Craig nodded slowly. Thoughtfully, he looked away to the west, where the nose of the starship showed above the buildings like a slim silver lance-tip. "Good. Meantime...." "Yes?" "Meantime--" * * * * * It was a sentence never finished. Suddenly, out of a gap in the roof of a ruined building below them, a blurred bulky mass vomited towards them. Spreading as it hurtled upward, it stretched into loose-patterned cordage. Bukal went rigid. "A net-gun--!" He sideslipped the disc. It careened low over the hovels. But green flame speared up in their path--a great, roaring gout of it, ten times the size of the blast that might come from any hand weapon. Bukal jerked back. The disc spun crazily. Then they were falling, men and disc alike, clinging precariously. Barely in time, the craft leveled off a fraction, then tilted once more to spill both Craig and Bukal to the ground, a jarring, ten-foot fall. Guardsmen lunged up from cover, converging upon them. Craig lurched to his feet, trying to shake the haze from his eyes. But Bukal was ahead of him--shoving him bodily back into an alley. "Run for it, you fool! I'll hold them--" Staggering, half-falling, Craig fled into the shadows. The starship. That was the answer. If he could only reach the starship! This thing was beyond any one man's handling.... Panting, he crawled up a crumbling stair, searching the skyline for some glimpse of the silver prow to guide him. Then there it was, off to the west. Craig's jaw tightened. That slim silver craft represented the strength of the whole Federation. One word from it, and a fleet would come roaring down upon Lysor. But first, that word must be spoken. He phrased the message in his mind: "DETAILS LACKING BUT NO DOUBT OF ZENAOR AGGRESSIVE INTENTIONS AS SHOWN IN ATTEMPTS TO KILL ENVOY...." He started to turn, to make his way back down the stairs. But in that instant the sky went suddenly bright with a blaze of light ... a light so dazzling that it left Craig blind and shaking. A light that centered on the starship. Craig clapped his hands across his eyes. A wave of sudden panic gripped him. Grimly--desperately, almost--he fought it down. Slowly, his vision cleared. He let his hands fall. Then he wished he had not. For now the starship's silver prow no longer stood silhouetted against the distant western sky. As if by magic, it had vanished, its passage marked only by a slowly settling dust-smoke haze. So this was Zenaor's answer to the Baemae challenge. He had destroyed the Federation starship. Craig Nesom stood on Lysor alone.... CHAPTER III