The rocket ship drew nearer. Limio saw that it had guns. Limio knew these guns. Once before he had met a rocket ship equipped with neutron blasters. Limio had received a hole in his body that had taken a century to heal. Limio had been unprepared then, but this time he was ready.
He tapped the inner fires of energy. A warm glow softened his body. The network of nerves that formed his brain threw out a web of magnetic energy. The toothed craters in his skin yawned expectantly.
The intelligence behind the controls of the ship spotted Chaos. It circled the dying sun. Searchlights stabbed downward toward the surface. Limio's sensitive nerves tingled as radio energy lashed out rhythmically from the craft. It was signaling, probably.
Suddenly from the surface of the star a long, tenuous arm shot out. It was fifty miles long and five miles in diameter. It leaped from the surface with mile a second velocity, aiming a blow at the space ship that could have pounded it to junk, had it landed.
But the pilot saw the blow and dodged out of the way. The tentacle snapped back. Again Limio tingled with radio energy. His brain caught the rhythm and deciphered the thought:
"It is a living world. It seems to be a vicious animal. Just now it attacked—"
"And I will attack again!" whispered Limio's brain in the same magnetic rhythm of the impulses that flowed from the ship.
Again the arm shot out toward the ship's hull. Once more the alert pilot dodged in time.
"Who are you?" asked the space ship, in the rhythm Limio had begun to understand.
"I am Limio," replied the monster. "Who are you, metal monster?"