The picture on the screen was satisfactory and the guards started to relax beside the slits where their guns projected into the chamber. Miles glanced at them, and his voice was urgent, commanding. "Shoot to miss. And keep getting closer."
Another screen showed the pilot turning to leave, just as the first bullet splintered the floor a yard from his boots. He jumped back with a terrified gesture. Another bullet came closer, and a third barely missed him. Shock hit his face, and vanished as he turned into a bright splash of greenish-yellow light.
"They over-estimated our production and under-estimated our ability to bluff," Miles said. "Good shooting, men. I'm glad he decided he'd failed the test before you had to shave it closer."
Norden stood staring at the blasted area and back toward the screen that had shown the image of a normal human standing before a fluoroscope. Breathing vacuum for five minutes hadn't hit him as hard. Subconsciously, he'd counted on the fluoroscopic evidence—and it had proved to be a lie.
"He couldn't have been an Alien with that kind of a skeleton!" he whispered.
Miles shook his head. "He wasn't. As near as our cyberneticists could gather, he was some kind of a robot, designed to mix with us. We left automatic televisors on Mars to catch a few telephotos of the Aliens, and they look a little like octopi on stubby legs. Nothing could make them look human."
"But a robot with a human skeleton?" Pat asked.
"It's possible, with enough advanced development. Hide the metal works in the so-called bones and skull, and shape everything else to the right form and transparency. Probably the first ones we caught were meant to mislead us. Hughes swears that any race capable of developing such an advanced cybernetic brain could handle the rest—down to letting him get his energy out of our food."
Miles' face was more fatigued than ever, but he found enough strength for a smile. "Thanks for playing along with me, Bill. Now get back to work, if you can stand it. The chem lab delivered your stuff while you were coming here."
The stuff from the chemists looked like wool, impregnated with the K-40 salt. Pat slashed off a yard of the coarse cloth and draped it around the cage, after a quick check with the Geiger-Mueller counter. She formed a rope of it and connected the cage-cover to the nearest pipe.