back to Mars.

"Well, we accomplished our mission, anyhow," Jonner said resignedly, "for whatever it's worth."

"A fool's mission," said the Marscorp captain, and Jonner was inclined to agree with him. "The Egg was an experimental laboratory and an auxiliary power station, and we can build another cheaper than we could recover it. As for you fellows, you're better off than you realize."

"How's that?" asked Stein.

"Why, if you aren't tried as war criminals, you ought to be freed pretty quickly. According to the latest news reports from Mars City, our armies are driving your people back into your underground base in the Isidis Desert. The war will be over as soon as we've cracked that."

Jonner, Stein and Aron lay around in the Marscorp brig on Phobos for more than a month. To be precise, they floated around, for Phobos had little more surface gravity than a spaceship in orbit. When there was no indication they were going to be transferred from Phobos, Jonner set up a howl that at last was heard in the little moon's officialdom.

Jonner was taken before the adjutant of the Phobos base to air his complaint.

"Look," said Jonner, placing both hands belligerently on the official's desk, "the terms of the terrestrial Space Compact apply to Mars, too. No prisoners of war shall be confined beyond a planetary atmosphere, except for so long as it is impracticable for them to be transferred to a surface prison."

"That provision was written into the compact to permit inspection by neutral powers and because, ordinarily, a prisoner has some hope that a surface prison will be overrun by troops of his own side and he will be released," answered the adjutant mildly, peering at Jonner over old-fashioned rimless spectacles. "In your case, that's not likely to happen and I can't see why you're raising such a fuss. The last we heard up here, our troops were about to overrun your last base."

"What do you mean, the last you heard?" demanded Jonner. "I heard that two days before we were brought to Phobos."

"Radio communication with Mars has been out completely," explained the adjutant good-naturedly. "Static's always bad during the Earth-sun conjunctions, as you ought to know, being a spaceman. This time we haven't been able to get anything through at all."

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