Mike O'Hara grunted: "Why this sudden fervor to destroy the Kraks, anyway? Until today, you were content to go fishing and hunting without thought of them. Now you've done a right-about-face." "I know," said Sean, and there was chagrin in his voice. "Until today, they hadn't bothered me." "So you want to embroil the whole human race in your fight, eh?" "Oh, hell, Mike, it's not my fight--it's humanity's battle for self-preservation. You know that as well as I do. Besides, wouldn't you like to see Jane again?" "That hurt, Sean," Mike said softly. Sean touched him lightly on the shoulder: "Sorry, Mike, but don't you see? All of us want to see the ones we love again. And we won't, if we let despair grab us." "All right," said Mike. "I'll go along with you. But it's no go just the same." "Pessimist," Sean said and laughed softly. But he was glad the blocky, black-haired Mike was with him. * * * * * The uprooting of these humans from their home of ages had been simple enough, Sean decided. Except for the nausea that held the stomach in noisome fingers when the Krak ship broke loose from the earth. Were there more captives this time than in the long years before? Were there 1,000 Krak ships--instead of 500--transplanting men and women and children to that scarlet land of Karrar? Sean said as much to Mike, and Mike said: "I heard before we left that this would be the biggest batch." Mike looked harried in the yellow wall light. "Sean," he said quickly, with a twist on his lips: "How's the search coming?" Sean jerked his red-thatched head around, stared at him. "Why the sudden earnestness?" Mike licked his lips quickly. "I didn't know it before, but just now when I was looking over the people here, I found Marcia, and she's sick." "Marcia?" Sean repeated. "I thought you and she had busted up that romance?" Mike nodded: "She did," he said quietly. "But I'll never stop loving her." "Mike, how about Jane? You and she were to be married--tomorrow, wasn't it?" "I know, I know," Mike said hurriedly. "But Marcia's sick, and she looked at me so appealingly when I recognized her, it all came back. The least I can do is comfort her." "Sure, sure ..." Sean said. That curious scraping sound that marked the coming of a Krak interrupted them. It was the scarlet-kilted Krak who had marked Sean for the trip. He stood inside the open prison door, his naked torso gleaming in the yellow light and his hairless round head turning. His round head stopped turning as his dark eyes above the wide flat nose fastened on Sean's red hair. "You," he mouthed, "with the red hair. Come!" Sean moved forward cautiously, his nerves atingle, his strong hands doubled into fists. He followed the scarlet kilt out of the packed prison room, along an interminable series of passageways that led upward, and finally entered a room about twenty feet wide and thirty feet long. It was innocent of furniture or decoration. There were no windows.