Without a second's hesitation, Sadie swung her weapon and pressed the trigger. Beetlebrow went over the cliff. "My Gawd! What did you do that for?" Frank looked at her aghast. "I think he was signaling for an attack up the cliff. Get a detail deployed over there fast." "Why, the kid cracked up!" "In that case he didn't belong in Wildoatia and I did him a service. Quick! That detail!" Surely enough, when they reached the clifftop they found twenty of the frowsy enemy toiling up toward them. This time their fire did real execution; the few survivors fled like lost souls. * * * * * Mindful that they must reach Nirvana before nightfall if they expected to enter its wall, the Incors, who had survived the battle with hardly a scratch, packed knapsacks and plunged again down the trail. Once they detoured a heavily-guarded convoy of ore trucks enroute to Venusport. Once their enemies of the morning tried another ambush. Nevertheless they made good progress and caught sight of the mist-shrouded battlements of their destination while it was still light. Here Sadie called a halt. "Fellow Incors," she cried as she leaped onto a rock, "you're entering Wildoatia proper. From now on each one of us is on his own. You all know the laws here: Might makes right; dog eat dog; devil take the hindmost. No cooperation; no partnerships; no friendships. Even hand-shaking is illegal. If you are robbed or cheated, don't go running to the police. They'll laugh at you. Maybe they'll slap you in a concentration camp where you'll work a year to pay your fine. "You get only three breaks in Wildoatia. If anyone swipes your gun, he has to leave a shooting iron of some kind in exchange. If you're arrested and escape, you can't be picked up again on the same charge after five hours have passed. And if you manage to beg, borrow, earn or steal a million bucks, you automatically become a Big Shot with all rights, privileges and immunities." "Wait a minute, Miss." The speaker was rawboned and bowlegged, as though from riding herd on some far-away cattle ranch. "Ain't they no way a feller can get help if he finds himself in a jam?" "There are two ways. First, you can return to Venusport and promise the S.P. that you'll go straight." She bit her lip and hesitated. "Maybe I shouldn't tell you the other way this early in the game, but I will. If you've got the guts, you can join the Underground. Then you'll have a sporting chance of getting to civilization." "The Underground," sang out a downy youth from Mars. "The indoctrinators said you can get shot just for joining it." "That's right. I said you had to have guts.... Well, good luck, folks. You've made a good start; only one group of Incors out of three ever gets to Nirvana without being hi-jacked. Let's go." She jumped from her perch and stalked off toward the town which rose, like a scene from fairyland, before them. 4