* * * * * Somehow she knew the man was Jon Kane, even as she knew she had found him too late. She stood, rooted to the spot in the deep shadow of the ragged crag beneath which she had landed, unable even to warn him of the man who had suddenly appeared behind him. A man with a weapon in one hand, aimed straight at the Cadtech's back! To use her radio at such a distance would mean a power output that would bring a spacetender down upon her within minutes. Helplessly, she watched. Watched as the other touched Jon with his weapon, forced him over the lip of a wide crater-- "No--!" Her choked scream all but deafened her inside her helmet. Then she saw that the other followed over the lip, and realized that their destination was somewhere inside the depression itself. For long, silent moments she stood in maddening frustration, watching the two men disappear into the crater, as powerless to act as she had been to warn. She could not go back, now, nor could she go further. IX The crater walls had been moderately magnetized with a thin coating of metallic spray, and Kane walked before his captor down their sloping incline with greater ease than he had been able to negotiate the planetoid's natural surface. He hesitated as the crater bottom suddenly began to yawn slowly open, and there was the prodding in his back again. "Keep moving, mister. There's a ladder, and you're first!" Kane moved carefully, looked over the smooth lip of the now fully opened shaft. The ladder was a thin, tubular affair with narrow rungs. He dropped to his knees, swung one leg over; held with his elbows, groped with the other foot for the next lower rung. Then felt with one hand, found the top rung, and started down. "I can't cover you on the way down," the man above him said. "But I have a fresh supply of oxygen, and I don't think you have. And I've got both guns!" The shaft closed silently above them, and then there was sudden illumination, and Jon blinked after the half-light of the bleak world outside. The folds of his suit began to feel loose, and he knew that the shaft must also function as an air lock, and was cycling up to pressure as they descended. When they at length reached bottom, his captor gestured at him with a hand weapon. "Get your suit off. It stays with me. Whether you get it back again or not'll be up to you. Move!" Jon fumbled with unfamiliarly placed dogs and buckles, then surrendered the suit, and took deep lungsfull of air. "Where now?" But the other couldn't hear. His helmet was still in place, and Jon knew that whoever wanted him wasn't taking any more chances than necessary. But as if in answer to his question, a concave panel in the shaft wall was suddenly sliding open, and the stockily built man who stepped in it covered him almost casually with a strange looking two-handed weapon. He signaled to the other, then looked at Jon as if noticing him for the first time.