me.
In his gloved right hand as it came slowly up over my throat I saw a
knife-blade, its naked, sharpened metal glistening blue-white in the
light from overhead.

I seized his wrist. But my puny strength could not hold him. The
knife, against all my efforts, came slowly down.

A moment of this slow deadly combat--the end of everything for me.

I was aware of the helmeted figure of Moa casting off Anita--and then
the two girls leaping together upon Miko. It threw him off his
balance, and my hanging weight made him topple forward. He took a step
to recover himself; his hand with the knife was flung up with an
instinctive, involuntary balancing gesture. And as it came swiftly
down again, I forced the knife-blade to graze his throat. Its point
caught in the fabric of his suit.

His startled oath jangled in my ears. The girls were clawing at him;
we were all four scrambling, swaying. With despairing strength I
twisted at his waist. The knife went into his throat. I plunged it
deeper.

* * * * *

His suit went flabby. He crumpled over me and fell, knocking me to the
floor. His voice, with the horrible gurgling rasp of death in it,
rattled my ear-grids.

"Not such a fool--are you, Haljan--"

Moa's helmeted head was close over us. I saw that she had seized the
knife, jerked it from her brother's throat. She leaped backward,
waving it.

I twisted from under Miko's inert, lifeless body. As I got to my feet,
Anita flung herself to shield me. Moa was across the lock, backed up
against its wall. The knife in her hand went up. She stood for the
briefest instant regarding Anita and me holding each other. I thought
that she was about to leap upon us; but before I could move, the knife
came down and plunged into her breast. She fell forward, her
grotesque helmet striking the floor-grid almost at my feet.

"Gregg!"

"She's dead."

"No! She moved! Get her helmet of! There's enough air here."

My helmet pressure-indicator was faintly buzzing to show that a safe
pressure was in the room. I shut off Moa's Erentz motors, unfastened
her helmet, raised it off. We gently turned her body. She lay with
closed eyes, her pallid face blue-cast from the light in the lock.

With our own helmets off, we knelt over her.

"Oh. Gregg, is she dead?"

"No. Not quite--but dying."

"Oh Gregg, I don't want her to die! She was trying to help you there
at the last."

She opened her eyes; the film of death