hting back
at a man with a gun; but we'll sure try to nibble us off a lunch while
they're getting a square meal ... here they come!"

The enemy sphere launched its flaming plane of force, and the _Forlorn
Hope_ shuddered in every plate and member as its apex was severed
cleanly under the impact. Instantly Stevens hurled his only weapons.
Flaming ultra-violet and dully glowing infra-red, the twin beams lashed
out; but their utmost force was of slight moment to the enormous power
driving the enemy screens. Two circular spots of cherry red in space
were the only results of Stevens' attack, and the next fierce cut
sheared away the two projectors and, incidentally, a full half of the
fifty-inch armor of the leading edge.

"Then we're checking out now?" Nadia asked quietly, as the man's hands
dropped from his useless controls. "I'm sorrier than I can say, lover.
But at least, I'm glad that I can go out with you," and her glorious
eyes were shining with unshed tears.

"Maybe, but snap out of it, girl--our hearts are still beating! We're
not dead yet, and maybe we won't be. Perhaps they want to capture us
alive, as they did before; if so, we may be able to hide out on them
somewhere and pull off another escape. Things don't look very bright, I
know, but we're not checking out until our numbers are actually run up!"

He hooked a hand under her belt as the shocks came closer, and stood
tense and ready. The lancing plane cut through one end of their control
room, and Stevens leaped with his companion toward the new-made opening;
while the air shrieked outward into space and their suits bulged
suddenly with the abrupt increase in pressure differential. While they
were in midflight, the frightful blade of destruction cleaved its way
through the control board and through the spot upon which they had been
standing a moment before. As they passed the severed edge, en route into
open spare, Stevens seized a metal brace and clung there, every nerve
taut.

"Something funny here, Nadia," he said after a little, in a low tone.
"They should have made one more cut, to make us absolutely blind and
helpless. As it is, they've clipped off all our projectors, so we can't
move, but I think we've got the whole control compartment of number two
lifeboat untouched. If so, we can look around, anyway. Let's go!"

Floating without effort from fragment to fragment, they made their way
toward the section of their cruiser as yet undamaged. They found