He did not know how long he was unconscious. Fires were burning in a dozen buildings around him, and he could hear the screams and shouts of the raiders. Dark figures rushed wildly by, silhouetted against the orange flames. Matt crawled down from the truck as four men ran by with crowbars, shouting at the top of their lungs. Matt stared at the crowd surrounding the fallen ship, shouting, raising torches high in the dark night-- He watched for a long moment, but something flickered in his mind. It was a picture of mad, frantic destruction on all sides of him, but something was whispering softly in his ear. Loevy's words. Loevy's intense face. _There is something far more precious than any one Rocket ship here_-- Staring at the screaming mob, Matthews suddenly knew what Loevy had meant. A wrecking crew was at work on the ship, savagely venting their pent-up rage and fear and frustration on the inanimate metal, wrenching hull plates off with violent screeches, ripping and slicing stanchions with blow-torches hissing. A dozen people were streaming in and out of the air-lock, dragging couches, springs, chunks of instrument panel, hoards of supplies, oxygen tanks. The crowd was exultant, the fire-light shining on a thousand wild faces, maddened by the lust of destruction. But Matthews stared, and the feeling of sickness and revulsion grew hard in the pit of his stomach. He turned and started over toward the buildings. The deed was done, but horror was still at large in the world. He didn't know what the future held--and yet, somehow now he didn't want to join the insane fury at work ripping the Rocket to shreds. Loevy's words nagged at his mind, and he made his way between the burning buildings, feeling the desert breeze turned hot in his face, until he saw the concrete and stone administration building up ahead. _We hope maybe we can still salvage something...._ As Matt walked through the doorway of the headquarters office he stopped short, stiffening to the sound of a forty-five booming in the room before him. There was Moe, his back half to the door, holding the still smoking automatic in his hand. And Matt's eyes went from Moe to a long row of filing cabinets against the far wall. Beside a partially open drawer a figure slumped against the side of the cabinet, hands clutching at a sheaf of papers inside the drawer. It was the Bulldog, the colonel himself. But even as Matt stared wide-eyed, the colonel let out a rasping sigh and fell to the floor. He lay still beside another body--that of Loevy. "Moe!" Moe turned as Matt strode into the room. There was an angry look on the old man's face.