"When that thing gets on a hot scent"--he snapped off the beam--"the beetle-heads won't be able to control it. There will be no reason for them to attempt to. Those hounds obey their first orders: kill--or capture. And I think this one operates on 'capture.' So they'll loose it to run ahead of their party." "And we move to knock it out?" Shann relied now on the other's experience. Thorvald rose. "It would need a blaster on full power to finish off a hound. No, we can't kill it. But we can make it a doorkeeper to our advantage." He trotted down into the valley, Shann beside him without understanding in the least, but aware that Thorvald did have some plan. The officer bent, searched the ground, and began to pull from under the loose surface dirt one of those nets of tough vines which they had used for cords. He thrust a double handful of this hasty harvest into Shann's hold with a single curt order: "Twist these together and make as thick a rope as you can!" Shann twisted, discovering to his pleased surprise that under pressure the vines exuded a sticky purple sap which not only coated his hands, but also acted as an adhesive for the vines themselves so that his task was not nearly as formidable as it had first seemed. With his force ax Thorvald cut down two of the stunted trees and stripped them of branches, wedging the poles into the rocks about the entrance of the hole. They were working against time, but on Thorvald's part with practiced efficiency. Twice more that cry of the hunter arose from the depths behind them. As the westering sun, almost down now, shone into the valley hollow Thorvald set up the frame of his trap. "We can't knock it out, any more than we can knock out a Throg. But a beam from a stunner ought to slow it up long enough for this to work." Taggi burst out of the grass, approaching the hole with purpose. And Togi was right at his heels. Both of them stared into that opening, drooling a little, the same eagerness in their pose as they had displayed when hunting. Shann remembered how that first howl of the Throg hound had drawn both animals to the edge of the occupied camp in spite of their marked distaste for its alien masters. "They're after it too." He told Thorvald what he had noted on the night of their sortie. "Maybe they can keep it occupied," the other commented. "But we don't want them to actually mix with it; that might be fatal." A clamor broke out in the interior passage. Taggi snarled, backing away a few steps before he uttered his own war cry. "Ready!" Thorvald jumped to the net slung from the poles; Shann raised his stunner. Togi underlined her mate's challenge with a series of snarls rising in volume. There was a tearing, scrambling sound from within. Then Shann fired at the jack-in-the-box appearance of a monstrous head, and Thorvald released the deadfall.