"Save that stuff for the suckers, old man. You and your pals are just worried because we get first chance to go down into the valley. Well—you'd better worry! There's a rotor-gun mounted in that life-skiff. If we hadn't all been jarred cold when we landed, we'd have given these greenies a sweet greeting. We're going to lift the ship out of that ditch and bring it back over here. Save your prayers; you'll need them when we come over!"
Salvation reminded him stonily, "The flames—"
"Flames be damned! Superstitious poppycock! Spacesuits will protect us from heat or cold alike. Well—come on!"
He gestured his mates to him. The wailing chant of the Titanian natives increased in tone and volume as the four outlaws left their guards and boldly strode the last few rods up the hill, past the dais—and into the roaring hell-mouth of the cave!
And as they entered, Chip Warren knew a swift sinking of heart. His apprehensions had been unfounded, Amborg's claim that the lethal power of the flame was "superstitious poppycock" was true. The spacesuits were adequate protection, and in short moments, Amborg would be soaring back across the plateau, the jets of his rotor-gun spewing death and destruction upon them all....
Then, "My God!" gasped Syd Palmer, his voice awed.
Chip looked, and shuddered to see, the last judgment of Blaze Amborg and his men. A scant dozen yards they strode into the cavern. Vast spirals of fire played about them, but they did not falter. Their suits, ingeniously woven of metal, rubber, asbesto-quartz, defied the combustive powers of fire. But despite this—one of the figures staggered. The stunted Jovian was first to succumb. He had just pitched forward to his face when the second figure reeled. Raat 'Aran, the Uranian. He reeled and clutched at the tall Venusian, Torth—but the Venusian, too, had dropped to his knees; his hands clawed frenziedly at his breast.
Then the mysterious death struck Amborg. His voice rang out in a piercing scream; Chip saw him stare wildly at the three now-motionless bodies of his comrades, whirl, race back toward the safety of the hillside.
But he never reached it. He had taken no more than a dozen strides when he fell. A moment his incoherent cries babbled sickening delirium into his watchers' ear-phones....
Then all was still, save for the inexorable chanting of the natives. And the grave, judicial voice of the Titanian on the altar.