Only two of the three reached the control room. Flicker played with the third for quite a long while before he killed him. * * * * * "We aren't going to get out of this alive," said Sha-Lee. "You know that, as well as I do, I guess." Jock nodded. "I've been sure of it since he got Klock in the first place. He moves too fast, he thinks too fast, he can see too well. And savage! He has a heat gun, do you realize that? But not one of us was killed with a heat gun. It's butchery, I tell you--no, we won't get out of here, alive." "And this thing that's stalking us. What will it do? Take the ship back home? Run loose there the way he's run loose here? Killing and maiming? We've got to stop it, Jock. We can't let it get home." * * * * * Jock stared at the instrument panel, "I know one way we can stop him," he said slowly. "It's suicide, but it would keep him from going home. And it would mean the end of him, too, finally." Charlie looked up, tired lines on his face. The fear was gone to resignation now, replaced by another more terrible fear--the fear that they would be killed and leave this thing running loose--on the ship. "What is it, Jacques?" Jacques picked up a space chart, and slowly ripped it in two. "This," he said. "We can cripple the ship, foul up the controls, the gas storage, the charts--cripple it beyond repair. Then he can't do anything! Wreck the engines, destroy the food, smash this ship so no one could ever do anything with it. Completely wreck his chances to get home--" They moved with sudden desperate swiftness. The heat gun sent up the space charts in wreaths of flame, fused the chart file into a molten heap of aluminum. The engines stopped throbbing, giving way to deathly silence broken only by the heat blasts and the heavy breathing of the two men. The instrument panel melted and exploded, the gas control was smashed. The men worked in a frenzy of fearful destruction, their own last escape going up in searing heat blasts, destruction that no man could even hope to repair, ever-- * * * * * And back in the corner, behind the acceleration cots, Flicker purred and purred. Easy, satisfied contentment filled him for the first time in days; he snickered as the alien creatures went on their path of self-destruction. Everything would be all right now, and his leaders would be pleased at how it turned out. He could bring back first-hand information about these creatures, vital, invaluable information. The contact could be made another time. And then he could go back to his family--they'd really enjoy hearing him tell about that alien, squirming and screeching with both arms ripped off--and have a long, comfortable rest.