What form of intelligence destroyed, killed without warning—-without speech?
Clemens' voice broke into the red haze that hovered over his Commander: "Hit again, sir, Section 8. Almost complete disintegration of hull. Bulkheads holding."
Jon McPartland spoke his thoughts aloud. "I saw the ray that time, just a faint glimmer across the black. It should have hit Section 6! And—and THEY have no magnetic screen!"
His hand flicked a lever. "Navigation—break away! Straight course back toward the System."
There was a long pause before Lieutenant Parek replied. It was easy to guess his thoughts; quitting, running away! Then he answered; "Yes, sir!"
Clemens' voice, speaking softly to the intra-ship, was suddenly the only sound in the control room above the muted whine of generators underneath. Jon McPartland, his battle-ending order acknowledged, glared silently into his screen.
There the hateful silver sphere shrank slightly in size. Once again McPartland caught the faint flicker of a ray, the star-studded blackness. The Commander looked a fierce question at Clemens.
"No further damage, sir," said the latter. He laid the headphones aside. "I believe we are out of range. Lieutenant Parek reports our speed sixty-five Spatial Units; we are drawing away from the enemy."
There was no relief in the last words; and Commander McPartland felt a sudden surge of sympathy for the other break through his own bitter anger. Clemens had been gloomy about their chances in the battle; now, the Earth ship broke away from the fight, the Lieutenant-Commander was gloomier in the belief that they hadn't tried hard enough—that they'd turned in cowardly flight. His eyes avoided his superior's.