A light flashed upon his detector panel. Behind him everything was clear. Nothing was coming from Dhil. Ah, there it was, coming in from open space. But nothing could move that fast! A space-ship of some kind . . . Gods of the Ancients, how it was coming!
As a matter of fact the lifeboat was coming in at less than one light; the merest crawl, as space-speeds go. That velocity, however, was so utterly beyond anything known to his system that the usually phlematic Nhalian stood spellbound for a fraction of a second. Then he drove a hand toward a control. Too late—before the hand had covered half the distance the incomprehensibly fast ship struck his own without impact, jar, or shock.
Both vessels should have been blasted to atoms; but there the stranger was, poised motionless beside him. Then, under the urge of a ridiculously tiny jet of flame, she leaped away; covering miles in an instant. Then something equally fantastic happened. She drifted heavily backward, against the full force of her driving blasts!
Only one explanation was possible—inertialessness! What a weapon! With that and Luda—even without Luda—the solar system would be his. No longer was it a question of Nhal conquering Dhil. He himself would become the dictator, not only of Nhal and Dhil and Lune, but also of all other worlds within reach. That vessel and its secrets must be his!
He blasted, then, to match the inert velocity of the smaller craft, and as his ship approached the other he reached out both telepathically—he could neither speak nor hear—and with a spy-ray to determine the most feasible method of taking over this Godsend.
Bipeds! Peculiar little beasts—repulsive. Only two arms and eyes—only one head. Weak, no weapons—good! Couldn’t any of them communicate? Ah yes, there was one—an unusually thin, reed-like creature, bundled up in layer upon layer of fabric. . . .
“I see that you are survivors of a catastrophe in outer space,” Darjeeb began. He correlated instantly, if not sympathetically, the smashed panel and the pilot’s bleeding head. If the creature had had a head worthy of the name, it could have wrecked a dozen such frailties with it, and without taking hurt. “Tell your pilot to let me in, so that I may guide you to safety. Hurry! Those will come at any moment who will destroy us all without warning or palaver.”
“I am trying, sir, but I cannot get through to him direct. It will take a few moments.” The strange telepathist began to make motions with her peculiar arms, hands, and fingers. Others of the outlanders brandished various repulsive members and gesticulated with ridiculous mouths. Finally:
“He says he would rather not,” the interpreter reported. “He asks you to go ahead. He will follow you down.”
“Impossible. We cannot land upon this world or its primary, Dhil,” Darjeeb argued, reasonably. “These people are enemies—savages—I have just escaped from them. It is death to attempt to land anywhere in this system except on my own world Nhal—that bluish one over there.”