pistol. "Long as you're goin' in, might as well take this."

"Thanks." Retief shoved the pistol in his belt. "I hope you're wrong."

"I'll see they pick you up when the shootin's over—one way or another."

The hatch clanked shut. A moment later there was a jar as the skiff dropped away, followed by heavy buffeting in the backwash from the departing mail boat. Retief watched the tiny screen, hands on the manual controls. He was dropping rapidly: forty miles, thirty-nine....

A crimson blip showed on the screen, moving out.

Retief felt sweat pop out on his forehead. The red blip meant heavy radiation from a warhead. Somebody was playing around with an outlawed but by no means unheard of fission weapon. But maybe it was just on a high trajectory and had no connection with the skiff....

Retief altered course to the south. The blip followed.

He checked instrument readings, gripped the controls, watching. This was going to be tricky. The missile bored closer. At five miles Retief threw the light skiff into maximum acceleration, straight toward the oncoming bomb. Crushed back in the padded seat, he watched the screen, correcting course minutely. The proximity fuse should be set for no more than 1000 yards.

At a combined speed of two miles per second, the skiff flashed past the missile, and Retief was slammed violently against the restraining harness in the concussion of the explosion ... a mile astern, and harmless.

Then the planetary surface was rushing up with frightening speed. Retief shook his head, kicked in the emergency retro-drive. Points of light arced up from the planet face below. If they were ordinary chemical warheads the skiff's meteor screens should handle them. The screen flashed brilliant white, then went dark. The skiff flipped on its back. Smoke filled the tiny compartment. There was a series of shocks, a final bone-shaking concussion, then stillness, broken by the ping of hot metal contracting.

Coughing, Retief disengaged himself from the shock-webbing. He beat out sparks in his lap, groped underfoot for the hatch and wrenched it open. A wave of hot jungle air struck him. He lowered himself to a bed of shattered foliage, got to his feet ... and dropped flat as a bullet whined past his ear.

He lay listening. Stealthy 

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