"You failed to look in the emergency fuel locker. It was a tight squeeze for me." He smiled tightly, surveying Ketrik's transformed figure. "A nice job. Slightly tall for a Martian but, withal very nice. Too bad all that ingenuity has to be wasted at the very outset."
Ketrik's muscles tightened. As though it were a signal, the other's voice became brittle.
"Up! Up with those hands, Ketrik. I have a few questions to ask, and then—"
It seemed ridiculously easy, the way Ketrik did it. He let his eyes go dull. He sighed and raised his hands, slowly. He saw the other's gun-fist relax ever so slightly. Then Ketrik's legs gave way and he went swiftly downward. The captain fired but Ketrik wasn't there, his powerful muscles had launched him forward, beneath the hissing beam. His shoulder caught the other just below the midriff and bent him double, carried him backward. They crashed into the controlroom door. Ketrik's left hand found the other's gun-wrist and twisted powerfully. A bone snapped, the electro skidded away. The captain began a curse but it was cut short by Ketrik's right hand at his throat.
Ketrik pulled the man to a sitting posture. He gazed deep into the eyes which were glazing over with pain. But it was not enough to prevent the true color from shining through ... the color of dull, tarnished gold.
"I thought so," Ketrik murmured, and then his hand loosened, balled into a fist that drove forward. The man laid back and went limp.
Ketrik's fingers probed the other's face. The man was a Martian, all right, the features had been subtly altered. Enough to fool even Mark! Captain of the elite guard! How long had the man masqueraded in that position, Ketrik wondered—and then he shrugged. It didn't matter now.
He went through the man's clothes, found nothing of interest until he came under the left arm-pit. There, next to the skin, he found a tiny metal disk. He rose, went over to the wall-light to examine his find. The disk was perforated with queer Martian characters. Ketrik knew Martian, but he couldn't quite make these out. He bent closer.
A sixth sense warned him, or perhaps it was some slight sound. He whirled. The Martian's hand had moved, was now grasping the electro which he swung up into line. Ketrik's hand dropped and he fired his own heat-beam from the hip. The beam cut a clean swath across the other's chest, and he died without so much as a sigh.