"You disappoint us, alien," Marston rasped. "Where's your espionage
training? Where's the cunning to test our wits?"
Soft, pitiful sobs answered Marston who barked, "Get up and run for
your life!"
C. G. got up and limped away, and Dr. Weeve turned in surprise. "What
are you waiting for? Why don't you finish him?"
Marston grinned. "He's headed for the park so I'll finish him there.
I'd like some old style hunting."
"Are you taking leave of your senses?" exclaimed Dr. Weeve. "What about
the weapon he used on Engel? Without this armorglass, you're risking
your life!"
"If he has a weapon, why didn't he use it?" Marston fumed. "It's
probably in that briefcase he dropped." He bellowed into the mike,
"Clear the park!"
Numbly Engel watched C. G. stumble past police riflemen at the end of
the street and crawl into dense shrubbery. The globe zoomed ahead, then
poised motionless over treetops as Marston searched for his prey.
"Watch for him!" Marston whispered huskily.
But Engel watched the screen in horror. A telltale circle of light, its
rim overlapping that of C. G.'s, burned steadily brighter. An alarm
bell rang on the instrument panel. Dr. Weeve raised a claw-like hand to
a switch, then eyed Engel queerly. "Something wrong?" he said. "Stomach
queasy?"
His eyes fell on the screen. "Another alien!" he shrieked.
Dr. Weeve's thin lips parted and his fingers fumbled at the safety
catch of his gun. Engel hurled him aside and grabbed at the wheel. The
globe keeled crazily, the trees rushed up at them. With a dull crash
the glass shattered, and struggling out of Marston's flabby arms, Engel
kicked open the door and dropped to earth. He scrambled to his feet
and crashed through high bushes, ducking as a lance of flame charred
branches overhead.
"There's two of them!" Marston's choked voice thundered and
reverberated against distant towers.
Engel paused in a dark glade to hear a police whistle shrill and a dry
crackling grow louder behind him. Stealthily he crept toward sunlight.
With a shock he saw C. G. sitting in the open, exposed and dejected,
his head bowed in pain. Engel dashed over to him, hoisted him on his
shoulders, and staggered over thick grass to a gravel walk. Then the
ground beneath him quaked. The hoarse cries of the hunters faded.
* * * * *
Gently he lowered C. G. to a park bench, and an old man nodding in the
warm sunshine raised bleary, astonished eyes. Engel turned to see a
nurse pushing a baby carriage and the old, familiar skyline of the city
smiling down on them. He shook with relief. Like an enraptured music
lover he listened to the faint roar of traffic.
"Don't let them kill me!" C. G. cried.
"Winos with the d.t.s," the old man muttered and stomped off.
"They're gone--all gone!" Engel shouted.
The little fellow groaned, pressing his wound. "You helped me--your
world need not fear us...."
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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