With surprising strength in one so slender, Carse lifted the ray and pointed it at an angle toward the middle of the ceiling. He pressed the control button, and a blinding stream of violet radiance splashed against the metal above. It hissed and sputtered where it touched; molten drops fell sizzling and splattering to the floor; then suddenly there was a flood of ruddy illumination, and the Hawk dropped the heat-ray, stepped forward and looked up. * * * * * Up through a neatly melted round hole, up at the great glasslike dome which arched over the whole settlement--up, past it, into the vast face of Jupiter, hanging out there oppressively near! Friday, champing for action, left his post by the panel and dragged a long low cabinet to position under the hole. On top of it he placed the operating table, and, after he had tripped the table's small wheels, another table on top of that. "You first, Eclipse!" his master rapped out as he finished. "I'll pass the suits to you; then swing Leithgow up." The negro answered by acting. Swiftly he climbed the rude pile, and reached for the edge of the hole. It was still searingly hot, and he gasped with hurt as his palms and fingers clenched over it, but he did not let go. Levering himself rapidly up, he got a leg through and then his body. A second later he peered back in and lowered his hands down. "No one up here yet!" he reported. "All right for the suits!" Carse passed the three bulky suits to him, and also two extra ray-guns he had found in the locker. "Now, Eliot--up!" With the Hawk's help, Leithgow clambered onto the cabinet. He was just mounting the operating table when, from behind, came a thin, metallic voice: "_Master Leithgow--Eliot Leithgow--please, a favor?_" * * * * * Leithgow turned and stared, then understood. It was the coordinated brains. They had forgotten to return the switches. And now the cold voice was speaking of its own accord; and somehow--though it might have been imagination entirely--there seemed to be a tinge of loneliness to the words that sounded from its speaker. Instantly Leithgow got down and hurried over to the grille. Seconds were precious, but Carse and he were heavily obligated to the brains, and any request in reason had to be fulfilled. "Yes. What can I possibly do?" The lower hinge of one side of the barricaded door gave, burned out, and the door wrenched inward at a resumption of the battering. The other hinge still held, but it was bending with each mighty blow. Outwardly calm, Hawk Carse watched the weakening door, a gun in each hand.