excitement. "I can see them, sor! By Cosmos! There be seven in this boat
on my side. I am behind a rock forty yards to sunward of the second
crater."

Rip turned up the volume of his communicator. "How are they armed? Santos,
report."

"One is carrying a pneumatic chattergun. The rest have nothing in their
hands."

"Pederson, report."

"No weapons I can see, sor."

Koa looked at Rip. "They must think the asteroid is clean. Otherwise
they'd have more than a chattergun in sight. You can bet they have knives
and pistols, too."

Rip had been playing with an idea. He tried it on his men. "These Connies
would be useful to us alive, if we could capture them."

It was Dowst who caught his meaning first. "You mean as hostages, sir?"

"That's it. If we could capture them, the Connie cruiser would be
helpless. We could use the snapper-boat radios to warn the ship that any
false move would mean harm to their men."

Koa shook his head doubtfully. "I'm not sure the Connies worry about their
men, but it's worth the try. We can capture some of them if they split up
to search the asteroid. But we won't be able to sneak up on them all."

"We have an advantage," Rip reminded them. "We've been on the asteroid
longer. We know our way around, and we're used to space-walking. They've
just come out of deceleration and they won't have their space-legs yet."

Santos reported. "They're breaking up into groups of two. Three are
guarding the snapper-boats. One is the man with the chattergun."

"Are their belt lights on?"

"Yes."

"Then keep out of the beams. Don't let them walk into you. Keep low, and
keep moving. Stay over on the dark side."

"We'd better get to the dark side ourselves," Koa warned.

He was right, Rip knew. The Connies didn't have far to search before
reaching the sun side. "Koa, you take Trudeau and Kemp. I'll take Dowst
and Dominico. Nunez and Bradshaw stay here to guard the cave. If they
arrive in twos, let them get into the cave before you jump them. Bradshaw,
how do you feel?"

"I'm all right, Lieutenant."

Rip admired the Planeteer's nerve. He knew Bradshaw was in pain, because
bleeding into high vacuum was always painful. The crack in the
English-man's helmet had let most of the air out, and his own blood
pressure had done the rest. He would carry the marks for days. A few more
moments and all air and all heat would have been gone, with fatal results.
Fortunately, bubbles didn't shatter easily when