Then the video screen stopped him again. Stopped him cold this time. He stared at the screen incredulously.
The distant camera had turned from the green planet, turning in from the space ship's window through which it had been shooting, and had focussed upon the cameraman. It was Dirk. Dirk—tall and thin-lipped, with bandages on his face—Dirk, that far out in space when not twenty minutes ago he'd been with Steel in that cell below.
How had he gotten out there? How could any space ship have gotten him to Venus that fast?
The other watchers in the room seemed to take it for granted, however. "How'd it go?" the fellow with the skull cap asked.
"No trouble at all," Dirk said from the screen. "Having trouble with this headache of mine though." He grinned faintly through his bandages. "Second one that guy's given me today. I must be slipping."
"Well, come on in and have a drink," the short-haired one said. "Looks like you did a good job on Venus anyhow."
Steel was so bewildered he completely forgot that video worked both ways. If he could see Dirk, Dirk could see him. This didn't occur to him till Dirk's grin faded abruptly and he squinted into the room's darkness from the screen.
"Hey!" Dirk yelled. "Who's that behind you—!" Then, as the two heads before Steel twisted around, "Look out! It's Steel! He's loose again!"
Steel went into action. His fist drove into the face nearest him—the short-haired one's. He knocked him over into the video with a punch that would have knocked out a horse. His left hand caught the other man's collar. His fist started in again.
But this was a blow that never landed.