"Not you, Perrin! You're not going."
"Not me, Commander? I wonder what you can mean?" The pirate's black eyes were glowing.
"Perrin, suppose I should get very careless and you suddenly escaped. I wonder where you'd escape to?"
Perrin glanced out at the glowing ball of Neptune. He was smiling again, but it was a grim little smile. "I have a hideout," he said, "which not even those Proktols have found yet. I imagine they have a lot more of that fuel mined by now, and I just love for them to hate me."
Janus glanced at the space-lock, and turned his back. When next he looked he saw the trim, black Princess speeding unerringly back toward Neptune, a thousand miles away.
Devries alone was regretful, almost bitter. He weighed the familiar atom-blast in his hand. "And I didn't even get to use this! Damn it, Janus, you know what that Brain's doing, planning. If they keep on with those sacrifices, feeding it that mental force, who knows how far it'll go? It's a potential menace, it oughtn't to be allowed to exist!"
"Devries, stop gibbering!" Once again Janus was in his familiar role, Commander of the Wasp of the Earth Patrol. "Ross! Stand by in the rocket room for orders; we're on double duty now."
"Yes, sir! It's a pleasure, sir." Ross hurried away.
"Devries! Start charting our course for Earth."
"Yes sir." Devries turned to the charts, disgruntled but obedient. Janus took over the controls. But a moment later he turned.