. If he'd swallowed his pride and left when Hoffman told him to. He brushed away such thoughts as futile, took stock of his surroundings. The cliff on the right hand side was undercut, overhanging several hundred feet of level ground. Ponderously, he heaved himself off the boulder, wandered aimlessly up the wider tongue of plateau. The undercut, he saw, grew deeper, forming a deep cleft, as if someone had furrowed out the mountain side. Heavy shadows clung within it. Suddenly he stopped, riveted to the ground, scarcely daring to breathe. Something was moving in the deep shadow of the undercut. Something that seemed to glint faintly with reflected light. The thing lurched forward and, in the fleeting instant before he turned and ran, Oliver Meek had an impression of a barrel-like body, a long neck, a cruel mouth, monstrous eyes that glowed with hidden fires. There was no speculation in Oliver Meek's mind. From the description given him by Stiffy, from the very terror of the thing, he knew the being shambling toward him was the Asteroid Prowler. With a shriek of pure fear, Meek turned and fled and behind him came the Prowler, its head swaying on the end of its whip-like neck. * * * * * Meek's legs worked like pistons, his breath gasping in his throat, his body soaring through space as he covered long distances at each leap under the influence of lesser gravity. Thunderous blasts hammered at the earphones in his helmet and as he ran he craned his head skyward. Shooting down toward the plateau, forward rockets braking, was a small spaceship! Hope rose within him and he glanced back over his shoulder. Hope died instantly. The Prowler was gaining on him, gaining fast. Suddenly his legs gave out. Simply folded up, worn out with the punishment they had taken. He threw up his arms to shield his helmet plate and sobbed in panic. The Asteroid Prowler would get him now. Sure as shooting. Just at the minute rescue came, the Prowler would get him. But the Prowler didn't get him. Nothing happened at all. Surprised, he sat up and spun around, crouching. The ship had landed, almost at the edge of the plateau and a man was tumbling out of the port. The Prowler had changed his course, was galloping toward the ship. The man from the ship ran in leaping bounds, a pistol in one gloved hand, and his yelp of terror rang in Meek's earphones. "Run, dang you. Run! That dad-blamed Prowler will be after us any minute now." "Stiffy," yelled Meek. "Stiffy, you came out to get me."