Ron nodded. He removed the charges from both firing chambers, making very sure that only one charge was left in each. "Your electro-pistol," Tarnuff said. "Leave it here in the control room. Not that I don't trust you, but everything must be equal." "I've a better idea than that. I don't trust you either. Want to watch this?" Ron donned a space-suit again, stepped into the airlock and hurled his electro-pistol far away into the void where it drifted out of reach forever. Tarnuff, watching from a port, nodded his satisfaction as Ron returned. "And now the statement," Ron said, drawing the paper from his pocket. "Which you will sign, after first adding a P.S. absolving _me_ entirely if I should be apprehended with these Silicytes on my hands." Tarnuff looked up, smiling. "You think of everything, don't you?" "It pays." Tarnuff wrote for a minute, signed, and handed it to Ron. The latter read it and was satisfied. Tarnuff took the paper from Ron's hands again and slipped it into his own pocket. "If I win I shall destroy this. If you win, which I doubt, you may take it from me at your convenience." "You think of everything too. Okay," Ron shrugged. He held out the identical pistols. "Your choice, if it means anything." "It doesn't, but I'll take this one." Tarnuff took one of the pistols and then climbed into a space-suit as Ron waited. "Which airlocks?" Ron asked through the audio-phone in his helmet. "I'd suggest the central ones. I'll take the port side and you the starboard. We'll enter the respective locks at the same instant, then into space. After that, well, only one of us will enter this ship again." They moved into parallel corridors on opposite sides of the ship. Instantly Ron was alert, not trusting the Martian out of his sight now that they were both armed with a bullet apiece. But both their helmet phones were on. Ron stopped a moment and listened. He heard the other's amused voice: "Stopping, Jordan? On to your airlock! Goodbye, but don't mind if I don't wish you good luck." "The same to you." Ron entered his lock. The inner door closed automatically, and a few seconds later the outer door opened. He knew Tarnuff had done likewise, for he could hear the faint sound of the mechanism through his phones. Then he knew that Tarnuff had swung outside, for he heard a couple of metallic clicks as the magnetic shoes made contact on the outer, opposite side of the hull. Satisfied, Ron moved out too, and his own shoes swung around in an arc to make contact. * * * * * For a single instant he was appalled at the utter, outer immensity, the sweeping darkness; then he did not look outward again, but clung to the hull, facing it. He knew the _Lucifer_ was still speeding along on its full rocket blast, but not relative to him.