Curt watched them, screaming as they fled before the shadow-things--the tortured humans of Earth. He watched them die, crushed and seared by the spreading blue flower, and he cursed himself. With all his knowledge and strength he could not save his people.

Around them, space--implacable but generous, impalpable but tangible--shot through with a thousand far off suns.

Looming at starboard, blacking out a section of space, the dark starside of the Moon. Then hundreds of flickering fireflies moving out of the darkness, blinking on by ones ... twos ... threes ... as they passed the black moon's rim.

Curt Wing relaxing, his dark head nodding softly, his dark eyes widening as he stared into the teleplate. He stared into the plate, and his lips, for so many hours a thin gray line, pursed into an almost inaudible whistle.

Without turning his head, he said to the lean rangy blond lieutenant beside him.

"That did it, Packer. It flushed them from cover. Curiosity did it."

"Now?" Lt. George Packer asked, pulling on his helmet, reaching for the red button to sound the klaxon alarm. One long finger almost touched the scarlet dot which would send a hundred crews on a hundred Earth ships into the action which they had awaited for these long weeks.

Curt Wing, wing Space Commander, shook his black shock of hair with deliberate slowness, wiped the sticky sweat from the palms of his hands on his gold-striped blue breeches.

"Wait."

"But, Curt! We've waited two weeks. And for the last seven hours the crew has been going mad. They know the Mercurians must be out there now. We got the flash on the intercommunicator and it's tuned to all-ship length."

"I know," Wing said. "But what's another moment or two. This has to be right. We'll never get another chance like this again. Be patient, George."

Curt Wing still stared at the visaplate.

"They must have the whole fleet with them! I've never seen so many Mercurian ships in my life."

"They'll spot us," Lt. Packer said anxiously. "Let me signal, Curt."

"Easy, George. This is Earth's last chance. We've got to be sure it's good. They've got us--ten to one. Surprise is our only chance of whittling down the odds."

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