“Are you at the hatch?” the toneless voice came, drifting and eddying through the corridors of the ship. They looked up, staring around them. “I sense something nearby, outside. A ship? You are leaving, all of you? Kramer, you are leaving, too? Very unfortunate. I had hoped we could talk. Perhaps at some other time you might be induced to remain.”
“Open the hatch!” Kramer said, staring up at the impersonal walls of the ship. “For God’s sake, open it!”
There was silence, an endless pause. Then, very slowly, the hatch slid back. The air screamed out, rushing past them into space.
One by one they leaped, one after the other, propelled away by the repulsive material of the suits. A few minutes later they were being hauled aboard the pursuit ship. As the last one of them was lifted through the port, their own ship pointed itself suddenly upward and shot off at tremendous speed. It disappeared.
Kramer removed his helmet, gasping. Two sailors held onto him and began to wrap him in blankets. Gross sipped a mug of coffee, shivering.
“It’s gone,” Kramer murmured.
“I’ll have an alarm sent out,” Gross said.
“What’s happened to your ship?” a sailor asked curiously. “It sure took off in a hurry. Who’s on it?”
“We’ll have to have it destroyed,” Gross went on, his face grim. “It’s got to be destroyed. There’s no telling what it—what he has in mind.” Gross sat down weakly on a metal bench. “What a close call for us. We were so damn trusting.”
“What could he be planning,” Kramer said, half to himself. “It doesn’t make sense. I don’t get it.”