"How many charges do you have for that?"
"Twelve."
"You think you can stand there and hold them off with only twelve charges for your needle gun?"
"There's my power pack."
"It's no good," Eckert said softly. "The batteries in it are dead. I was afraid you might do something foolish with it."
The footsteps were only yards away. He listened intently, but it was hard to tell how many there were by the sound.
"What do we do then?"
"See if they're following us first," Eckert said practically. "They might not be, you know."
They slid out from the shadows and ducked down another lane between the houses. The footsteps behind them speeded up and came down the same lane.
"We'll have to head back for our house," Eckert whispered.