Jon Saxon couldn't have been unconscious but a fraction of a second because he didn't have time to fall. He came to himself swaying dizzily, nauseated as if with space sickness.
He opened his eyes. He was blind!
The shock left him numb. Then gradually, like a flower unfolding its petals to the light, he felt his extra-human sixth sense assume control.
He became aware of the grass and the sun and the distant hills. Everything registered in varying degrees of grayness. It wasn't grayness exactly, but the word came as near to describing the peculiar impressions that external objects were registering on his sixth sense as his vocabulary could supply.
He didn't picture his environment; he realized it. The burned circle of grass, the naked alien....
A second shock rocked Saxon to his heels. The Alien!
Tentatively, almost timidly, he examined the strange figure confronting him. The man, for man he appeared to be, stood quietly several paces, sizing up Saxon with an equal degree of caution. The analogy to two strange dogs eyeing each other belligerently, but each afraid to make the first move, was so ludicrous that Saxon chuckled although no sound issued from his lips.
He sensed his opponent relax. The fellow was big the way Saxon was big, and the same virility radiated from him like a physical force.
The impressions received via his sixth sense were gaining in vividness. Saxon had never fully appreciated its scope before.
Then with the force of a blow, Ileth's terrified thoughts penetrated sharply to his mind.