While she was thinking, Erol was still talking. "I will ask you, since you are young and more adept in this sort of emergency. What shall we do?"
Florin glanced at Yma, and saw that the bitterness had left her in the face of danger. She too looked anxiously to him for help.
"If we stay here," he said, "we will be killed without question. I have no doubt that those ships are part of the mob. Even if it is the police, and I doubt there are any left after the rioting, they will imprison us."
Erol said, "This is a hunting lodge. There are some weapons here. We have nothing but your gyro to escape in, and it's too slow. I can see that those are police gyros."
"Then we'll fight," Yma declared and rushed inside, with Florin and Erol following her.
"This place is not much for defense," Florin said while they rummaged for rifles, for nothing more deadly was allowed outside the hands of the Galactic Patrol. "I suggest we make it seem peaceful and surprise them."
"Good idea, boy," Erol said. "If you want, I'll sit outside as a decoy."
"That's great!" Florin said quickly, ignoring Yma's protest. "If they see you, they will probably land and talk; but if nobody's in sight, they might bomb us."
The three worked well together, swiftly and efficiently. Erol sat on the veranda, in the open, with a pistol under a lap robe, while Yma and Florin stationed themselves inside.
The three gyros approached cautiously. They were the large black type used by the planetary police, but from the inexpert way they were handled all three at the lodge knew they were not bearing police. They carried bombs, the one weapon allowable to planetary police by the Galactic Patrol, but the men in them would have nothing more than firearms. Therefore it was imperative to get them on the ground.