A man was stepping out into the street, a man who carried a gun in hand and suddenly Meek realized they were abreast of the Silver Moon. The armed man was Blacky Hoffman. Here, thought Meek, is where I get it. This is what I get for playing the big shot ... for being a smart alec, for remembering how cards shouldn't be dealt and for shooting a man's gun out of his hand and letting myself be talked into being a marshal. But he sat stiff and as straight as he could on the Prowler and kept his eyes on Hoffman. That was the only way to do. That was the way all the heroes did in the stories he had read. And doggone, he was a hero. Whether he liked it or not, he was one. The street was hushed with sudden tension and the very air seemed to be crackling with the threat of direful happenings. Hoffman's voice rang crisply through the stillness. "Go for your blasters, Meek!" "I have no blasters," Meek told him calmly. "Your hoodlums took them from me." "Borrow Stiffy's," snapped Hoffman, and added, with a nasty laugh: "You won't need them long." Meek nodded, watching Hoffman narrowly. Slowly he reached back for Stiffy's gun. He felt it in his hand, wrapped his fingers tightly around it. Funny, he thought, how calm he was. Like he had been in the Silver Moon that night. There was something about a gun. It changed him, turned him into another man. He didn't have a chance, he knew. Hoffman would shoot before he could ever get the gun around. But despite that, he felt foolishly sure.... Hoffman's gun flashed in the weak sunlight, blooming with blue brilliance. For an instant, a single fraction of a second, Meek saw the flash of the beam straight in his eyes, but even before he could involuntarily flinch, the beam had bent. True to its mark, it would have drilled Meek straight between the eyes ... but it didn't go straight to its mark. Instead, it bent and slapped itself straight between the Prowler's eyes. And the Prowler danced a little jig of happiness as the blue spear of energy knifed into its metal body. "Cripes," gasped Stiffy, "he draws it! He ain't satisfied with just taking it when you give it to him. He reaches out and gets it. Just like a lightning rod reaching up and grabbing lightning." Puzzlement flashed across Hoffman's face, then incredulity and finally something that came close to fear. The gun's beam snapped off and his hands sagged. The gun dropped in the dust. The Prowler stood stock still. "Well, Hoffman?" Meek asked quietly and his voice seemed to run all along the street. Hoffman's face twitched. "Get down and fight like a man," he rasped. "No," said Meek, "I won't do that. Because it wouldn't be man to man. It would be me against your entire gang." Hoffman started to back away, slowly, step by furtive step. Step by step the Prowler stalked him there in the silent street. Then Hoffman, with a scream of terror, broke and ran. "Get him!" Meek roared at the Prowler.