He saw it, a rose pink paled by nearer flame, washing lazily against the black cliff edge of Lundy Forest. It grew, boiling up over the barrier in places, spilling through the gap, and the great, agonizing chord of music muted and dwindled. The flame-perimeter began shrinking and still the fire mist grew, staining the night sky north and south beyond eye-reach. The song became a mournful wailing and the soldiers in the garden moved forward for the mopping up. "Pia, I've got to go down there. I've got to see a stomper close up." She was trembling and crying with reaction. "I think they'll be too busy to mind," she said. "But don't go too far in ... Flinter." He ran down the stairs and through the unguarded gate toward the fought-over area. Wounded men were being helped or carried past him, but no one noticed him. He found a stomper, blaster-torn but not yet dead, and stopped to watch the four-foot tripart beak snap feebly and the dark wings writhe and clutch. The paired vertical eyelid folds rolled apart laterally to reveal three eyes under a single triangular conjunctiva, lambent in the flame-shot darkness. Soldiers passed unheeding while Cole stood and wondered. Then a hand jerked violently at his arm. It was Morgan. Morgan wordlessly marched him off to a knot of men nearer the mopping up line and pushed him before Garth Bidgrass. Sweat dripped from flaring eyebrows down the grim old face, and over a blistered right cheek. A heavy blaster hung from the old man's body harness. "Well, Mr. Cole, is this data?" he asked dourly. "Have you come out to save stompers?" "I wish I could have saved men, Mr. Bidgrass. I wanted to help," Cole said. "Another like this and you may have to," Bidgrass said, less sharply. "It was close work, lad." "I can help Dr. Rudall. You must have many wounded." "Good, good," the old man said approvingly. "The men will take that kindly and so will I." "One favor," Cole said. "Will you have your men save half a dozen living stompers for me? I have another idea." "Well, I don't know," Bidgrass said. "The men won't like it ... but a few days, maybe ... yes, I'll save you some." "Thank you, sir." Cole turned away, catching a thick scowl from Morgan. Overhead the three moons were strung in a ragged line across the sky, and Hoggy Darn was rising. * * * * * Cole worked around the clock at the hospital, sterilizing instruments and helping Dr. Rudall with dressings. He was surprised to see other doctors, many nurses and numerous biofield projectors as modern as any on Belconti. Some of the wounded were women. All of them, wounded and unwounded, seemed in a shared mood of exaltation. He caught glimpses of Pia, working too. She seemed less poised for flight, tired but happy, and she smiled at him.