ensign threw him one last taut, frustrated glance, then wheeled and ran off down the passage towards the carrier lock. 

A score of steps he ran.... Only then, out of the murk, a primordial horror rose before him--a thing of tentacles and feelers massed about a hideous white skull-face. It happened too fast for shouts or screaming. The ensign's head jerked back and sidewise. He tried to veer. Too late. With a sound that came straight from hell, the skull-thing lurched forward. The tentacles engulfed him. Convulsively, Boone clawed the blaster from the dead hands of the man beside the lift-shaft ... lanced a fire-bolt into the monster's leering face. Face and monster vanished in a blaze of ear-shattering sound and blue-white flame. Then the echoes died and Boone was alone again--shaking, retching. Of the ensign, no trace remained. 

Numbly, Boone stumbled back into the lift and dropped it full speed down the shaft to the tenth level, the very heart of the great sphere-ship. There was another monster waiting for him when he came out--a creature that looked for all the world like a huge, iridescent coffin whose lid came up to bare rows of razor-edged shark-teeth. Raw-nerved, he blasted it to atoms; then, belly churning, waded through stench and putrescent fragments towards the tech quarters where Eileen lay. As he did so, the ship rocked sharply. For an instant Boone went rigid, then cursed aloud. That jolt--it could have been only the impact of the carriers' departure. Now, truly, he was alone--alone in the void on a sphere of death, where nightmare monsters roamed lusting for his blood. Alone with Eileen, perhaps. If she were still alive. _If...._ He quickened his pace, moving along the corridor cold-eyed and wary, his finger taut on the blaster's trigger. The last door to the right. A card that said, "Miss Rey." Palm slick with sweat, Boone tried the handle. The door was unlocked. He opened it a fraction. A voice rose high and incoherent, ranting. The voice of delirium. Boone stepped inside; flicked on the light. Eileen lay in the bunk, held there by the broad straps of a safety pack. A flush-faced Eileen with wild, fever-blinded eyes. Her lips moved in ceaseless, garbled speech. Thin fingers tugged and twisted at the sheets as if it were not in them to be still. A knot drew tight in Boone's midriff. Grimly, he studied the chart on the stand, then glanced at his chronox. Time for more chandak extract. Stiff-fingered, he prepared the aerojet; sprayed the precious drops into Eileen's jugular vein. Then, barring the door against invading monsters, he settled down to wait and hope. The hours dragged by till he lost track, a blur of time broken only by 

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