He felt tired, crushed, old. He'd gone a long way in the last dozen years, but every mile of it had only led toward this ending. He was going to die here under the hurtling meteor-moons of Vesta, and that meant that Ricky and Ricky's dream were going to die soon too.
"I told you you were a fool to throw away that gun," Holk Or was muttering.
ou two march over there to the edge of the clearing," Captain Walls ordered grimly, gesturing with his gun. "Anything you want to say first, Kenniston?"
"Nothing that you would listen to or understand, you people," Kenniston answered dully. "No, I've got nothing to say."
A crackling voice came out of the dark jungle at that moment.
"I have something to say! Drop those guns, every man of you, and get your hands up!"
Walls spun around with an oath, levelling his atom-pistol. But out of the jungle crashed a streak of fire that hit the captain's arm and sent him reeling.
One of the girls screamed. Another of the Sunsprite's crew had tried to aim his weapon and had been cut down by a second bolt of atomic fire that had hit his leg.