Their bodies strained as the ship lurched. Oakey counted the seconds with his hand, for he could not talk now. Al squeezed the control button again. This was repeated again. And again. Then Al cut the rockets. The pressure on their bodies eased. Both men relaxed. Al unstrapped himself and swung his legs to the floor. He walked toward the porthole. He had to walk carefully, for the centrifugal pitch made the feat like balancing on a turn-table. He reached up and adjusted the flaps. Into the room streamed warm sunlight. A glowing orb swung into view as the ship turned on its axis. A moment later they saw another disc, a bright green disc, a planet hanging in space. "We're there!" whispered Oakey. Al said nothing. His eyes were not on the planet, but on his hand, raised a fraction of an inch from the flap control on the metal wall of the ship. Writhing like a snake from his fingertips to the wall, was a tiny red spark! * * * * * Oakey turned his eyes from the porthole to the silent commander. He saw the ribbon of flame. His body grew tense. Slowly his hands fingered the buckles on the straps of his G-harness. He unfastened them and sprang to his feet. Al didn't try to stop him as Oakey swung across the turn-table room toward the tier of drawers. "Make it quick, Oakey," said Al. Oakey opened the drawer, took out the gun and thrust it into his pocket. "Shoot me, Oakey. You've got to. We can't take the Quinnies to that planet!" "I won't." "It's mutiny. Give me the gun; I'll kill myself." "There's no such thing as mutiny any more, Al. We're just two men in space. The last earthmen alive. The problem will solve itself." "Oakey, we're not going to land on the planet alive." "Be yourself. We've made a good fight. We lost. Let's die with a solid piece of ground under our legs. What if we do infect a planet with a plague. There's a thousand planets just like it in the universe. Every man on them will die, if not today, then in a few years from now. What difference does it make? Why should we try to keep the merry-go-round going?" "Because ... there's a reason. We don't know what it is, but we've got to live and we've got to die. But we've got to preserve life every second we can." "Is that why you want me to kill you? To preserve life?" "One life doesn't matter." Al pointed to the porthole. "It's a whole world of living human beings ... people like us." "We don't owe them anything." Al pushed himself away from the wall, toward Oakey across the room by the tier of drawers. But the reflexes of youth were on Oakey's side. The young man's punch caught Al flush on the jaw and the bearded commander went down. * * * * * When Al opened his eyes, Oakey was decelerating the circular ship into a spiral that would set it down on the planet. Al raised himself on his arms and pulled himself toward the control panel. "You can't do this, Oakey. You're killing a world."