They dashed back up the long corridor and Conroy opened the other door by the same process. Then they were out in the main room again.
Major Hawes gasped in astonishment as he saw the ragged army sweep toward him. He drew his blaster, but one of the half-skeletonized veteran jetmen stumbled forward and took the bolt in his stomach, then kept going and wrapped decaying arms around the Major's throat.
Conroy's fist collided with the mouth of a surprised Space-Station guard; his knuckles felt a sharp stab of pain, and teeth crumbled. Dave came up with a staggering blow to the guard's midsection and he fell.
That left two more to take care of. The lightning assault was still only seconds old. One of the guards was fingering the firing-stud on his blaster, but a man Conroy knew only as Pete sprang forward, wrenched the gun away, and dove into the guard.
Conroy grabbed the fallen gun, scooped it up and fired. His bolt spurted redly into the arm of the remaining guard.
Three more Space-Station men in gray uniforms came in, and Conroy and his little army swept forward to meet them. In the general confusion, Conroy's blaster was swept away—and, alone, unarmed, he slipped past the milling rebels and escaped into the corridor outside.
He found himself facing the giant viewing dome again, the curving arc of plexiplast that bellied out from the side of the satellite and afforded a striking view of the distant Earth. The orbiter was 100,000 miles above the Earth's surface—a sort of halfway-house between Earth and the Moon. From a hundred thousand miles up, the view was breathtaking.
Conroy glanced out at the sweeping circle that was Earth, green and shining in the sky. Just now, Africa and Europe were upturned, and the rippling mass of the Atlantic. A little tingle of wonder shot through Conroy at the sight of his home world, seen from the satellite he had helped to build.
Then he saw guards heading down the broad corridor that ran completely around the outer rim of the satellite, and knew he had to hide.