He fought silently, striving to work around the ship to the air lock, but the hideous half-men divined his purpose and swiftly moved to flank him, cutting off all escape. Gene cursed explosively and battled all the fiercer.
Then he gaped in surprise as a spear whizzed past him and sank deep in the breast of his nearest attacker. A look of fear crossed the features of the ferocious barbarians, and as one they turned to face this new enemy.
Gene, too, turned to look at the small band of sturdy beings advancing nimbly over the rocky ground, filling the air with well-aimed spears even as they came.
His assailants made a show of standing firm under the onslaught, screeching defiantly and launching their spears haphazardly at the newcomers.
The ranks wavered and suddenly broke, then the horrible monstrosities were fleeing, chattering their hate as they went scrambling away over the boulders. Now and again one would pause and turn to hurl his spear at Gene in a last venomous attempt to do him in. Then all had disappeared in the far distance.
Gene breathed a sigh of relief and wiped sweat from his forehead in spite of the chill air. "What a reception!" He grinned wryly. "Saturn's Rings! The tracer surely developed a bug and took me off course. These people are nothing more than savages. I can't believe them capable of constructing an intricate ray and directing it on Earth. The whole thing is crazy, just plain, crazy!"
His rescuers hurried up, waving their spears and shouting in a strange tongue.
Gene could not understand the words, but he guessed at their meaning from the triumphal air in which they were spoken. A crude tongue, at best, but then these wild tribesmen needed no elaborate language to express their simple minds.
Now the tribesmen, clad in shaggy furs, clustered about him, feeling wonderingly of his clothes, muttering exclamations of surprise as they noted the five digits on each of his hands. Their own gnarled, hairy paws boasted but four fingers to each.