ost the last of John Dark's pirates had
been possessed by Vestans and had become parasite-dominated robots
stumbling off into the jungle. The remaining swarms of gray creatures
were scurrying toward Kenniston's group.

They tumbled into the _Falcon_ and slammed shut the space-door. The
ship, completely if roughly repaired, was ready for take-off. Captain
Walls and the men of the _Sunsprite_ crew hastily started the
newly-installed cyclotrons while Kenniston and the others raced up to
the bridge.

Kenniston took the controls. He sent the big black pirate ship leaping
up into the darkness upon flaming keel and tail-jets, and then it
climbed steeply toward the wonderful sky of countless rushing
moonlets.

By the time an hour had passed, the _Falcon_ had groped out through
the periodic break in the meteor-swarm around the asteroid. And it was
throbbing at steadily increasing speed out into the vault of space,
away from the World with a Thousand Moons.

"We'll head for Mars," Kenniston told the others. "We can report there
to the Patrol."

"If you don't mind," Holk Or put in hastily, "I'd just as soon you
dropped me at some asteroid before then. I've no desire to meet the
Patrol."

Captain Walls told the Jovian, "Nonsense! After what you've done,
you'll get a full pardon from the Patrol."

"You can count on it," Hugh Murdock told the doubtful Jovian. "We have
some influence, back at Earth."

"Well, I guess I'll have to go honest, then," sighed Holk Or. "All the
real pirate outfits are gone now, anyway." He shook his head heavily
as he walked away. "The System sure isn't what it used to be."

Captain Walls was asking Ricky earnestly, "You're quite sure your
formula will cure my son? All these years, I've hoped and prayed--"

"I'm certain," Ricky smiled. "Within a few weeks after we get back to
Earth, gravitation-paralysis will be a thing of the past."

They moved off with the others. But Gloria lingered in the bridge with
Kenniston.

"Where will you be going, after we get back?" she asked him quietly.

"Oh, back to space," he answered, a little uncomfortably. "There's
nothing to hold me on Earth now that Ricky's work has succeeded."

"Nothing to hold you on Earth?" Gloria repeated. "That, I would say,
is about the most ungallant speech on record."

He flushed. "You don't mean--that night on the _Sunsprite_--you
weren't in earnest, surely--"

"Your passionate proposal is accepted," Gloria said calmly.

K