Steve could see the finger tightening on the trigger when he dove. His shoulder jarred Charlie's knees, and they went down together, rolling over and over on the floor. The neutron gun hissed once, between them, and Charlie relaxed.
A smile tugged at the corners of his mouth for a moment, and he said, "Steve." He died that way, with the smile still on his lips.
Schuyler Barling was laughing and screaming, froth flecking his chin. The delicate balance between parasite and host had been entangled, possibly beyond repair. Neither could dominate, and the result was a hopeless, gibbering hulk of a man.
"Poor devil," said Kevin. "He'll get psychiatric treatment on Earth, if that will help."
Steve crossed to the airlock, climbed into a spacesuit.
"What the hell do you think you're doing?" Teejay wanted to know.
"You're forgetting about the other ship. We haven't got a blasting cannon on the Frank Buck, and there isn't one down on the Gordak, either. But with no absorbing medium in space, one of these neutron guns can be a potent weapon." Steve clamped the fishbowl helmet down over his head and activated the airlock.
Soon he stood outside, with nothing but space on three sides of him. On the fourth, his magnetic boots gripped the Frank Buck's steeloid hull as he set himself, ready to fire the small hand gun.
Energy flared brightly from its muzzle, and the other ship, a slim, sinister shape miles off in the void, flared up with it and dissolved in a shower of sparks and mist. But the neutron gun had a kick which dislodged Steve from the hull and sent him spinning off into space.
Through the lock-port, no more than four feet away, he saw Kevin donning a vac-suit. The big Exec reached out to grab him but his arm fell a full foot short. All at once, Kevin was dwarfed by the anthrovac as the big animal joined him, scratching its head as Kevin reached out hopelessly into space. The gap was increasing.