He started toward her; the slim figure pulled itself erect again. He saw a drawn, emaciated face behind the helmet. Then, with a fury that unnerved him, she whipped out a heat rod, shot a searing bolt in his direction. He felt the fierce heat of it as it whizzed past his shoulder; in his brain Digger's thoughts of attack came to him, he flung an arm around the spacehound, dragged it back as he withdrew toward the door. The girl continued to fire bolt after bolt straight ahead, her eyes wide and staring. They made the door, waited outside while the firing within continued. When at last it was still within, he peered around the corner of the room. She lay in a crumpled heap in the corner; quietly he re-entered, picked her up awkwardly. Through the thin, resistant folds of the spacesuit, he could feel the warmth of her, but could not tell whether the heart still beat or not. They would have to take her to one of the ships. Her limp form was held tightly under his good arm as Nat hurried down the main tunnel. Digger apparently realized the seriousness of the situation, for he received impressions of "must hurry" from the beast and another creature, looking much like him, surrounded by small creatures of the same type, trapped in a crevice. "Aren't you a bit premature, old fellow," he chided. Halfway there, the globes met them again. The things were not singing; from their many eyes poured a fierce, angry blue light. They rolled with a determination that frightened him. Yet he strode on, until they were barely a foot away. "Jump, Digger!" The spheres stopped short, reversed their direction toward the little group at a furious rate, flinging out long, whip-like tentacles. One wrapped itself around Nat's ankle, drew him down. He shifted the limp form over to his shoulder, slipped out his heat-rod. Quickly the tentacle was severed. But now others took their place; he continued firing at them, making each bolt tell, but the numbers were too great. Digger sprang into action, rending the globes with those claws that were capable of tearing the hulls of spaceships. But tentacles lashed around him from the rear, snaked about him so that he was helpless. The girl was slipping off Nat's shoulder. He could not raise the stump of an arm to balance her; it was stiff and useless. He stopped firing long enough to make the shift, even as the spheres attacked again. The bolts had put out the lights in fully half of the marauders but the others came on unafraid.