s every driving force and his every weapon, but no beam could
penetrate that red murk, and the lifeboat remained motionless in space.
No, not motionless--the red rod was shortening, drawing the truant craft
back toward the launching port from which she had so hopefully emerged a
few days before. Back and back it was drawn; Costigan's utmost efforts
futile to affect by a hair's breadth its line of motion. Through the
open port the boat slipped neatly, and as it came to a halt in its
original position within the multilayered skin of the monster, the
prisoners heard the heavy doors clang shut behind them, one after
another.

And then sheets of blue fire snapped and crackled all about the three
suits of Triplanetary armor--the two large human figures and the small
one were outlined starkly in blinding blue flame.

"That's the first thing that has come off according to schedule."
Costigan laughed, a short, fierce bark. "That is their paralyzing ray;
we've got it stopped cold, and we've each got enough iron to hold it
forever."

"But it looks as though the best we can do is to stalemate," Bradley
argued. "Even if they can't paralyze us, we can't hurt them, and we are
heading back for Nevia."

"I think Nerado will come in for a conference, and we'll be able to make
terms of some kind. He must know what these Lewistons will do, and he
knows that we'll get a chance to use them, some way or other, before he
gets to us again," Costigan asserted confidently--but again he was
wrong.

The door opened, and through it there waddled, rolled, or crawled a
metal-clad monstrosity--a thing with wheels, legs, and writhing
tentacles of jointed bronze; a thing possessed of defensive screens
sufficiently powerful to absorb the full blast of the Triplanetary
projectors without effort. Three brazen tentacles reached out through
the ravening beams of the Lewistons, smashed them to bits, and wrapped
themselves in unbreakable shackles about the armored forms of the three
human beings. Through the door the machine or creature carried its
helpless load, and out into and along a main corridor. And soon the
three Terrestrials, without armor, without arms, and almost without
clothing, were standing in the control room, again facing the calm and
unmoved Nerado. To the surprise of the impetuous Costigan, the Nevian
commander was entirely without rancor.

"The desire for freedom is perhaps common to all forms of animate life,"
he commented, through