Tom's foot jerked off the accelerator. His Hornet slowed. The car ahead disappeared into the white distance like a black arrow. Whew! His legs were suddenly like ice water. He pulled over to the emergency strip. Down went the speedometer--five hundred, four, three, two, one, zero.... He saw the image of the approaching Hornet in his rear-vision radarscope. It was traveling fast and heading straight toward him. Heading onto the emergency strip. A side-swiper! Tom's heart churned. There would be no physical contact between the two Hornets--but the torrent of air from the inch-close passage would be enough to hurl his car into the Jetway bank like a storm-blown leaf. There was no time to build enough acceleration for escape. His only chance was to frighten the attacker away. He swung his Hornet right, slammed both his acceleration and braking jet controls to full force. The car shook under the sudden release of energy. White-hot flame roared from its two dozen jets. Tom's Hornet was enclosed by a sphere of flame. But dwarfing the roar was the thunder of the attacking Hornet. A black meteor in Tom's radarscope, it zoomed upon him. Tom closed his eyes, braced himself for the impact. There was no impact. There was only an explosion of sound and a moderate buffeting of his car. It was as if many feet, not inches, had separated the two Hornets. Tom opened his eyes and flicked off his jet controls. Ahead, through the plexite canopy, he beheld the attacker. It was far away now, like an insane, fiery black bird. Both its acceleration and braking jets flamed. It careened to the far side of the Jetway and zig-zagged up the curved embankment. Its body trembled as its momentum fought the Jetway's electromagnetic guide-field. As if in an incredible carnival loop-the-loop, the Hornet topped the lip of the wall. It left the concrete, did a backward somersault, and gyrated through space like a flaming pinwheel. It descended with an earth-shaking crash in the center of the gleaming Jetway. _What happened?_ Tom's dazed mind screamed. _In God's name, what happened?_ He saw the sleek white shape of a Referee's 'copter-jet floating to the pavement beside him. Soon he was being pulled out of his Hornet. Someone was pumping his hand and thumping his back. "Magnificent," a voice was saying. "Simply magnificent!" * * * * * Night. Gay laughter and tinkling glasses. Above all, Dad's voice, strong and proud: "... and on his very first day, too. He saw the car in his rear radarscope, guessed what the devil was up to. Did he try to escape? No, he stayed right there. When the car closed in for the kill, he spun around and turned on all his jets full-blast. The killer never had a chance to get close enough to do his side-swiping. The blast roasted him like a peanut."