THEY have no magnetic screen!"

His hand flicked a lever. "Navigation—break away! Straight course back toward the System."

There was a long pause before Lieutenant Parek replied. It was easy to guess his thoughts; quitting, running away! Then he answered; "Yes, sir!"

Clemens' voice, speaking softly to the intra-ship, was suddenly the only sound in the control room above the muted whine of generators underneath. Jon McPartland, his battle-ending order acknowledged, glared silently into his screen.

There the hateful silver sphere shrank slightly in size. Once again McPartland caught the faint flicker of a ray, the star-studded blackness. The Commander looked a fierce question at Clemens.

"No further damage, sir," said the latter. He laid the headphones aside. "I believe we are out of range. Lieutenant Parek reports our speed sixty-five Spatial Units; we are drawing away from the enemy."

There was no relief in the last words; and Commander McPartland felt a sudden surge of sympathy for the other break through his own bitter anger. Clemens had been gloomy about their chances in the battle; now, the Earth ship broke away from the fight, the Lieutenant-Commander was gloomier in the belief that they hadn't tried hard enough—that they'd turned in cowardly flight. His eyes avoided his superior's.

The latter looked about the room, and no glance was raised to meet his own. Reynolds, the Ray Control Officer stared glumly at his calculators, and fingered the phone that had waited vainly for his range data and fire commands. Clemens, stood quietly, awaiting orders. Engineer McTavish sat in stony silence, gaze fixed on the desk before him, where sensitive indicators flashed red damage signals against a three dimensional scale projection of the ship.

McPartland felt his eyes misting, and ground his teeth, remembering the alien ship and using his hatred of it to fight back the weakness of his own pride in his men. They wanted to fight! They hated cowardice almost as much as they did the murderers they were running from; and these Earthmen thought their own commander a coward. But discipline and training held them to his judgment.

"Hell!" barked McPartland. "We're going back after them."

His words shattered the silence and the gloom. Reynolds' face was suddenly radiant; Clemens relaxed into an expression of smug worry; McTavish grunted.

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