THE RUNAWAY ASTEROID
--------------------


THE STARMAN SERIES
by Michael D. Cooper






Currently 5 Starman books have been released. They are:

ASSAULT ON MARS
THE RUNAWAY ASTEROID
JOURNEY TO THE TENTH PLANET
DESCENT INTO EUROPA
THE LOST RACE OF MARS

To find out more about these books and/or order copies,
check out the Starman website at:

http://www.StarmanSeries.com/






David Foster Number Two

THE RUNAWAY ASTEROID

by Michael D. Cooper

Artwork by Nick Baumann
Endpaper photography by Tom Narwid

A David Foster Starman Adventure
Copyright © 2000
David Baumann, Jon Cooper, and Mike Dodd
all rights reserved
ABCDE "A Baumann-Cooper-Dodd Enterprise"



The Starman Team dedicates this book to 

Fred Woodworth

a rare and gifted individual who practices
generosity in a world of acquisitiveness,
courage in a world of indifference, 
honesty in a world of opportunism, and
personal responsibility in a world of buck-passing;
an artist and craftsman
few in this era know how to appreciate;
who has done as much as any and more than most to 
advance the cause of series books;
and whose genius has abundantly proven that the 
books deplored by librarians of a previous age
are treasures that shaped several generations and 
made their readers better people.
To Fred Woodworth of Tucson, Arizona,
the series book world owes a debt
that can never be repaid.



CONTENTS


																				PAGE
INTRODUCTION by Paul Greene	.	.	.	.	.	.	.	  9
A Note on the Name "Zip Foster"	.	.	.	.	.	.		 12

CHAPTER																		
1.	Controlled Fury	.	.	.	.	.	.	.	.	 15
2.	Sent to Ceres		.	.	.	.	.	.	.	 24
3.	Montezuma's Castle.	.	.	.	.	.	.	.	 37
4.	Sabbath George	.	.	.	.	.	.	.	.	 51
5.	The Destruction of Z25	.	.	.	.	.	.	.	 62
6.	Battles Lines		.	.	.	.	.	.	.	 72
7.	Prisoners on the Pirates' Asteroid	.	.	.	.	.	 84
8.	The Starmen Strike!		.	.	.	.	.	.	 93
9.	A Vision in the Night	.	.	.	.	.	.	.	 102
10.	Both Sides Move		.	.	.	.	.	.	.	 111
11.	An Asteroid is Missing	.	.	.	.	.	.	.	 120
12.	First Impact	.	.	.	.	.	.	.	.	 127
13.	The Brink of Disaster	.	.	.	.	.	.	.	 138
14.	The Shield of St. George	.	.	.	.	.	.	 148
15.	A Microwave Net	.	.	.	.	.	.	.	.	 156
16.	A Dark Spirit	.	.	.	.	.	.	.	.	 167
17.	The Enemy Revealed	.	.	.	.	.	.	.	 177
18.	Collision Course! .	.	.	.	.	.	.	.	 187
19.	Change of Guard	.	.	.	.	.	.	.	.	 198
20.	Desperation	.	.	.	.	.	.	.	.	 208
21.	The One That Got Away	.	.	.	.	.	.	.	 218



INTRODUCTION

The Starman Team dedicated its first book, Assault On 
Mars, to Joseph Greene, the late author of the Dig Allen 
series which was the inspiration for the Starman series. A 
complimentary copy was sent to his son Paul, who was 
moved by the tribute. We then asked Paul to write an in-
troduction to The Runaway Asteroid. The following is his 
response—surely one of the most unusual introductions in 
any book anywhere, and one we are privileged to share 
with our readers.



Dear Dad,

A most remarkable invention is weaving the world together in 
a way we never anticipated while you were on Earth, and it 
netted your writing. Fans of your books for juveniles, The 
Digby Allen series, were able to connect to each other, share 
their enthusiasm for your novels, and were inspired to continue 
the voyage. Led by Jonathan Cooper, the intrepid mastermind 
of the creative crew, they made a commitment to write their 
own vision of the future. Thoughtfully, they credit you as hav-
ing shoulders broad enough for them to stand on and see the 
centuries beyond. The invention that has made this possible is 
called the internet. There seems no need to explain what it is 
here, but part of its magic is that it can permit people to con-
nect to each other independently of time and space.

The themes of Dig Allen from the 1960's have worked like the 
internet in that they functioned independently of time and 
space, only much more slowly. You presented your ideas in 
books as ideas are posted on the internet. The authors of Star-
man were drawn to the themes in your books and then each 
other in cyberspace, which acts as both the bookshelf and café 
for today's ideas and authors. The creators of Starman saw 
value in your stories and tried to get the publisher to renew the 
series. Sadly, your old publisher ignored them and blocked the 
revival, as though they were so much space junk. 

No one owns a theme. But the creators of Starman have shown 
that they share some of the beliefs that you express in your 
subjects. Their young men of the stars prove that they too are 
brave, adventurous and willing to sacrifice for freedom and 
justice.  With a loyalty toward each other that would create 
envy in every generation, they test themselves against cunning 
scoundrels. As they conquer villains, they, and we along with 
them, learn whether they measure up. Will they prove them-
selves worthy as young people have done for all time? Young 
readers can have a chance to preview something about their 
own lives and the world they will live in. And just as you be-
lieved, somehow the human race survives. If the world of 
Starman is an accurate guess on the future, then the good guys, 
the ones in the white space suits, will continue to prevail and 
produce more young people to keep the dream alive. I hope 
that some of the next generation of courageous young people 
will read this series. 

Your fans don't know that you started writing seriously rela-
tively early in life, in the 1920's and '30's, first as a teen for 
your personal pleasure and then on your school newspaper at 
New Utrecht High School in Brooklyn, New York. Did having 
to learn the English language after speaking Russian until the 
age of seven help you become a better writer? Were your po-
ems and letters to Mom valuable both to her and to your pro-
fessional development? Did the comic books you authored 
during the Golden Age of comics give you a better sense of 
story-telling and dialogue or did it degrade your love of lan-
guage? I know that writing television scripts and other creative 
projects supported the family during the difficult years of the 
1950's, but how did it affect your later work with Digby Al-
len? So many of your themes are repeated and reworked in 
several of your creations right through to the late 1980's. Who 
would guess that you once wrote a paper on the use of the ra-
ven in several of Shakespeare's plays? Or that you wrote biol-
ogy text to accompany a new medium, slides made from strips 
of 35-mm film? Would admirers realize that you were most 
interested in world events, but read the sports section of the 
New York Times first, everyday? I'm certain your fans 
wouldn't have read the American Elsewhen Almanac, a compi-
lation of bits of Americana and commentary that you published 
in the 1980's. 

I want to thank the authors of Starman for giving me the op-
portunity to write the introduction to their second novel. If 
there is a way to communicate to you across the veil between 
our dimensional world and the one in which you now reside, 
then it must be through the pages of a book. After the love of 
family, I don't believe anything was more precious to you than 
books, so maybe this letter will be able to cross the divide. Just 
as I proofread the drafts of Digby Allen before you sent them 
to the publisher, your granddaughter and grandson proofread 
this. Perhaps that will act like a mystical booster rocket to get 
these pages to you. 

And to future space pioneers, may the solar winds be at your 
back.

Love,
Paul

October 20, 2000



A Note from the Starman Team
on the name Zip Foster

Several readers of Assault On Mars, the first book in this se-
ries, commented on the similarity of the name of the Starman 
leader, Zip Foster, to the name of the character Rip Foster in 
the book by Harold Goodwin under the pseudonym Blake 
Savage. This book, Rip Foster Rides the Gray Planet, was 
published by Whitman in 1952 and reissued six years later as 
Assignment in Space With Rip Foster.

The similarity between Zip Foster and Rip Foster is a coinci-
dence, but only partially. We chose the "Foster" surname as a 
tribute to Rip Foster, but Zip is a nickname we came up with-
out deliberately trying to mimic Rip. Although we have not 
hesitated to break some new ground in developing the Starman 
series, we are also gratefully aware that we are working in a 
genre with a venerable past. The use of the "Foster" surname is 
only one of several ways we have chosen to show our appre-
ciation to the writers of the classic books.

Interestingly, well into the production of Assault On Mars, we 
learned that there is a very minor character named Zip Foster 
in a book called The Boy Ranchers in the Desert, published in 
1924! The Boy Ranchers series appeared in nine volumes be-
tween 1921 and 1930, but we only have the one volume and 
don't know if Zip Foster is a major character in the other 
books in the series.




THE RUNAWAY ASTEROID


1: Controlled Fury




	"THEY'RE getting closer! They're almost on us! We 
won't make it into the Belt on time!" The navigator of 
the Silver Spear was on the verge of panic. His frenzied 
hands moved over the controls.
	"Keep going! Keep up full speed! Make sure that we 
get there ahead of them!" Lurton Zimbardo's voice was 
even and controlled, but it was obvious that he was 
barely containing his volatile fury. His commands were 
not to be questioned. His nostrils flared, the muscles 
around his lips were taut, he kept his fists clenched and 
pounded a persistent rhythm on his ship's control panel. 
His breath sounded as if he could inhale and exhale the 
room's entire atmosphere. It was only his iron self-
control that kept his crew from giving in to their fears.
	Behind them just moments away Starman David Fos-
ter's ship, the Star Ranger, was closing the gap. The 
pursuit had been going on for two days, since the Silver 
Spear had blasted off from Eagle City on Mars, escaping 
while the rest of the pirates were being rounded up by 
Earth's forces. David Foster, accompanied by Starmen 
Mark Seaton and Joe Taylor and their companion Steve 
Cliff, had followed less than fifteen minutes later. The 
brief lead that Lurton Zimbardo's ship had was enough 
to keep the Silver Spear out of the clutches of their 
pursuers, but not by much. The crew of the Spear was 
dark-eyed from sleeplessness and mounting anxiety.
	The Belt loomed up. The first few chunks of rock 
were visible now to the unaided eyes of those on the 
deck of the Silver Spear. In seconds, they were among 
them. The navigator screamed as the ship whipped by a 
pitted rock a quarter of a mile long, missing it by a few 
yards.
	"Fool!" shouted Zimbardo. "Turn on the automatic 
pilot!" The navigator's eyes were the size of saucers. 
Immobile with terror, he didn't respond to Zimbardo's 
command. The former second-in-command of the pirates 
pushed him out of the chair and took over, activating the 
switch that cut in the automatic pilot. Lurton Zimbardo 
was not physically imposing, but more than made up for 
his slight build with an immensely strong will and a de-
cisive nature, easily merciless whenever it served him.
He knew they were going too fast even for the auto-
matic pilot to keep the ship safe once they got into the 
thick sweep of the asteroids. He also knew that that was 
their best, their only, hope of escaping from the Starmen 
on their trail. Powered by adrenaline, his senses were 
functioning at their peak. With amazing alacrity and in-
tensity, Zimbardo aided the automatic pilot and threaded 
the Silver Spear through the weaving asteroids. It almost 
seemed as if he were in a trance.
	Soon a gigantic asteroid loomed ahead, roughly 
shaped like a potato, forty-five miles long and twenty-
five wide. It was nearly invisible both to the eye and to 
the instruments, but Zimbardo knew where it was. He 
barked out a command. The Silver Spear slowed 
quickly. A huge airlock door opened in the side of the 
asteroid. Zimbardo piloted the ship into the airlock, 
through the stone tunnel into the interior of the asteroid, 
and touched down.
	The thin, wiry man raced for the control room as fast 
as he could run, pushing men out of the way and heeding 
no calls. Once inside, he quickly pressed a series of but-
tons and entered a numeric code. Once it was entered 
and confirmed, he made a fist and slammed it hard on a 
large red button. Immediately all the radar screens were 
covered with snow.
	Zimbardo relaxed for the first time in days. He ex-
haled quietly and actually smiled. He took a deep breath 
and smiled more broadly.
	"Sir?" asked one of the technicians who had watched 
the procedure.
	"I detonated a hydrogen bomb on a neighboring aster-
oid a couple of hundred miles from here. Part of a 
backup plan for keeping this place hidden. It will clog 
all radar screens for a few minutes. By the time they 
clear, no one will be able to find us or this asteroid."
Zimbardo's relaxed state did not last long. He swelled 
up with energy again, strode to another console, and 
tapped in a series of commands.
	"Come here, Gene," he ordered as his fingers flew 
over the keyboard. The man he addressed quickly came 
to stand by the pirate leader. He was a well-built young 
man in his late twenties with short curly brown hair, 
finely chiseled features, and an obvious desire to please. 
He was well trained in the technology of space control 
systems. After he had proven his competence in the 
field, Troy Putnam had made him his chief control offi-
cer.
	Zimbardo continued. "Follow these coordinates at this 
speed. Don't alter the course for any reason without my 
permission."
	Gene looked at the planning board where the numbers 
were posted in a pleasant green light. "That course will 
take us out of the Belt, Mr. Zimbardo. Is that what you 
want?"
	"That's what I want. It's time to move away from 
here. If anything out of the ordinary happens, let me 
know immediately. Find me by using my personal code 
on the communicator—no general announcement. Keep 
watch especially for any spacecraft—especially any 
spacecraft!"
	"Yes sir!" Gene took his place and the others returned 
to their duties.
	Once he saw that the crew members were well settled, 
he picked up the intercom and ordered his leaders to 
assemble in a meeting room in five minutes. From the 
few dozen pirates left, he had hand-selected five compe-
tent leaders to be his lieutenants: Gebbeth, Crass, 
Lather, Bolcher, and Slant.
	In less than that time, Lurton Zimbardo was sitting at 
a table with the five other men. All but Zimbardo looked 
haggard. They were demoralized and upset. Victory on 
Mars and beyond had been within their grasp, but it had 
all been blundered away. A band of several hundred 
men who had planned and worked for several years had 
been reduced to a few dozen. Their dreams of power and 
prominence, shaped and fueled by their captain Troy 
Putnam, had been utterly destroyed. Putnam was in cus-
tody on Mars, along with the rest of the pirates.
	"Troy Putnam was a fool," Zimbardo announced in a 
quiet voice edged with steel. "His plan might have 
worked—might have worked, if I had had more part in 
planning—but he was no more than a conceited ignora-
mus. The Starmen walked in on him and took him com-
pletely by surprise! I can just imagine how his face must 
have looked as he realized his plan was over and he was 
led off to jail. A fool! We are better off without him!"
	"Better off without him?" asked one man in a dull 
voice. "What do you mean, Lurton? Better off for 
what?"
	"Don't be a fool yourself, Crass!" Zimbardo sneered. 
"You don't think we're finished here? We will still get 
what we want and it won't be very difficult, either. And 
we don't need Putnam and we don't need a few hundred 
men, either. You can be thankful you're here instead of 
locked a stone room in Eagle City eating square, plain, 
healthy meals off of a metal tray. The collapse of Put-
nam's big dream is the best thing that could have hap-
pened for us."
	A muscular, unsmiling man on Zimbardo's right 
swung his gaze to the speaker. "It sounds as if you have 
a plan, Mr. Zimbardo." The man was in his early thir-
ties, and looked like a street fighter. With carefully 
combed dark hair, he was almost strikingly handsome, 
but his eyes were black and humorless.
	Zimbardo turned toward the man. "Yes, I have a plan. 
You, Gebbeth, will be my chief assistant, and the pilot 
of the Tartarus, my personal ship. I can depend on you. 
Space Command's celebration on Mars will be ex-
tremely short-lived."
	"You were always the strong one, Lurton," said an-
other. "I kind of always figured you for the real leader, 
and I always wished it was you instead of Putnam."
	"Now you got your wish, Bolcher. I've taken charge. 
I'm moving this asteroid out of its orbit into a place out-
side the Belt. Here's my plan."
	Almost an hour later, the men left the meeting room, 
smiling, joking, and stepping lightly. Their fatigue was 
gone, their discouragement forgotten.
	Lurton Zimbardo was the last to leave. Now that 
things were moving in the direction he wanted, he al-
lowed his fatigue to take over. Encouraged by the sup-
port of his assistants, he felt he could rest at last. He 
walked down the halls, past various doors and entered 
an elevator. The display screen normally offered only 
the few floors in use by the pirates. Zimbardo, alone in 
the elevator, punched in a special code which only he 
knew. When the proper sequence was displayed, he 
pressed "Enter." The elevator began to move. The new 
leader of the pirates relaxed even further. The others 
would not know where he was, and he would be undis-
turbed.
	He could barely sense the elevator's motion. He 
didn't know how far into the asteroid's interior he was 
moving, but he knew what he would find when he 
reached his destination. The door opened. A short corri-
dor led to a double door. Embossed on the doors was a 
huge, rich, golden symbol—a lush planet with about 
80% blue oceans, a few continents, and thick cloud 
cover. Three small moons were arranged at the upper 
left, set at the points of an equilateral triangle. Zimbardo 
had been intrigued by the design when he'd first found 
it, but now he hastened through the doors without notic-
ing it. He was eager to get into the Chamber beyond.
	As Lurton stepped into the room he gasped. His dozen 
prior visits still had not taken the surprise out of the 
room. Each time he stepped into the Chamber he seemed 
to be stepping foot into another world; he knew he was 
still inside the asteroid but his senses told him other-
wise.
	Lurton seemed to be standing on a high mountain 
overlooking a vast plain on some forgotten planet. A 
pale blue sky was overhead, and a light wind was blow-
ing. Down below on the plain he saw a river snake its 
way through a green forest; if he listened he could hear 
the water. In the distance Lurton saw a fantastic alien 
metropolis of beautiful glass skyscrapers; he could just 
barely make out ships hovering over it and small vehi-
cles driving around in the distance. Clouds sailed gently 
overhead; it was near dusk.
	He knew that the room was actually no more than 
about a hundred feet square, but the display was seam-
less. He could not even make out where the door to the 
room had been; for all the world he seemed to be stand-
ing on another planet on a late, peaceful afternoon. He 
had never been able to find out how the room worked or 
where the wind came from, but he suspected the display 
was generated by some sort of holographic projectors far 
in advance of anything he had ever seen or heard of.
	Lurton suspected that the scene was from the home 
planet of the asteroid's builders; perhaps the distant city 
was their capital. He had spent hours watching the room 
and never tired of it, for the scene always changed. After 
a certain number of hours dusk fell and the city lights 
came on. He had watched different kinds of weather and 
seen glorious sunsets and sunrises. Occasionally he 
caught a glimpse of a huge alien starship. He had seen 
many strange things in the Chamber and he was sure that 
he had not seen them all.
	Lurton liked coming here when he was upset or an-
noyed; the room had a peaceful air that rested and 
soothed him. He was certainly in need of that now. He 
hadn't slept in over fifty hours and could easily have 
lain down in what seemed like soft turf and fallen deeply 
asleep, but the ethereal beauty of the Chamber's vision 
was restful and he didn't want to close his eyes for an 
instant while he was inside.
	He thought back to the day when he'd found the 
room. The asteroid had been drifting and uninhabited for 
who knows how many thousands of years when a soli-
tary asteroid miner had found it and discovered that it 
was hollow. He had told a few others about his find and 
eventually Troy Putnam had learned of it. Zimbardo 
grudgingly admitted to himself that Troy was a genius—
a weak, impractical genius, but a genius nonetheless. He 
had followed the miner's directions and found the 
nearly-invisible asteroid. He had even learned how to 
use many of the asteroid's capabilities. He had made it 
the base for his foolish attempt to take over Mars.
	Shortly after the pirates had taken residence, Troy 
Putnam had instructed Lurton to explore the asteroid 
beyond the few floors the pirates used, and find out eve-
rything he could about it. One day Zimbardo had found 
the Chamber. There was very little that could arouse any 
kind of sensitivity in the wiry, energetic man, but the 
Chamber could do so. Maybe it was because no one else 
knew about it and no one could see him wrapped in the 
depths of the emotions the room could inspire. The 
Chamber was not the only secret of the asteroid which 
Lurton had retained for himself, but it was certainly the 
best one.
	At last the peace and enchantment of the Chamber 
overcame Lurton's resistance to slumber. He sat down 
and rested with his back against a tree, gazing over the 
landscape at the alien city. The massive trunk was 
slightly rough but not uncomfortable. Huge roots spread 
out in all directions before disappearing into the grassy 
soil. Branches laden with broad leaves made a shadow-
filled canopy over the pirate leader.
	As he felt sleep coming on, he fumed one more time 
at the Starmen and the stupidity of Troy Putnam. He 
mulled over his plan and smiled a little. The Starmen 
would live to regret what they had done to him. His eyes 
closed and his breathing became deep and regular. At 
last the pirates' new leader slept. Above him a few birds 
chirped peacefully. A short distance away a brook mur-
mured in lyric gentleness. The sky over the city gradu-
ally turned from flawless blue through lavender into vio-
let, and silver stars emerged.




2: Sent to Ceres




THE SPLENDOR of the Asteroid Belt stretched away in 
all directions, and the piercing light of uncountable stars 
filled the background. The view was possible only in 
airless space. Starman David Foster was staring out of 
the window of his ship, the Star Ranger, but he was not 
really seeing anything. His brow was furrowed with an 
uneasy doubt. 
	"Still no sign of 'em, Zip," announced Joe Taylor. 
The lanky six-footer had eased naturally into the posi-
tion of pilot/navigator under David's direction. "I've 
scanned as far as the instruments can reach, and there's 
just nothing out there in any direction—except the Earth 
ships, of course. They should be here in about three 
hours."
	"No debris?"
	"No, Zip. I've found where the explosion took place 
and examined that more carefully than any other area. It 
was a violent blow. I think about a third of an asteroid 
was turned into dust when it went off, and that's power-
ful enough to vaporize any ship that was carrying a 
weapon with that kind of potential."
	Zip shook his head as if warding off a buzzing insect. 
"All right. Nothing we can do about it." He turned to the 
third Starman on the crew. "Mark," he called out. 
"Would you send a report to Mars please and ask Com-
mander De Koven what he wants us to do?"
	"Okay, Zip."
	While they were waiting for the connection to be 
made and response to come through after the delay of 
several minutes, Joe was waiting. "You seem uneasy, 
Zip. What's there to worry about?"
	"I just like completion. That ship we were chasing 
carried the last of the pirates from Mars, and I'd just feel 
a lot better if there were some debris, some evidence 
that they hadn't escaped."
	"Zip," came a deep voice from the lounge next to the 
flight deck, "there's a lot of uncertainties in life, 'spe-
cially life in space. I been around a lot and believe me, 
the exception is when you really know everything that 
happened—and that's never."
	"Sure, Steve," answered Zip, raising his voice. "I 
know. But I don't like it."
	"You'll probably be uneasy most of your life then. 
C'm on, be like me. Lie down, relax, take a nap. You've 
been rushing for days now, especially the last couple 
when we were shooting through the void at top speed. 
Give it up now, boy. You can't do anything more."
	Zip didn't answer, but he walked into the lounge. 
Steve Cliff was completely relaxed, with his feet 
propped on a table. His huge frame was sunk into the 
sofa deeper than Zip would have thought possible. Zip 
picked up a book that Mark had been reading, and lay 
down. In less than a minute, he was asleep with the open 
book face down on his chest.

	"Up you go, Zip, it's dinnertime." Steve's normally 
boisterous voice was gentle and almost subdued. Zip 
took a deep breath and slowly opened his eyes. He sat 
up, put the book aside and ran his hands through his red 
hair.
	"What's going on?"
	"You've been out almost four hours. Figured I'd make 
myself useful so I whipped up some food. Here you go." 
Steve set a tray down on the nearby table. Mashed pota-
toes, salad heavy on diced tomatoes just the way Zip 
liked it, and a few pieces of very thinly sliced roast beef 
in a luscious brown gravy.
	"Looks delicious, Steve; thanks."
	"Coffee's coming up in a minute, steaming hot with 
half a teaspoon of sugar." Zip reflected for a moment 
about how little time he had known Steve, but how well 
he fit in to the group of three Starmen. Steve already 
knew how he liked his coffee—hot and fresh—and what 
his favorite meal was. While he was enjoying the aroma 
of the meal before tucking into it, Steve brought in the 
coffee.
	Zip lifted a mouthful of roast beef and potatoes. 
"What's going on?" he repeated.
	"Mark got ahold of the big guys in Eagle City, told 
'em what was going on out here. They told us to wait 
until the Earth forces showed up and then get on back to 
Mars. We've been under way almost an hour." Zip nod-
ded.
	"And Mark says there's more and wants to talk to you 
whenever you're ready."
	"Send him in."
	Mark came in as Zip put a fork into a chunk of tomato 
and lifted it out of the bowl, dripping with dressing. 
"This really is delicious, Steve!" he called out as Steve 
disappeared onto the flight deck, leaving the two Star-
men to themselves.
	"Steve told you we're on our way back to Mars, I'm 
sure," said Mark by way of preamble. Zip nodded. 
"Commander De Koven also said that we are to report 
directly to Mars Base. We drop Steve off at Eagle City 
and go right on to the Base without getting out of the 
ship." Mars Base was Starlight Enterprise's headquar-
ters on Mars. It was a huge plant, covering several thou-
sand acres of Martian desert, near the north pole and far 
from any other settlement. 
	"What's up?" Zip's gray eyes peered over the rim of 
the coffee mug as he took a swallow.
	"There's no danger of further attack on Mars—
everything seems to be secure in Eagle City—but we're 
to be given an assignment with a 'significant time fac-
tor,' as the Commander put it. Too sensitive to put out 
over the radio even with scramblers and tight beam."
	"They must've learned something from the pirates 
they captured."
	Joe peeked around the corner. "No—I think they're 
going to give us a medal and a month off for liberating 
Eagle City."

	Two days later, the Star Ranger was cruising at a 
good clip a few miles above the Martian desert. Eagle 
City was behind, and the course was set almost due 
north. Mark was remembering the parting with Steve.
	"Don't worry about a thing, boys—I'll make sure the 
little folk get back to the Moon safely enough." Steve 
was referring to Jack and Jill, the diminutive citizens of 
Titan who had played the critical role in rescuing Eagle 
City from the pirates.
	Mark felt very badly that he hadn't been able to see 
the Titanians. Four days before, they had left Mars 
without notice to begin the frantic chase of the escaping 
pirates, and now they were urgently called to Mars Base 
with no time permitted to see their friends. Personal re-
lationships were important to Mark. As the Star Ranger 
returned to Mars from the Asteroid Belt, he had made a 
recorded greeting and farewell for Jack and Jill and en-
trusted it to Steve. Mark was beginning to realize that 
for him, the life of a Starman would be marked with fre-
quent partings and sorrows.
	The always-ebullient Joe did not seem to be affected. 
"Don't worry about it, we'll see them again. They'll un-
derstand. Right now we're off on another adventure!"
As the Star Ranger approached the pole, Mark shifted 
his mood and hoped that Joe would be right.
	"Oooh, yes! Look at that!" exulted Joe, pointing out 
of the front of the ship. A light came over the horizon 
like a flame too bright to be looked at comfortably. The 
sun was reflecting off the glass-sheathed buildings of 
Mars Base, Starlight Enterprise's primary headquarters 
on the fourth planet.
	Rapidly the Star Ranger closed the distance. Mark ra-
dioed for landing clearance.
	"Gorgeous!" said Joe. From the pilot's seat he could 
make out the airport, the hangar, the huge laboratory and 
research buildings and the manufacturing centers. Men, 
robots, and machines scurried around the plant. Security 
was very high; ever since the pirate attack SE had re-
doubled its efforts to keep out unauthorized personnel. 
This was the area from which Starlight Enterprise con-
ducted its Martian operations.
	Immediately after landing, the Starmen were brought 
into the office of Oritz Konig. Konig was in charge of 
security throughout the entire SE system.
	"Mr. Konig!" exclaimed Zip as he led the little parade 
into the central portion of the complex. "I sure didn't 
expect to see you here!"
	"Welcome to the Base, Starmen!" Konig stood up and 
came around his desk to greet each of them with a warm, 
two-handed handshake. He was a genial man, large but 
by no means overweight, very strong, firm, and of al-
most regal bearing. He gave the impression of being al-
ways available and affable, but never to be taken for 
granted. He was clean-shaven and wore a rather long 
crew cut.
	"Sit down," he continued. "What I have to say is of 
vital importance and I'm afraid we don't have time to do 
more than get you briefed on the situation. I can't even 
take the time to commend you for the outstanding work 
you did against the pirates. Richard is busting with pride 
over his newest Starmen! And I can't say I blame him—
you did marvelous work! You three are wanted on Earth 
for some special recognition, but unfortunately we have 
a brief mission for you first."
"Richard" was Richard Starlight, the head of Starlight 
Enterprise who had entrusted Mark and Joe with their 
Martian assignment.
	"Thank you, Mr. Konig," responded Zip simply.
"The pirates only had a few men placed here at the 
Base, but they were enough to shut down operations for 
the few days they needed to paralyze Eagle City. 
Frankly, it was a surprise for us and Richard wanted me 
to take personal charge of security on Mars until it was 
quite clear that the threat was past. Actually, I flew in 
with the invasion fleet. My most important assignment 
here is to set up a secret base for Starlight Enterprise, 
which will be a backup and defense unit prepared for 
any events such as the one we've just experienced."
	"A secret base?"
	"Yes. I'll be looking for the best site, recruiting the 
right people to man it, and drawing up plans for con-
struction and the tasks it will have to perform. I don't 
need to tell you that the project is highly confidential. 
I'm only telling you about it because you're Starmen, 
and it will be a resource you'll need to become familiar 
with. Of course, there will be much more information 
coming your way later."
	Oritz Konig spoke cleanly and clearly, but gave the 
impression that his thoughts were racing faster than he 
could speak. He had had to discipline himself to speak 
so that others could follow him. There were few wasted 
words when he had to get a message across, but he was 
able to converse in a way that assured his listeners that 
he valued them as people and needed their cooperation. 
Konig manifested an extremely rare combination of be-
ing a "people person" as well as having a supremely 
disciplined and task-oriented mind.
	"While you were in the Asteroid Belt, we interrogated 
the pirates. Not all of them cooperated, but enough did 
that we learned that they have a base in the Belt. It's no 
ordinary base. Most of the pirates don't know its origin 
but they can describe what it looks like.
	"It's a fairly good-sized chunk of hard stone, mostly 
iron. It's hollow, and the base is inside. The access port 
is concealed. More to the point, it cannot be detected by 
radar.
	"Some of the toughest of the pirates sneered that we'd 
never find it—that it couldn't be seen even if you were 
right on top of it."
	Joe jumped in. "But sir, this technology is not new. 
There have been craft since the late twentieth century 
that were invisible to radar. There are other ways to find 
them—gravitational influences, to name one."
	"Of course, Starman Taylor. This asteroid, however, 
appears to be the work of some advanced race, other 
than Earth. The pirates didn't create it—they took it 
over. And its sheathing system is highly effective, highly 
effective indeed. The pirates could be lying, of course, 
but once the word got out to them that we knew about 
the asteroid, most of them seemed to swell with a kind 
of arrogant pride, even welcoming the fact that we had 
the information. They were confident that we couldn't 
do anything about it."
	"And that explains, I'm sure, why we couldn't find 
them in spite of an exceedingly thorough search of the 
area," concluded David Foster, feeling somewhat vindi-
cated.
	"So are we to go find the asteroid?" put forth Joe, 
leaning forward in his chair.
	"No, Mr. Taylor. We want you to find the man who 
discovered it."
	Joe leaned back into his chair, a puzzled look on his 
face. Oritz Konig continued.
	"The asteroid was discovered almost twenty years ago 
by an asteroid miner named George St. George. He's a 
loner, like so many of the asteroid miners. He makes a 
good living, but has no fixed address. He's constantly on 
the move and spends most of his time away from settle-
ments in the Belt. He'll disappear for months, maybe a 
year or two—then show up on Ceres or in Eagle City 
with what he has found in the Belt and turn it into cash 
and supplies. Then he's gone again.
	"Apparently he discovered this remarkable asteroid 
the pirates took over. He's a trusting, almost naïve, de-
cent man. He spoke unguardedly about his find at one 
time and Troy Putnam learned about it. Putnam had St. 
George take him to the asteroid and paid him a good 
price for the knowledge. St. George showed Putnam 
where it was, and then disappeared into the Belt. Putnam 
went on to build his empire of pirates."
	"And now you want us to find St. George so he can 
show us where the asteroid is," inferred Zip.
	"It's not that simple, Starman. We've also learned that 
the pirates who escaped are the most dangerous of the 
lot. Their leader is a very bad number named Lurton 
Zimbardo. The pirates were willing to obey Troy Put-
nam because he encouraged them. They liked him. He 
was a charismatic leader who gave them visions of 
grandeur and made them think that they could pull off 
the impossible. But they are afraid of Zimbardo—for 
good reason, from what we hear. He is a merciless, cal-
culating spaceman, patiently willing to play second-in-
command to Putnam while waiting for his chance to take 
over. That chance has now come.
	"The pirates are greatly reduced in number now, but 
those who are left are extremely dangerous. They will be 
fierce, uncompromising enemies. St. George is the only 
person outside of the pirates who knows where the as-
teroid is, how to find it, and has some knowledge of how 
it works. Where Putnam was willing to let St. George go 
about his business, Zimbardo will certainly determine to 
eliminate him. Zimbardo will try hard to find St. George. 
You must find him first. Protect him, and learn from him 
where the asteroid is."
	"What do we know about him? How can he be 
found?" asked Zip.
	"He hasn't been heard from for over a year, and he 
could be anywhere in the Belt. But he has a friend 
named Montezuma Vly. If anyone knows where St. 
George is, Vly will know. And we know where Vly is."
	"Why not just ask Vly where St. George is?" asked 
Mark.
	"That's where your assignment begins," answered 
Konig. "Like St. George, Montezuma Vly is an asteroid 
miner. Unlike St. George, he doesn't wander far from 
his home. But Vly has a deep distrust of any authority 
figures. He lives on an asteroid called Montezuma's 
Castle. He claimed it over thirty years ago and has com-
plete right to privacy. Starlight Enterprise can't get in to 
see him. No government officials have any right to enter 
his domain. He is completely independent. We're hop-
ing that where officialdom can't act, you young Starmen 
can. When he knows that George St. George is at risk, 
I'm sure he'll help you."
	"Where do we find Montezuma Vly?" asked Joe, who 
was the navigator for the trio of Starmen.
	"Montezuma's Castle is not far from Ceres. You can 
get to Vly in less than a day from Yellow City." Yellow 
City was the major center on Ceres, the largest and most 
important asteroid in the system, with a population of 
around 100,000. It doubled as a spaceport, and was a 
stopping-over and refueling point on the long voyage 
between Earth and the outer planets.
	"Go to Ceres first and check in there. You'll need to 
change ships and clothes in Yellow City. Since the pi-
rates will be searching for St. George, you'll have to 
conduct your search quietly—using the Star Ranger and 
wearing Starman's red uniforms won't do on this as-
signment. The rest of the information you'll need will be 
provided for you in files which you can read as you 
travel. Now get going."

	Lurton Zimbardo called his five most trusted leaders 
to a meeting in one of the libraries on the pirates' aster-
oid. Each was dressed in the gray and black uniform that 
Troy Putnam had designed for the pirates for their failed 
mission to take over Mars. The meeting had been going 
on for several hours and had involved a lot of detailed 
organizational work. The men were tired and showing it. 
As usual, only Zimbardo showed no signs of fatigue.
	"Yes, gentlemen," said Zimbardo, "You know what to 
do now. We will need to get all of our men busy and you 
must drive them, drive them relentlessly! I don't want to 
take any longer on this work than we need to. We've 
been moving slowly out of the Asteroid Belt for almost 
three days."
	His laser pointer made a few small red circles on a 
chart in the library. "This is where we were, and this is 
where we're going to be." The chart was nearly a full 
wall of smooth quartz, illumined from the inside and 
showing the nearby configuration of asteroids.
The table was strewn with large books opened to star 
maps, note pads, a couple of small computers and calcu-
lating machines, and a huge number of crumpled balls of 
paper. One man reached for a pitcher of water that was 
on the table and slowly filled his glass. Zimbardo con-
tinued.
	"The manufacturing will begin tomorrow—that'll be 
for Stubb to oversee. Once the sheathing device has 
proven effective we can begin work on restoring and 
disguising our fleet. After that, Crass, you'll take care of 
the rest."
	One of the men looked up. "What about St. George? 
If anyone discovers him he could put a serious crimp in 
our plans."
	Zimbardo looked annoyed. "St. George will be dealt 
with, Mr. Slant. I have not forgotten him; you can leave 
that to me. He will never speak to the Starmen or anyone 
else."
	Another spoke. "Is it really necessary to silence him? 
It will take a large number of men to make a search—
men we could use on the urgent projects at hand. Since 
you've moved the asteroid from its original site, he can't 
find us now or show anyone else how to find us."
	"He can't find us, but he knows how this asteroid 
works—almost as well as I do. If the Starmen learn what 
he knows, it could be disastrous for us in the unlikely 
chance that they ever locate us. I don't like taking 
chances, and I don't like leaving any loose ends. St. 
George is a loose end we can't afford." 
	"Do you know where to find him? He doesn't have 
any fixed place he calls home."
	"Our men have quietly inquired for him on Ceres and 
learned that he has a good friend, another asteroid miner 
named Montezuma Vly. We know where Vly lives, and 
Vly will know where St. George is. Vly doesn't receive 
visitors, but his resistance won't keep a small fleet from 
landing. One way or another, Vly will tell us where to 
find George St. George—and soon."



3: Montezuma's Castle




A FEW DAYS later, Lurton Zimbardo decided to take a 
tour of the workshops and check on progress. Where 
Troy Putnam's organization had been large, easy-going, 
and confident, Zimbardo's was tight, highly-organized, 
and ruthless. Its high degree of efficiency was dependent 
almost exclusively on Zimbardo himself. Once Zim-
bardo had asserted his control over the organization, the 
asteroid and its crew had rapidly become an extension of 
his formidable personality.
	He took an elevator from his suite to the main floor of 
the organizational complex and stepped out into the hall-
way. He walked with a firm tread, and men stepped 
aside with a slight deferential bow. He passed through 
the great glass doors at the end of the passage into a 
huge foyer. Passing through, he entered a courtyard, 
strode across it, and came into the working area.
About sixty men were working at various stations. 
They were glad to see their new commander. It was 
amazing how rapidly the sense of defeat had been 
changed to one of expectancy and pride. The men felt 
that Zimbardo was a real leader. Every day or two an-
other ship docked and new workers came in to join the 
crew. Zimbardo had sent out a few trusted leaders to 
noted asteroid bases and mining operations in the prox-
imity of his asteroid, to recruit. He could use more men, 
especially skilled workers in electronics and mathemat-
ics, but he wasn't eager to build up a large force. He 
chose carefully. The workforce was being built up 
gradually, but with men he could trust. He had also in-
vited three smugglers he had known before to join the 
operation, with their men.
	"Stubb," called out Zimbardo.
	"Sir," responded the man so addressed, an eager man 
about thirty years old, with sandy blond hair and baby 
blue eyes. He hastened up to the pirate leader.
	"Give me a status report. The ships first."
	"The sheathing systems are easy to manufacture, 
thanks to the ample supplies from the warehouses. The 
men are able to put them together rapidly, even the un-
skilled workers, since they just need a master circuit to 
copy. I have forty men working on these, with the 
skilled electricians checking each plate. As you know, 
we completed work on ten ships six days ago, and they 
were tested and went out on their assignments. They 
have not returned yet. These plates we're working on 
now are going on the remaining ships, and we have al-
ready finished work on four of them. That leaves just 
three to go, including the ship that just joined the crew 
yesterday. We should be finished by tomorrow after-
noon."
	"Good. And the power units?"
	"These are far more complicated, sir, so I only have 
the most skilled workers assembling these. The same 
with the propulsion units. They won't be ready for at 
least a week, not even one of them. However, once we 
get the prototype finished, the rest should follow rap-
idly."
	"How long until you have all 85 completed?"
	"I should have a good number of the unskilled work-
ers ready for a new assignment once they have finished 
with the sheathing plates. Once the design has been 
checked by the experts, we can get them cracking on the 
power and propulsion units. Of course, each unit will 
have to be tested by the experts, so I would estimate that 
all 85 can be operational within ten days—unless we run 
into any problems."
	"Good work, Mr. Stubb. I will check on progress 
every day."
	"Very well, sir." The man went back to work and 
Zimbardo returned to the main complex. 

Ceres was the hub of the Asteroid Belt. Nearly 600 
miles across, it was the largest body in the ring of plane-
tary debris that swirled and turned in a large swath be-
tween the orbits of Mars and Jupiter. It was the place 
where professional miners first arrived from Earth be-
fore their companies farmed them out to the mining cen-
ters on various asteroids. The independent asteroid min-
ers came to Ceres once in a while for supplies, and the 
corporations picked up equipment imported daily from 
Mars. Several days' travel from the nearest sizable 
population center, Ceres was a buzz of activity.
	The Star Ranger approached the large asteroid after a 
fast but uneventful journey of six days.
	"Quite a cloud of starships!" remarked Joe as Yellow 
City came into view. A cloud of at least forty ships of an 
amazing variety of sizes, shapes, and vintages was mov-
ing over the port. Some were hovering, others were 
heading in toward the landing field and a few others 
were departing. None moved very fast since the space 
was as crowded as bees around a hive.
	Yellow City was a well planned settlement, in spite of 
having been developed jointly by several different min-
ing companies. Although the competition was fierce for 
the rich minerals of the Belt, cooperation was necessary 
to build the city, especially in the earliest years of set-
tlement. The result was beneficial to all, as Yellow City 
could easily supply the needs of miners of all kinds as 
well as serve the traffic to the Outer Planets that almost 
always came by way of Ceres. Advancements in propul-
sion systems were making it possible for some of the 
newer ships to bypass Yellow City on their way to Jupi-
ter and beyond, but the Belt was still a major stopping 
point.
	Zip spoke quietly to Mark. "Mark, please let them 
know that we would like to land."
	Mark opened the microphone. Joe had already plotted 
the final trajectory.
	"Starman Mark Seaton on the starship Star Ranger 
requesting permission to land."
	The response was immediate. "Yes sir, Starman! Ce-
res is proud to welcome you!" The operator went on to 
give directions for landing.
	"Why is he so deferential?" queried Mark after com-
munications had been completed.
	"We're famous!" responded Zip. "We've been aboard 
ship since the end of the attempted takeover on Mars 
and haven't kept up with the news, but we've become 
household names. I learned that from Oritz Konig just as 
we were leaving the Base. We're the men who liberated 
Mars! The people in the Belt are especially pleased 
since the pirates had planned to blockade them once 
they had a strong hold on Eagle City. Why, you couldn't 
find another place in the Solar System that'd be happier 
to see us than Yellow City!"
	The Star Ranger was given priority docking. Once its 
engines were shut down, a large crew ran to secure it 
and welcome the Starmen. As Zip, Mark, and Joe de-
scended the ladder, eager hands reached up to help them 
down the last two or three rungs. Through the bubbles 
on their suits, the mechanics and service personnel were 
all smiles.
	When Zip inquired about the offices of Starlight En-
terprise, the Starmen were ushered to a small moonbus 
and driven directly to the site. It was a small two-story 
building set in a row of offices, workshops, and garages 
not far from the landing field. All buildings on Ceres 
were made of the gray rock the asteroid provided. Build-
ing material was cheap and solid, but plain.
Although the city itself was covered with an atmos-
phere dome, the SE office was located close to the land-
ing field, not within the city proper. Entrance was 
through an airlock.
	Once through the airlock, the Starmen removed their 
helmets and placed them on the rack.
	"Whoopee! This is fun, being famous!" exclaimed 
Joe, his eyes alight. "I hope it lasts until we get back to 
the Earth-Moon system! I'd like to enjoy it!"
	"I hope so, too, for all our sakes. Your exploits have 
given all the Starmen a good name!" Joe whirled. 
	"Kathryn Mullaney!" cried Joe. Mark and Zip smiled 
widely.
	"What are you doing on Ceres, Kathryn?" asked Zip. 
	"I haven't seen you since your last visit to the Academy 
at the beginning of our senior year." Kathryn Mullaney 
had graduated from Starlight Academy a year before Zip 
and his partners; her first assignment as a Starman was 
in the Outer Planets. She was twenty years old, wore her 
strawberry blond hair short, and had a few freckles span-
gled across her nose below blue eyes which had a touch 
of green in them.
	"Finished my assignment on Saturn and I'm coming 
back home for a leave which I hope will be very long! 
Just staying here long enough for a quick once-over on 
my ship, refueling, and then I'm Earth-bound. In fact, 
I'm on my way out now."
	There was a little more pleasant conversation, then 
Kathryn said, "I've got to be going, and Sim is waiting 
for you upstairs. Good luck!"
	Zip, Mark, and Joe ascended the stairs and came to 
the landing. The stairway and corridors were very plain. 
There was no unnecessary ornamentation of any kind, 
and light was minimal. They came to the door of the 
operations officer for Starlight Enterprise on Ceres. It 
was marked "Sim Sala Bim." Joe knocked.
	"Come in," said a voice. The Starmen entered the 
door. The occupant was already coming toward the door 
to welcome his visitors. He was a tall, slender man of 
Indian extraction, with black thinning hair. "Welcome! 
So glad to see you! Welcome, please come in!" He ush-
ered them into the room.
	"Nice to see you again, Sim," greeted Zip. They sat 
down in a circle of chairs, Sim sitting near a table on 
which were placed all the makings necessary for tea. 
There were already two cups set out, which had been 
used recently. Sim took one for himself and set the other 
aside. "This was Kathryn's," he said as he produced 
three new cups for his visitors. "You probably passed 
her on your way in."
	The conversation continued as Sim poured the tea 
from a very large brown earthenware teapot. Before 
long, Zip brought up the subject of their visit.
	"I wish we had more time to visit, Sim, but our as-
signment is extremely urgent. We must find George St. 
George as fast as possible, and Oritz has told us that 
only a miner named Montezuma Vly can tell us where 
he is. We're on our way to Montezuma's Castle."
	"Ah, yes," said Sim Sala Bim, "Sabbath George. He is 
well known here, but we haven't seen him in almost a 
year, I think. Almost a year."
	"Sabbath George?" asked Mark.
	"George St. George is a devout man—genial, gener-
ous, liked and respected by everyone. Honest to a fault. 
He's called Sabbath George because of his beliefs. The 
nickname is intended to kid him a little bit, but is really 
meant as a term of respect and affection. But to find him 
in short order, you will indeed have to go through Mon-
tezuma Vly. Montezuma's Castle is not hard to find, but 
getting in will be difficult."
	"We are familiar with Mr. Vly's convictions and we 
wouldn't bother him if there were any other way to find 
St. George. Given the time constraints, we have no 
choice."
	Sim nodded. "Montezuma's Castle is easily recogniz-
able by its unusual shape. It is a true crescent, a sliver of 
stone with Vly's operation in its very center." Sim went 
on to provide coordinates and whatever other informa-
tion the Starmen would need to find it.
	Zip continued. "We also need another ship. Our as-
signment is to be carried out in secret. We will not be 
traveling as Starmen. No one must know who we are or 
where we're going."
	With Sim, they made plans to leave the Star Ranger 
on Ceres while the Starmen, dressed in ordinary clothes, 
quietly depart for Montezuma's Castle in another ship.
	"I'll let you have the Vigilant Warrior," said Sim. 
	"It's a local ship, designed for operating in the Asteroid 
Belt. We own it, but it hasn't been used in a while and 
probably no one will recognize it as an SE ship. It's the 
best I can do on short notice, but it should serve you 
well."
	"I'm sure it'll be fine, if you say so," answered Zip.
Sim Sala Bim got right to work, and the Vigilant War-
rior was ready for takeoff within two hours. The Star-
men lifted off from Yellow City. As Joe piloted the ship 
into the heart of the Belt, Zip looked back for a brief, 
wistful moment and saw the Star Ranger, his ship, on 
the field of Yellow City.

	"That's it," said Mark, as the navigation equipment 
locked onto the asteroid that was the home of the elusive 
Montezuma Vly. 
	"Hmmm. No wonder it's so hard to find," observed 
Zip, looking over Mark's shoulder for a moment. Not far 
from major travelways but so unobtrusive you'd never 
notice it."
	"It just hovers almost in the shadow of that large, 
worthless chunk here. Should be able to see it out the 
window before too long."
	Zip was busy threading the Vigilant Warrior through 
the asteroids for the next few minutes. He kept the ship 
at a moderate pace and passed easily around the slowly 
turning asteroids. They were all moving at about the 
same speed and maneuvering was not difficult.
	"Should be coming up on it about now," offered 
Mark.
	"There it is," said Zip almost immediately. The Vigi-
lant Warrior had eased its way around an oblong world-
let—the "large, worthless chunk" that Mark had just 
mentioned—bringing a crescent-shaped, stony asteroid 
about ten miles long into view. It looked almost like a 
fat banana with the ends tapering into sharp points.
	"Montezuma's Castle," breathed Zip. "Kind of looks 
like a moon for that large asteroid."
	"I think it is," answered Mark. "It rotates around the 
larger chunk and the two make almost a helix pattern in 
their journey through the Belt. They were probably a 
single asteroid at one time. One powerful impact must 
have split them, but the pieces haven't drifted far apart."
	"Well, let's get down there. There's no mistaking the 
shape of the 'Castle.' Whatever odd shapes you can find 
in the Belt, that's got to be unique." The Starman 
brought the Vigilant Warrior slowly into the proximity 
of Montezuma Vly's refuge. "See if you can raise him, 
Mark."
	Mark Seaton flipped on the communicator.
	"Starman Mark Seaton on the starship Vigilant War-
rior calling Montezuma Vly on the Castle, requesting 
permission to land." His voice was smooth, intimate, 
and confident. There was no response. A minute later, 
Mark repeated the message. The metallic voice of an 
automatic response system came on.
	"This asteroid is private property and visitors are not 
welcome."
	"We understand that, sir," Mark replied, "and we 
would not request permission to land if it were not a 
matter of urgent business of personal concern." A hu-
man voice came on.
	"Yeah, like I haven't heard that one before! I don't 
want visitors! If I wanted a social calendar, I'd go live in 
a big population center like Ganymede. Keep going! 
Next services are 3,000 miles away."
	"Mr. Vly, this is Starman David Foster, Commander 
of the Starlight Enterprise ship Vigilant Warrior," Zip 
broke in. "We understand and respect your reluctance to 
receive visitors and will stay no longer than necessary. 
We are calling on you because your friend George St. 
George has information we need which is vital to the 
safety of all the settlements on Mars and even the Earth-
Moon system. We also believe it possible that he is in 
danger from violent men."
	"Well, that's a new one. George in danger? What 
about it?"
	"May we land, Mr. Vly? I don't want to take the 
slightest risk that our conversation can be overheard. We 
won't stay any longer than necessary."
	"You've found me. May as well come in and state 
your business." The communicator was shut off from 
Vly's end.
	Zip came up on the Castle. It didn't take long to find 
the landing site. There were two spacecraft in position in 
about the middle of the asteroid. One was a small ship 
suitable for local jaunts, and the other was a normal-
sized craft capable of interplanetary travel. The name 
Sentinel was painted on the side of the larger craft. Both 
were very old and in places a little battered, but were 
clearly cared for and well kept up. The Vigilant Warrior 
touched down about fifty yards from the closest of Vly's 
craft. Zip shut off the engines and pressed the security 
button. A slight shudder ran through the ship as bolts 
shot from the fins, securing the ship to the surface. The 
Starmen disembarked and descended the ladder.
	"Over there," pointed Joe. The entrance to the airlock 
was discernible across the tiny landing area. The Star-
men began walking toward it. The starfield swept away 
to right and left, with a couple of nearby asteroids visi-
ble to the eye. A great horn of stone rose up before 
them, sweeping several miles to a point above. Behind 
them a similar horn curved up in the opposite direction.
The ground was uneven, with contours sharply de-
fined. Jagged, broken rock comprised most of the ter-
rain, with a few smooth, ripples which rose about twenty 
or thirty feet from the plain. Shadows were utterly dark 
in the vacuum of space. The Starmen's boots gripped the 
hard ground of the asteroid. Without the asteroid shoes, 
the minimal gravity of "Montezuma's Castle" would 
have made walking a difficult task. The airlock was set 
into the side of a hill. The side had been artificially cut 
away in front of the door.
	As Zip, Mark, and Joe approached the airlock, the 
outer door opened. When they had passed through, it 
shut behind them. Joe kept watch on the instruments as 
air filled the compartment. When the atmosphere had 
become normal, he removed his helmet. Zip and Mark 
followed suit. They opened the second door and passed 
through. A dimly-lit stairway led down in front of them. 
About twenty-five steps brought them to the beginning 
of a short passageway. At the end was another door. It 
was solid.
	Zip approached the door and paused. He turned his 
head to the other two, lifted his eyebrows and shrugged. 
Mark and Joe nodded. Zip knocked. The door was 
opened almost immediately.
	A good-looking, clean-shaven man with dark hair 
looked them over once quickly, then stepped aside. 
	"Come in," he said, waving a hand while the other held 
the door. "I'm Montezuma Vly." He had powerful 
hands, obviously used to hard labor. His nails had grit 
under them. Strong as the hands were, clearly they were 
also the hands of an artist, capable of fine work. He 
shook hands with the Starmen as they entered.
	"Wow!" said Joe, the last to enter. Vly shut the door. 
The three Starmen gazed about them. A small room was 
packed with machinery—old fashioned-machinery used 
for rock cutting, polishing stones, and mounting speci-
mens. The heady smell of machine oil hung in the air, 
not heavy like an aircraft hangar but attractive and ener-
gizing, almost like a perfume.
	The machinery was made of cast iron, with wheels 
and gears, rods and chains visible inside the cases. Each 
machine was lovingly maintained. The newest machine 
must have been at least fifty years old, but all were in 
top quality condition.
	"They're made to be used," explained Vly. "You 
can't get better machines than these today. The new 
stuff doesn't last and can't be depended on."
Joe, the engine master of the trio, immediately 
thought of the precision instruments produced by Star-
light Enterprise. He opened his mouth, but said nothing. 
He knew that SE made quality machinery, but little of it 
was iron. He didn't want to make a fool of himself by 
talking about something of which he knew little. Instead 
he smiled and decided to take a closer look.
	He leaned over the closest apparatus. His mild skepti-
cism quickly turned to awe. "My goodness, Mr. Vly! 
This is incredible! These machines are beautiful!" Vly 
didn't smile, but his face softened a little.
	Mark and Zip were looking around the room. On two 
walls were hung various hand tools. Several shelves held 
cans of oil and paint, boxes of supplies, and dozens of 
samples of minerals and crystals. The other two walls 
were lined with books, half of them behind glass. 
Zip turned his head to the side to read the titles of 
some of the books. He saw The Complete Works of Wil-
liam Shakespeare; Kon Tiki by Thor Heyerdahl; 
Homer's Odyssey; and several advanced textbooks on 
mineralogy, metallurgy, engineering, and electronics. 
Zip's eyebrows lifted. He was impressed.
Mark was looking at the books on the other wall. Ba-
sic Watercolor, he read. The Stories of Edgar Allen Poe 
was next to The Life of Johann Sebastian Bach. Mark 
whistled. "Not what I expected, Mr. Vly," he said. "Not 
at all what I expected."
	"Uh huh," murmured Montezuma Vly. "Let's get 
down to business. Follow me." He squeezed past Zip in 
the crowded little workplace, passed through a narrow 
door on the other side of the room, and through a pas-
sageway. The Starmen followed.
	A small furry shape leaped through the air in front of 
Joe. "Ack!" exclaimed the lanky Starman, stumbling 
backward, knocking over a couple of small boxes as his 
arms flailed. Nuts and bolts scattered on the floor. Joe 
backed into another box and sat down hard on it.
	"What—?" exclaimed Vly, turning.
	"What was that?" cried Joe. "Something jumped 
across the corridor. I think it went into this recess here." 
He pointed to an opening between a few stacked boxes.
	"One of my koalangs," answered Montezuma. "I've 
got four of them here. And a few more in the living 
quarters. Good company. They can startle you, though, 
and they can make an awful mess. More than once I've 
threatened to make stew out of 'em and eat 'em for din-
ner." The Starmen looked at one another, wondering if 
he was joking. His next action showed that he was.
	"Come on, Howard," said Montezuma gently, bending 
over and calling into the dark place where the koalang 
had hidden. "They won't hurt you. I know you're not 
used to company, but no one's gonna hurt you. Come on 
out. That's it, come on." He reached in gently and drew 
a small creature out of the darkness. It had a small furry 
face with large, frightened eyes, and snuggled up against 
the miner. Its fur was caramel and white. He folded it 
into his chest and covered it gently with both hands. He 
crooned to it lovingly for a moment or two, then said, 
	"That's right. You're okay. Go play." Then he added 
with mock fierceness, "Just stay out of the paint!" He set 
it down and turned back to the door at the end of the 
corridor
	"In here," he directed, leading the way into the room 
beyond.



4: Sabbath George




THE ROOM was smaller than the Starmen had antici-
pated. Its small size was accentuated by being packed to 
the ceiling with a variety of items. Hand tools which had 
been used by rock hounds for centuries lay on tables and 
on shelves. Stacks of paper, most of which showed signs 
of being bound by hand, covered much of the remaining 
space. On one shelf was a large, clear sphere on an or-
nately shaped stand. The eyes of all three Starmen were 
drawn to it.
	"Have a seat," offered their host.
	There were three chairs. Montezuma sat in one placed 
before a desk and swiveled to face his visitors. Zip and 
Joe took the other chairs and Mark sat on a short stack 
of crates filled with rock samples. A thick book rested 
on a table in the center of the room. Mark glanced at the 
title, turning his head slightly to do so. The Flying Car-
pet, by Richard Halliburton. There was a bookmark 
about halfway through the book.
	The asteroid miner leaned forward. "What about 
George?" he asked.
	Zip filled him in. Montezuma Vly paid close atten-
tion. His eyes never wavered from Zip's face as he 
spoke. When Zip was finished, Vly nodded.
	"Mm hmm," he murmured. "This could be bad for 
George. I'll tell you where to find him. I expect that 
you'll be able to keep him out of the clutches of the 
space vultures. You've got an enemy to be reckoned 
with in this Zimbardo psychopath, but I believe you can 
handle him."
	"You seem to know a lot about our recent exploits, 
Mr. Vly," said Joe, conversationally.
	"I'm not the complete recluse people think, Mr. Tay-
lor. People have a lot of wrong ideas about me. I don't 
want to be listed in the Register of Peoples, and I don't 
want people butting into my business or telling me how 
to live, but I keep up with the news. If I hadn't recog-
nized you, you wouldn't have been allowed to land on 
my asteroid. You're not wearing Starman's red, you 
know."
	"We're grateful to you, Mr. Vly," nodded Zip.
	"May I ask—" began Mark, then hesitated.
	"Yes, you may ask. Go on."
	Mark turned his head toward the sphere. "The 
sphere…"
	"Oh yes. It's pure crystal, all right."
	The Starmen gasped. "Pure … crystal…?" stam-
mered Mark. "Why, there can't be a larger one in the 
Solar System! It's priceless!"
	"Next largest was in the Smithsonian Institution, a lit-
tle more than twelve inches in diameter. This one's six-
teen and three-quarters inches. Found it myself on Ada-
mant—that's the parent asteroid from which this sliver I 
live on was busted off a few millennia ago." Mark knew 
he was referring to what he had called a "worthless 
chunk" before they landed.
	Vly went on. "Shaped it myself in those old machines 
you saw coming in here. Had to redesign some of 'em to 
fit a crystal this size, but we did it."
	"It looks flawless!" breathed Joe.
	"Looks it, but isn't. Its flaws are its greatest treasure. 
Watch this; you haven't seen anything yet." Vly picked 
up a small cutting tool with a laser guide at the end. He 
turned off the lights and then pointed the laser at the 
crystal sphere. The beam struck the surface and then 
scattered throughout the interior of the globe, igniting 
sparks of spectacular glory. Mark could feel tears come 
into his eyes with the unearthly beauty the light created. 
	Many dozens of flakes, invisible to the naked eye, were 
revealed when the laser beam pierced the near-perfect 
sphere. They exploded in glorious colors—gold, orange, 
deep red, flaming yellow, silver; even a few brilliant 
green, deep blue, and violet sparks traced across the in-
ner world.
	The Starmen were speechless. They couldn't take 
their eyes off the resplendent glory of the sphere under 
the laser light. "Beautiful, isn't it?" asked Vly, gently. 
There was no need to answer.
	"Where do the colors come from?" asked Mark. "La-
ser light has only one wavelength, so it can't be refract-
ing in there."
	"The crystal's impurities are almost invisible to the 
unaided eye," answered Vly, "but the laser hits the im-
purities and causes secondary emissions of light of all 
sorts of color—the more impurities, the more colors. It 
lights up better than a fire opal.
	As he moved the laser beam slowly around the globe, 
the interior lights changed—first one, then another 
"flaw" taking the light and surging into radiance.
All too soon, he switched off the laser and turned the 
room lights back on. It was almost as if a spell had been 
broken.
	"C'mon," he said. "I'll show you just where George is 
on the chart." He moved back down the hall, the Star-
men following. When they were back in the room they 
had first entered, Vly reached up into a recess where 
there were several rolled sheets of paper. "Move aside," 
he said quietly, pushing a reluctant koalang over and 
pulling out a large roll. He unrolled it over a rock pol-
isher and gestured for the Starmen to take the corners. It 
was a map of a portion of the asteroid belt.
	"Here's where we are," said Vly, pointing to a spot on 
the map. "And here's where George is." His finger 
swept across the map to where a tiny dot had been 
placed. "It's a mining operation of moderate size called 
Z25. He runs it there with a fair-sized crew—maybe a 
dozen men." There were equations, sketches, and notes 
scribbled all over the sheet.
	"I'm sorry, Mr. Vly," said Joe, "but I don't follow 
you. I'm used to plotting coordinates and thinking in 
three dimensions."
	"See these figures?" asked Vly. "They're your coor-
dinates. It is a three-dimensional map, in a manner of 
speaking. If it weren't, I couldn't get around. I'll write 
down what you need. But you'll find George on that lit-
tle plunk of a rock. He's been there several months now 
and won't be hard to find, once I point it out to you. I 
just spoke to him a few hours ago and I'll get ahold of 
him again and tell him you'll be coming." He began to 
write some notes down for Joe.
	"Must take a lot of power to run your operation here, 
Mr. Vly," observed Joe while he waited for Montezuma 
to finish writing. "Don't you have to conserve energy?"
	"Haven't had to conserve energy since I developed a 
new process for drawing energy directly from the sun."
	"But out here the solar radiation is so weak. You can't 
get much energy from solar panels, no matter how effi-
cient—certainly not enough to run your machines with-
out some sort of supplement."
	"I don't use solar panels any more, Mr. Taylor. I mine 
energy from the sun directly with an entirely new proc-
ess. I can pull in and store about four gigawatts. Gives 
me all I need and plenty left over."
	"Four gigawatts?"
	"Four gigawatts. That's a four with nine zeroes after 
it."
	Joe almost shouted. "I know how much it is! Mr. Vly! 
You amaze me! There's nothing like that anywhere else 
in the Solar System! Nobody has anything like that, no-
body! Not even Starlight Enterprise! You could make a 
fortune if you sell your design!!"
	"Really?" said Mr. Vly, lifting his eyebrows slightly, 
handing Joe the sheet with his notes on it. "Excuse me a 
moment while I write that down, so the next time I want 
to turn my whole life over to lawyers and businessmen 
I'll know just what to do."
	"But, but, …" Joe spluttered. Mark laughed and Zip 
smiled.
	"Thank you, Mr. Vly," said Zip, extending his hand. 
	"It has been a remarkable visit, and we appreciate very 
much your letting us drop in."
	Montezuma shook Zip's hand. "Wait a minute, Star-
men. Let me give you something to help you while away 
the long hours in space." He turned and rummaged 
through a box, then scanned a shelf behind him. After a 
moment he pulled out a gold disc in a flat, clear con-
tainer.
	"Take this," he said, handing it to Zip. "It's a re-
cording of the entire works of Johann Sebastian Bach. 
That's more than 1,200 compositions. The music is so 
complex that some of its mysteries weren't even discov-
ered until the computer age. Lily made it. She's an ex-
pert in the music of the Renaissance. Does research all 
the time."
	"Lily?"
	"Lily and I have been partners out here for over 
twenty years. Us and the koalangs."
	"Thank you, sir. Best wishes to you."
	"You too. An occasional visit once in a while is wel-
come, especially when people value my way of life. 
Most don't understand. I think you three do. Just protect 
George. He's a good friend, and they're hard to find."

	About 56 hours later, the Vigilant Warrior came into 
the proximity of Z25. Joe eased the ship through a scat-
tering of moderate-sized asteroids and then came into a 
space where there were relatively few chunks of stone 
and iron moving through space. On the far side of the 
open area there was an asteroid nearly twenty miles long 
and half as wide.
	"There it is," announced Joe. "Z25."
	Zip gave a nod to Mark, and Mark opened communi-
cations.
	"Vigilant Warrior calling Z25. We have arrived in 
your area and seek permission to land."
	"You made good time, friends," came a voice in-
stantly. "Come on in and welcome."
The Starmen had spoken to St. George once during 
their journey from Montezuma's Castle, but only briefly. 
The communications were encrypted, but even the en-
cryption could be a tipoff to an enemy who might be 
listening in.
	As they made the final approach, the Starmen had a 
good view of Z25's horizon near the time of local sun-
set. The surface was dark because of the oblique illumi-
nation, but several boulders caught the sunlight and ap-
peared like bright sentinels on the landscape. The 
brightest of the boulders, just to the upper right of a 
deeply shadowed crater in the foreground, marked the 
landing area. A cluster of artificial structures was visible 
nearby, and several spaceships stood in informal array. 
A dome covered the buildings, and reflected the sun in a 
burst of brightness. Mark had a quick memory of dew-
drops in the garden of his home on Earth when he was a 
child. He recalled thinking that each dewdrop held a 
small sun.
	In moments the Starmen were sitting in George St. 
George's study. He was a man in his middle-fifties, of 
average height and weight, with a full head of wavy 
blond hair. It was obvious that he cut his own hair, but 
long practice had made him skilled at it. Though his 
eyes were ice-blue, he exuded warmth. He had a ready 
smile. The Starmen were sitting in a makeshift room 
under a temporary atmosphere dome on an isolated as-
teroid, but St. George's courtliness and genuine respect 
for his visitors made them feel as if they were in a 
manor house. On his desk lay a thick book with the title 
Commentary on the Letter to the Romans, and several 
sheets of paper and a pen were set beside it where he 
had obviously been doing some study.
	"I hope you men won't mind waiting for refresh-
ments. It's almost dinnertime and the crew will be com-
ing up for a meal in about half an hour. Of course, you'll 
join us, won't you?"
	"Thank you Mr. St. George," responded Zip. "We'd 
be pleased to meet your men and see your operation."
	"Monty tells me you three are real ripstavers, and he 
doesn't say that very often about anybody. You must 
have impressed him!" St. George was full of smiles.
	"May we sit down, Mr. St. George? Our business is 
rather urgent!" Zip continued.
	"Of course, of course. Please forgive me! We don't 
get visitors of any kind out here and I'm just not used to 
entertaining. Please forgive me!" St. George rushed bus-
ily setting out chairs, bringing in two from a room next 
door. "And please call me George."
	Once they were settled, Zip began to tell George 
about the pirates and Zimbardo's likely determination to 
find and eliminate the one man who knew where the 
pirates' asteroid could be found.
	Before he got too far into the story, George lifted a 
hand and smiled. "Yes, yes, I know," he said. "Monty 
told me all about it." The Starmen were stunned to hear 
this. Before they had left Montezuma's Castle, Zip had 
impressed upon Vly how vital it was for St. George's 
safety that they not communicate until his friend was 
safe. Just a quick, encrypted message that Z25 was to 
expect three visitors who had Vly's seal of approval—
no more.
	"George!" gasped Joe. "That message could have 
been intercepted by the pirates! They must be looking 
for you!"
	"We told Vly not to communicate with you! It could 
mean your life!" continued Mark, suddenly heartsick 
with anxiety.
	George chuckled. "Don't worry, Starmen! The pirates 
already tried to find me through Monty, but the greegles 
protected him. And the pirates'll never find me without 
cooperation from Monty—which they'll never get. 
There's really no need to worry. We're completely safe 
here. We'll have dinner, you'll stay here to sleep, I'll 
show you around the operation, and you can go back to 
Ceres."
	The Starmen were speechless for a moment. Joe's 
eyes nervously scanned the room and Mark stared at 
George with his mouth agape. Then Zip spoke.
	"What are greegles, George?"
	George chuckled again. "You haven't heard of this 
'asteroid miner's legend'? Most people think it's in a 
class with leprechauns and mermaids, the story of the 
greegles, but it's all true. The greegles are the inhabi-
tants of the asteroids. Don't know if they're alive or not. 
They're made of metal—some kind of metal—or maybe 
they just wear a metal suit. They're about a foot high. 
Now, don't stare at me like that; you're looking thor-
oughly obflisticated, probably thinking I've been out in 
the vacuum too long, but I've seen them! They're little 
and they're old, very old, but they're powerful! No one 
can beat them! Usually no one ever sees them and they 
don't have any need to interfere with human beings. 
They don't mind it too much, though, if a solitary aster-
oid miner sees them once in a while."
	"And wh—, what do they have to do with Monte-
zuma?" asked Zip, keeping his voice steady.
	"Why, a short time after you left the Castle, about five 
ships tried to land on the Castle by force—pirates, for 
sure. No doubt they wanted to force Monty to tell 'em 
where I am. But Monty knows how to contact the 
greegles. There's a lot of greegles on Adamant." George 
chuckled again.
	"Those poor fellows—the pirates, that is! When the 
pirates told Monty they were going to land whether he 
wanted them to or not, why, he just called the greegles 
for help. They cut four of the ships into pieces in a mat-
ter of seconds, leaving the crew floating in their space 
suits. Then they grabbed them with some sort of invisi-
ble grappling beam or something and herded them to-
ward the fifth ship. That ship gathered them in and took 
off."
	Now George laughed out loud. "They got the message 
real fast! Go away and don't come back! And they 
scrammed! Never even set foot on Montezuma's Castle. 
Monty will make good use of the floating space junk the 
pirates left. Serves 'em right!"
	Just then a gentle buzz sounded. "And that's the call 
for dinner, friends. Come meet the others!"
	Almost immediately another sound came through the 
communications system—an urgent clangor. St. 
George's face became taut and a look of surprise and 
anxiety came over his features.
	"What's that?" asked Zip.
	"It's the alarm," St. George whispered. "It's never 
sounded before." The alarm abruptly shut off and an 
excited, panic-stricken voice came through the intercom.
"Five ships approaching! Coming in fast! They're 
commanding all hands to come to the landing field and 
threatening to destroy the whole operation if we don't 
cooperate! They've already started to destroy the base!"



5: The Destruction of Z25




JOE dashed from the room and sped down the hallway to 
the control center of the mining base. Each strike of a 
laser beam colored the interior of the buildings with 
ruby red as the attackers' targets were vaporized, and the 
flashes were coming with disturbing frequency. He 
hurled himself into the tiny office where a frantic young 
man sat at a console.
	"We're going to die!" cried the young man. Joe 
looked through the large window and saw five ships 
hovering over the base. Their laser cannons were rapidly 
destroying the outlying parts of the mining base. There 
were no defensive weapons. Joe glanced at the radar 
screen. His hair stood up as he saw that the screen 
showed nothing. To the surveillance system, the ships 
were invisible. The technician was babbling in abject, 
helpless fear, but Joe realized with an internal surge of 
adrenaline that the frightened young man might be right. 
They could all be dead at any moment. The man fled the 
room crying.
	Joe looked out the window again and saw that laser 
cannons were destroying the ships. Through the horrify-
ing, rapidly expanding concentric vapor shells, he saw 
the Vigilant Warrior crumpling into a heap. The other 
ships were either completely destroyed or well on the 
way.
	"What is this? Who are they?" exclaimed Mark. He, 
Zip, and George had followed Joe to the control center 
and were watching the laser beams sweep the landing 
field. The ships were being indiscriminately reduced to 
molten slag.
	"Their laser beams are immensely powerful, and 
they're operating at full capacity," observed Zip, grimly. 
Just then the lights went out and every apparatus in the 
control center went dark.
	"They found and destroyed the power plant," whis-
pered George, the tenseness evident in his voice. "But 
they're not touching the inhabited parts of the base."
	Suddenly Zip turned to their host. "George!" he said 
urgently. "Do any of your crew know that we are Star-
men?" George turned a distracted face to Zip and stared 
as if he wasn't comprehending what Zip had said.
	"Do any of your crew know that we are Starmen?" 
Zip repeated carefully.
	"I—I don't know. I didn't tell anybody, I think, but I 
didn't keep it a secret."
	"Look! Gather them all together and tell them not to 
say anything about us to these invaders! Our safety may 
depend on it, as well as any chance we all have of even-
tually escaping!"
	"Ah—all right," George stammered.
	Since the power was out, there was no way to make 
an announcement through the communication system, 
but the rest of the crew was assembling anyway. The 
refectory was located not far from the control center and 
the men were coming together there, so the Starmen and 
George went to join them.
	In a moment, there were about a dozen men in the 
room. Some sat on the benches, others stood. There was 
palpable fear in the room, as if they knew that sudden, 
violent death was near.
	Zip asked George, "Is this everyone?" George took a 
quick glance around the room.
	"I, I think so, yes."
	Zip took charge. "Men, listen to me. We're about to 
be taken captive. I don't think anything worse will hap-
pen to us, or it would have happened by now. My 
friends and I have come to visit Sabbath George. Just 
got here from Ceres and sure didn't expect this!"
	George took over. He was showing more confidence 
now. Alone of the Z25 crew, he had never shown fear, 
just shock. "We'll just wait right here, men, and see 
what's next. I don't know who these attackers are or 
what they want, but don't volunteer any information of 
any kind. You hear me? No information of any kind, 
beyond the most basic."
	The men were silent and collapsed in on themselves. 
They were afraid, but the panic seemed to have dimin-
ished somewhat. Outside, the five ships had landed and 
about twenty space-suited men had emerged. With 
weapons in hand, they were approaching the dome. The 
leader gestured to several of them, who spread out 
around the dome. The others remained at the main air-
lock and waited. Their feet were spread in an attitude of 
defiant power.
	"They want the airlock open, Mr. St. George," said 
the young man who had fled from the control center. His 
voice was dry and squeaky.
	George said, "Can't open it. No controls Those fools 
destroyed the power center. If they're coming in, you'll 
have to get your space suits on because the atmosphere 
is going to disappear. Make it quick before they blow 
the airlock by force." The men scattered. George and the 
Starmen went to the airlock and looked at the invaders 
from the inside of the dome. George said to the Starmen, 
	"Of course, there's a backup power system, but I don't 
feel a compelling need to make it any easier for these 
strangers."
	When the leader saw that there were people coming, 
he kicked the airlock savagely and aimed his weapon at 
the mechanism. As was customary, the helmets were 
lined up on a rack on shelves on the inside of the air-
lock. George put on his helmet and the Starmen put on 
theirs. The rest of the mining crew began to show up 
with their suits on and found their helmets by the air-
lock. When all were suited up and the intercoms were 
on, George told the mining crew to stand aside. Then he 
made a motion to the leader of the invaders to enter.
The man fired a stupendously powerful beam at the 
airlock that melted it like ice in a furnace. In seconds, 
the air inside the dome whooshed out into the vacuum of 
space.
	"Get into the ship," growled the leader of the invad-
ers, indicating the closest of the five spaceships. "No 
one is going to be hurt, but I'm not guaranteeing that 
that situation will last. I'm not a patient man and I don't 
like wasting time."
	"What about our belongings?" asked George.
	"You won't need them. Move to the ship. Now." The 
voice was even and quiet but as hard as iron. Zip started 
the procession. He slumped down as if completely dis-
heartened and walked like a prisoner, his eyes pointed to 
the ground. The others followed. The invaders kept them 
surrounded as they walked the short distance to the pilot 
ship. Several invaders entered first and then kept watch 
on the prisoners as they ascended the ladder into the 
staging area. Once the asteroid miners were aboard, the 
other invaders entered their ships.
	When the door was sealed, the invaders removed their 
helmets. The miners followed suit. The leader took a 
quick inventory of the prisoners, and finally settled his 
gaze on George.
	"You are George St. George," he said in a tone that 
knew he was stating a fact. "My name is Lather. You 
and your men are now prisoners of Lurton Zimbardo. I 
am taking you to him. As long as I've got you, I don't 
care about anything or anyone else. Don't make any 
trouble and I won't see any need to put anyone off the 
ship. It doesn't make any difference to me whether any 
of your men is in deep space or my guest room, but it 
might make a difference to you—and them."
Without turning his head, Lather addressed one of his 
crew. "Blaze, see that this base is melted into the bed-
rock."
	"Yes sir," said the man addressed and left the room.
Lather addressed another of his crew. "Spelford, es-
cort the prisoners to their quarters."
Spelford lifted his weapon and nodded in the direction 
they were to go. The prisoners went, under the guard of 
several armed men.
	They were taken to a room set up to accommodate up 
to twenty passengers. There were niches with beds in 
them, and chairs for use during acceleration.
	"Prepare for lift off," ordered Spelford. The prisoners 
sat down and strapped themselves in. Spelford and his 
men left, locking the door behind them. In a moment the 
warning signal for lift-off was given. The ship raised 
itself gently from the surface of the asteroid. The fierce 
glare of destructive laser strikes came through the quartz 
window for nearly a minute, and the prisoners knew that 
the living quarters of Z25 were being systematically de-
stroyed.
	"They're ramsquaddling the whole operation," said 
Sabbath George in a voice that sounded almost matter-
of-fact. "Never had anything like this happen before. 
This is a first."
	When the glow ceased, the ships accelerated. The 
Starmen and their companions felt themselves pressed 
into the chairs.

	The five invisible ships had been gone for over an 
hour, but the man in the shadow still did not move. He 
was on a neighboring chunk of floating iron, just a mile 
or two in diameter with a very slow rotation. St. 
George's asteroid would vanish below his horizon in a 
few minutes. The man pulled the telescope up to his face 
plate once again and scanned the area that had been the 
base on Z25. There had been no movement of any kind 
since the ships had rayed the site. He took a few more 
pictures for his files. The metal and quartz plating—all 
signs of human presence—had been completely de-
stroyed, melted into the rock of the asteroid. The bril-
liant orange of superheated rock had quickly cooled in 
the near-absolute zero of airless space.
	"Guess it's okay to go now," he thought. "Those 
space buzzards are not detail men—just grab and de-
stroy without even looking around. Lucky for me."
The man went over to a small asteroid cruiser, built 
for speed in touring the Asteroid Belt. Stepping in, he 
sealed the airlock and pulled out a small recorder. He 
tuned in a complicated code and began to speak.
	"Steve Cliff, reporting in to Oritz Konig on Mars 
Base." Steve went on to give the date, time, and loca-
tion, and a brief but thorough report of what he had 
seen, from the time the Starmen landed on Z25 to the 
time the pirates' five ships had disappeared. He added to 
the file the pictures he had taken, and concluded, "Now 
returning to Yellow City. If you have anything else 
you'd like me to do, Oritz, contact me there. I don't have 
to tell you I'm pretty fond o' those boys and I was 
more'n delighted to keep an eye on 'em for you on this 
trip. Sorry this report isn't any better. I'll stop in and see 
Sim before I continue my trip back to Earth, just in case 
you leave a message for me there."
	Having finished the recording, he put it into a small 
projectile with an automatic timer to release and send 
the message in three hours. Then he lifted off the small 
asteroid and headed toward Ceres. A few minutes after 
liftoff, he fired the projectile. When it sent its message, 
Steve Cliff would be far away and no one could trace 
the message back to his ship. Additionally, the message 
was encrypted and was designed to travel on the micro-
waves similar to those in the background of space. It 
was highly unlikely that this message would make any-
one curious. And after the message had been sent, the 
projectile would break down into its component parts 
and scatter them.

	The ships had stopped accelerating and the prisoners 
could talk easily.
	"You don't seem too upset, George," suggested Mark.
	"Naw," said George. "'Course I'm sorry to lose my 
stuff back there, and I'm sorry for the men, but most of 
our stuff is somewhere else. This was a temporary base 
and the mine wasn't producing too well anyway. Hardly 
worth our time. Besides, I've learned to be content just 
about wherever I am. I've been around the asteroids a lot 
and I've learned to depend on a Resource outside myself 
whatever the circumstances. I know what it is to be 
brought low, and I know what it is to have plenty. I've 
been thoroughly initiated into the human lot with all its 
ups and downs—fullness and hunger, plenty and want. 
Makes little difference to me. Wherever I am, whatever 
happens, I'm confident. And I'm a man of prayer."
	"I'm sure sorry about your friend Montezuma," said 
Zip sympathetically.
	"What do you mean?"
	"Why, these ships must be the same five that attacked 
him. They couldn't have found you without getting the 
information from Vly. And it's a good guess that they 
destroyed his base the way they did yours."
	"Nothing of the sort!" said St. George heatedly. "I 
told you that those ships were defeated and their crew 
sent back to wherever they came from with their tail be-
tween their legs!"
	"But this story about the 'greegles'—" contributed 
Joe.
	"The greegles sliced those ships up like salami!" in-
sisted St. George. "These ships we're on are a different 
lot! And besides, Monty would never have told anybody 
how to find me—not by force or threat, anyway!"
	"We're sorry, George," apologized Zip. "I didn't 
mean to upset you or cast any doubt on Montezuma Vly. 
You're right—he's not the type to give in to any threat. I 
must be mistaken."
	"You're forgiven," said St. George. He went off to see 
how his men were doing.
	"Zip!" whispered Joe urgently. "You don't really be-
lieve that story about the 'greegles.' These have to be 
the same ships!"
	"I think it's more important not to upset George. We 
don't know the whole story."
	"But greegles!"
	"What about the greegles?" asked Mark, with a slight 
edge of defensiveness in his tone. "Did it seem to either 
of you that Vly would betray a friend to save himself? 
And did you see any sign of advanced weaponry at 
Montezuma's Castle?"
	"What are you saying, Mark?" asked Joe.
	"I'm saying that we shouldn't just discount an old tale 
just because it sounds foolish or superstitious. George 
knew we were coming. He couldn't have known unless 
Montezuma sent him a message, even though we warned 
him against doing so. If he sent George a message, he 
wasn't taken over by the pirates. These aren't the same 
ships. These are another part of Zimbardo's fleet sent 
out to find George St. George. And they tracked him 
down through the message Vly sent—not because they 
landed on the Castle and threatened him."
	Zip looked deeply thoughtful. Joe looked incredulous.
"Mark, you can't be serious!"
	"It's not a matter of being serious or not, Joe; it's a 
matter of being open-minded."
	"George described it himself! He's been out in the 
vacuum too long."
	"I don't think George strikes me as an unbalanced 
man. Unusual, for sure. But not unbalanced. Not unbal-
anced at all." Mark looked over his shoulder. George 
had his arms around two of his men and was talking to 
them in a low voice. The rest of them were gathered 
around, paying close attention to what he was saying. 
Already the atmosphere was one of peace. No one 
seemed afraid now.
	Through the window beyond, a portion of the vast 
arm of the Milky Way spread out in its eternal beauty. 
The Starmen were silently wondering the same things: 
How long would it be before they met Lurton Zim-
bardo? Would he recognize them? Why did he want St. 
George alive?



6: Battle Lines




THE PIRATES' ASTEROID swung in a smooth, private or-
bit about a thousand miles beyond the farthest extremity 
of the Asteroid Belt. Lurton Zimbardo was in his private 
sanctum, a well-equipped workroom with precision as-
tronomical equipment, sky charts, and an enormous in-
ventory of computer files. As he turned his telescanner 
toward the Inner Planets, he saw the spread of the Belt 
before him. Countless celestial bodies moved in an in-
credibly slow pattern like a stately dance. Reflected 
sunlight glinted from oblique surfaces into the light-
gathering lenses of the telescanner. When the occasional 
crystalline surface or frozen lake on a passing asteroid 
caught the radiance just right, an intense but transitory 
sparkling brilliance was generated, and created a pattern 
of astonishing beauty on the scanner's computer screen.
	Zimbardo entered a few more bits of data into the cri-
teria of his search pattern and then said "Enter." Within 
seconds several asteroids were marked in his files. He 
brought their profiles up one by one.

	M253.
SHAPE: OBLONG.
MAXIMUM LENGTH: 0.683 MILES.
MAXIMUM WIDTH: 0.307 MILES.
COMPOSITION: 90.568% IRON, 6.443% TIN, 
0.752%
ICE, 2.237% TRACE ELEMENTS; CLICK HERE 
FOR DETAILS.

	Other information was provided, including the aster-
oid's precise location and its speed of motion and rota-
tion. Zimbardo hesitated a moment, then said "Delete." 
He went on to the next entry.

	M3366.
SHAPE: ALMOST PERFECT SPHERE; VARIATION 
<5%.
MEAN DIAMETER, 0.057 MILES.

	The other information was provided. Zimbardo 
smiled. "Ah—nearly solid iron and about 100 yards ex-
actly!" he thought to himself. "That makes five." He told 
the computer to save that file, then opened the intercom.
	"Gene," he said.
	"Yes sir," came the immediate response.
	"Contact Mr. Crass and tell him I want M3366."
	"Right away, sir." 
	"Then call the five lieutenants up to my study at once, 
please. Get Kimball, Lorry, and Jenner also. Once 
you've called them, come up yourself." Gene nodded 
and activated the personal contact codes of the men 
Zimbardo wanted to see.
	A quarter of an hour later, the ten men were in the 
lounge in Zimbardo's quarters. He was playing host, and 
pouring out a dark golden sherry wine into luxurious 
spun glass goblets.
	One of the men lifted up the goblet so the illumination 
reflected from it, highlighting subtle rainbow whorls in 
the surface. He swirled his wine before he sipped it.
	"Very nice, Lurton. And the glass here is pretty top 
stuff."
	"The wine came from Earth but the glassware came 
with the asteroid, Jeff. This place has so much in it that I 
haven't found a hundredth of what it contains, but all of 
it is high quality."
	The men relaxed in the comfortable chairs. The chairs 
automatically adjusted to the body weight and shape of 
whoever sat in them. Soft, almost imperceptible music 
was playing in the background. A light fragrance in the 
air eased tensions and sharpened minds for thought. 
Zimbardo had nothing to do with creating this atmos-
phere—these features came on automatically whenever 
anyone came into the room.
	"Petty soft life you got here, Zimbardo," sighed the 
man named Lorry, easing himself down into his chair. 
	"I'm not used to this kind of comfort."
	"No, Lorry, I guess not. You don't find too many easy 
chairs aboard the kind of ships you pilot when you're 
transporting the Banjoman's flilox to his customers in 
the Belt. But when our plan succeeds, you'll be able to 
buy all the soft chairs you want. Let's get down to busi-
ness."
	Zimbardo stood before the assembled company. Be-
hind him, taking up most of the wall, was a map of a 
large portion of Mars. "As I was saying when we met in 
the hangar assembly room yesterday, it is simply a mat-
ter of choosing an appropriate target to convince them 
we have the capability. What should our target be? Well 
here, gentlemen, are the five major atmospheric genera-
tion plants on Mars." He turned to the map and pointed 
out five places—two in the northern hemisphere, two 
near the equator, and one in the southern hemisphere. 
	"Each is valued at two billion solars and would take 
several years to replace. If they were destroyed, Starlight 
Enterprise's terraformation project would have a severe 
setback—possibly as much as three to four years. The 
Superiors desire such a setback very much and have re-
quested that we make it happen. Now, data gathered 
from analysis has shown that these plants can be re-
moved very easily by the proposal we have suggested. 
Mr. Crass, do you have anything to add?"
	"No, Mr. Zimbardo. I've checked the specs on the as-
teroids you've selected and I've checked progress with 
what Stubb is doing. If he has the propulsion units ready 
in ten days, we'll be ready to deliver our first package to 
Mars in precisely two weeks."
	A muscular man in short sleeves spoke up. Since no 
one else wore short sleeves, everyone suspected that he 
wore his sleeves short to show off his biceps. "Lurton—
what about the ships that went to interrogate Vly? We 
know five took off, and yesterday I only saw one return. 
No one else wants to ask about it, but I'm asking. If I'm 
going to risk my men and my ships on this venture of 
yours, I want to know what's involved."
As the speaker went on, Gene lowered his head and 
kept his eyes on the floor.
	"All right, Captain Kimball. It's a fair question. 
You're right. Five went out and only one returned. None 
of the men was lost—the returning ship brought them all 
back. But four of the ships were destroyed before they 
could land on Montezuma's Castle." Zimbardo's five 
lieutenants were already aware of the setback. The visi-
tors, Jeff Jenner and Lorry, gasped. Kimball grunted, as 
if a suspicion were confirmed.
	"Well?" he pressed, his face hard and demanding.
	"Gene," said Zimbardo, turning away. He didn't like 
to deliver news of defeat.
	"The pilots of the ships tell essentially the same 
story," began Gene. "They came directly to Monte-
zuma's asteroid, opened communications, and insisted 
that they were going to land. There was no response. But 
within seconds some kind of weapon came forth from 
Adamant, the neighboring asteroid, and sliced the four 
ships into small sections. It was clear that there was no 
intention to kill any personnel—only to destroy the 
ships. The crews were left floating in space. Forces of 
some kind we are not familiar with pulled them into the 
proximity of the remaining ship, where they were taken 
aboard. Clearly, against forces like that we are helpless. 
The ship returned immediately. The men are badly 
shaken."
	Kimball grunted again. "And Vly?"
	Zimbardo answered. "They never talked to him. But 
we don't need him. A short time after this incident he 
radioed to St. George and we intercepted the beam. 
We'd been looking for it. Vly probably assumed that 
with the destruction of our landing party he was safe and 
so was St. George. But his call went directly to Z25. It 
was encrypted so we couldn't read it, but we didn't have 
to know what the message was to know where it went. 
Our other five ships were two days away from the loca-
tion. They went directly there and picked up all the min-
ers, including St. George, in a very neat operation."
The intercom buzzed. "Mr. Zimbardo?"
	"Yes, what is it?" he responded with obvious irrita-
tion. 
	"Sorry to bother you, sir, but you asked to be in-
formed as soon as the ships returned. The Silver Cloud 
and its four companion ships are expected to dock in 
approximately 45 minutes."
	"Very good. Tell Mr. Lather to put the prisoners into 
cell block 258 for now. I will deal with them later." The 
intercom went off. Zimbardo turned back to the gather-
ing. "As you heard, St. George will be on the asteroid 
within the hour."
	There were nods around the table. Many questions 
were asked about the destruction of the four ships near 
Montezuma's Castle, but there were no answers. The 
issue was left unresolved; Zimbardo, however, was not 
saying everything he suspected. He was frightened, but 
was determined that no one would know. He had heard 
of the legend of the greegles and took it more seriously 
than anyone would ever suspect.

	Richard Starlight's spacious office was located near 
the top of the highest tower of Starlight Enterprise on 
the Moon, forty miles north of Amundsen City. Acces-
sible only by two express elevators, it covered nearly an 
entire floor of the tower—more than 3,000 square feet. 
Its walls were treated glass, harder than any metal alloy 
and impervious to the constant rain of micro-meteorites, 
with clarity which was nearly perfect. It was the equiva-
lent of 121 stories above ground level, and only an ob-
servation deck and various antennae were above it. The 
lunar landscape was visible for miles in every direction. 
The pass which marked the entrance to the Field of Ob-
solescence was barely visible ten miles away just a little 
east of north.
	What he called his "office" was really a combination 
laboratory, resource library, work and communications 
center, and lounge. In one corner was a huge table, made 
of artificial material but, apart from chemical analysis, 
not distinguishable from highly polished mahogany. Its 
chairs matched its reflective sheen. Table and chairs 
rested on an intricately patterned carpet, at least twenty 
by twenty-five feet. Patterns in cerulean blue, silver, and 
gray, with flecks of green and violet beautifully com-
plemented the lunar gray visible through the windows. 
Not far from the table was an immense, detailed globe of 
the Earth, about four feet in diameter and perfectly bal-
anced. Equally detailed globes of the Moon and Mars on 
the same scale were nearby. In another corner were 
globes of Mercury and Venus and a few other celestial 
bodies.
	"I'm sorry to put an end to the festivities this way, 
gentlemen," said Richard Starlight to the assembly. 
Around the table were the President of the United States 
and three of his advisors, among whom were Com-
mander John Lewis of Space Command; Richard's sec-
ond-in-command, John "Rock" Rwakatare, head engi-
neer of the Advanced Design Department of SE; and the 
fathers of the three Starmen, Allen Foster, Keith Seaton, 
and Charlie Taylor. Robert Nolan, founder of Nolan 
Mining Enterprises and a friend and colleague of Rich-
ard Starlight, filled out the number. On two viewscreens 
were stationary images of Oritz Konig on Mars, and 
Steve Cliff returning to the Moon from the Asteroid 
Belt. The time delay for Konig was a little more than 
fifteen minutes, and for Cliff was about 22 minutes, so 
they could not actively participate in the discussion. 
Both, however, had vital reports to make and Richard 
was prepared to present them by videotape at the right 
time.
	Richard continued. "We all expected that our three 
Starmen would be back with us in two days for the Re-
ception of Honor. That will have to be postponed. Most 
of you know at least something of the reason why, but 
this hastily-called meeting is to make sure that everyone 
is brought up to date and, more importantly, to take 
counsel on a course of action."
	Richard summed up what had been learned about the 
pirates after the liberation of Mars up to the point of the 
Starmen's departure from Oritz Konig's office.
	"Our conclusion is that, although we have 542 men in 
custody in Eagle City, including their captain Troy Put-
nam, several dozen pirates are still free. It would have 
taken a large facility to prepare the ships and house the 
men used in the assault on Mars, and it is virtually cer-
tain that a sufficient force for maintaining this operation 
was left at their base. We believe that this was probably 
a minimal number, but there may have been pirates in 
other locations in the Asteroid Belt or elsewhere. More-
over, as you know, one ship managed to escape from 
Mars during the liberation. Oritz Konig, now on special 
assignment at Mars Base, will make a report on what 
we've learned about Putnam's chief assistant, Lurton 
Zimbardo."
	By pre-recorded videotape, SE's Chief of Security 
presented a brief report, similar to that which he had 
given to the Starmen.
	At the conclusion, Richard continued. "Since the ship 
that escaped headed recklessly at its highest velocity 
toward a certain area of the Belt, we can reasonably as-
sume that the pirates' base is situated on an asteroid not 
far from that area."
	Nolan asked, "Why were the ships from Space Com-
mand not able to find this asteroid, or any trace of the 
pirates?" Robert Nolan was a man of early middle age, 
slight of build, with thinning hair. He was noted for his 
analytical mind and incisive decisions. His hard work 
over a twenty-year span had built a small company into 
an influential corporation, and his achievements had 
brought him respect throughout the Inner Planetary sys-
tem.
	"This is what we are gathered here to reveal," Richard 
answered. "I'm afraid the news is quite disturbing. Steve 
Cliff will give us his report."
	By videotape, Steve Cliff reported what he had seen 
in the area of Z25. He concluded, "So it is obvious that 
the pirates have a very effective radar bender. Their 
ships are, in effect, invisible to our standard radar detec-
tion systems." The men at the table looked grim. The 
fathers of the Starmen wore especially troubled expres-
sions.
	"Our battle with the pirates is not yet over, I'm 
afraid," said Richard Starlight. "Their radar bender is 
nearly perfect. The notion of developing a technique that 
makes an object invisible to radar is not new, of course, 
but in spite of several decades of effort even Starlight 
Enterprise has not been able to achieve the high level of 
effectiveness Zimbardo's men have available to them. 
From these observations we draw several disquieting 
conclusions.
	"First, the pirate base is probably invisible to radar; it 
can't be seen with normal methods.
	"Second, the pirates have probably outfitted this de-
vice on all their ships, not just the five Steve Cliff ob-
served. If so, their ships can be anywhere without the 
possibility of any of our bases or centers of civilization 
being aware of them until they become visible to the 
eye. Since all our computers track ships and contribute 
toward strategic battle decisions based on radar data, it 
is almost impossible to guard against such pirate raids as 
Zimbardo's men are now able to carry out—and have 
already done on Z25." Richard sighed.
	"Third, and most alarming of all, it is almost impossi-
ble for the pirates to have invented the radar bender on 
their own. Our computer estimated the chance that they 
did so to be approximately 0.0001%. That kind of tech-
nology is beyond any earthly scientific capability. It is 
much more likely that they got it from some alien civili-
zation—a highly advanced alien civilization.
	"We don't have any solid information other than that, 
so we can only guess what level of connection there may 
be between any such hypothetical civilization and the 
pirates. At any rate, where the radar bender came from, 
other devices might come too—devices against which 
Earth has no defense. And we have no idea when we 
will learn the pirates' next move. And we don't know 
where the Starmen are now."
	The room was silent. Everyone was stunned. When 
Mars was liberated they had thought that the conflict 
was at an end. Now they saw that their situation was 
more desperate than they thought possible.
After a moment, Robert Nolan spoke up. His eyes 
were wide and his voice was high-pitched. "Wh-, what 
can we do? Can't we find these pirates? Can't we just 
send out ships and comb the entire area of the Belt 
where they disappeared? Can't we…?"
	Keith Seaton broke in. "Robert, believe me, if there 
were anything we could do, anything we could think of 
that wouldn't be the equivalent of running around in 
circles, we'd be doing it! The Starmen are our sons! 
Richard informed us last night that they were captured, 
and we've done just about nothing else but try to think 
of something we can do."
	Allen Foster joined in. His voice was level and deter-
mined, clearly being controlled with supreme effort. "It 
is impossible to do a random search of the Asteroid 
Belt—even if we restrict our search to the section where 
the hidden base must lie. We've done the math. We may 
as well be looking for a black marble hidden at night 
anywhere in North America."
	"And invisible ships!" Nolan gasped. "The Solar Sys-
tem has no defense against anything like that. Why, they 
could come in anywhere and invade! They'd be invinci-
ble! We couldn't even see what hit us!"
	Commander Lewis spoke up. "And an alien civiliza-
tion! They could have science beyond what we can 
imagine. Earth doesn't stand a chance against an enemy 
like that!" The men were scared.
	After a moment when no one else addressed the gath-
ering, the President spoke. "Our position is essentially 
the same as it was when Mars was still in the control of 
the pirates. Our strength does not lie in superior science 
or in superior numbers. Troy Putnam recently placed his 
trust in superior strength and technology: the unsound-
ness of such a hope is shown by his fall. David fought 
Goliath and won because his heart was in the right 
place. Zimbardo might have weapons and other technol-
ogy of which we cannot even conceive and he might do 
great damage, but he is still in the wrong. Evil might 
have its day, but in the end it will always fall; the forces 
of light will overcome it as it decays from within. With 
that faith and that assurance, we can make our plans. 
Does anyone have a suggestion as to how we can meet 
this crisis?"
	Allen Foster spoke again. "There are two issues here: 
finding and rescuing the Starmen and their companions, 
and defending our civilization from the pirates. For the 
first, well, we're very hopeful that they are still alive 
because they were taken aboard the pirates' ship before 
the base on Z25 was destroyed. And they are resourceful 
young men—they are Starmen, after all.
	"For the second, any solution I'm afraid will be long-
term. We'll have to develop a detector that uses a proc-
ess other than radar—perhaps something based on grav-
ity or light absorption. But you can appreciate the obvi-
ous fact, I'm sure, that inventing such machinery will 
take a very long time. No, we think that our course now 
must be entirely defensive. We are, at least, forewarned. 
But I'm sure that the pirates will be making the next 
move before we can do anything about it." 



7: Prisoners on the Pirates' Asteroid




"WHAT'S the word for 'walk'?" asked Mark.
	"Gentrikian," answered Zip automatically.
	"That makes forty-seven points for you," said Joe. "I 
need fifteen more just to catch up. C'mon Mark, give me 
an easy one—help me out."
	"Okay. Do you want English to Titanian or Titanian 
to English?"
	"Titanian to English. That's easier."
	"K'intrishian."
 	Joe thought for a moment. Languages seemed to come 
easily to Mark—he could absorb concepts and find men-
tal hooks to hang them on with no noticeable effort at 
all. Joe found languages far more difficult. He preferred 
engine diagrams, flow charts, and working with his 
hands.
	"I don't know!" The lean engineer blasted, exasper-
ated. The Starmen, like the crew from Z25, were passing 
time as they entered the third day of their captivity 
aboard the Silver Cloud. Mark was teaching Zip and Joe 
some of the Titanian vocabulary he'd been working on 
for two years.
	"This one should be easy for you, Joe, even if it isn't 
'sleep' or 'eat.' The answer is just about all we've been 
able to do on this trip so far."
	"Well, sleeping and eating is all we've done!"
	"'K'intrishian' means 'wait'."
	"We've certainly been doing a lot of that on this out-
ing! The past couple of weeks have seemed about point-
less! Just about all we've been doing is bouncing from 
place to place! We blasted off from Eagle City to the 
Asteroid Belt and then went right back to Mars. Then 
back to Ceres in the Asteroid Belt. Then to Monte-
zuma's Castle and on to Z25. And we complete our mis-
sion just in time to get captured by the enemy! Now 
we're being taken to this 'secret asteroid' where Lurton 
Zimbardo has his base and I'll bet anything we're going 
right back to where we started—where we lost track of 
that ship we were chasing into the Belt!"
	An announcement came through the intercom. "Pre-
pare for deceleration in two minutes."
	The Starmen looked at one another, then at the crew 
of Z25. St. George was already walking toward his 
chair. Each of them could feel his heart suddenly beating 
a little faster. They strapped themselves into their chairs. 
Zip looked out of the window but saw nothing out of the 
ordinary.
	A moment later, the rockets on the Silver Cloud ig-
nited and the ship began to slow. About half an hour 
later, the ship's speed had become extremely slow and 
the view of the stars disappeared. It became apparent to 
the prisoners that they were entering a tunnel. After a 
few seconds, the ship touched down and secured itself to 
the landing pad. The prisoners waited. No one spoke.
	Minutes passed, then the door to their quarters 
opened. Spelford stood in the opening, with several 
other men behind him. All were armed.
	"Time to go," Spelford announced. The prisoners 
were escorted single file through the ship and down the 
access ladder to the floor of the landing pad. They were 
under observation at all times by several armed pirates 
in front of them and behind.
	Joe reached the bottom of the ladder and turned to 
look around. To his right was an enormous clear wall 
which sealed off the landing area from the immense tun-
nel through which the ships had come. In front of him 
and to his left was a complex of charcoal-dark struc-
tures, lined with silver trim and glinting with many pan-
els of glass. The entire area was powerfully lit by sev-
eral hundred sources hundreds of feet above him. He 
was both impressed and intimidated at the same time.
	When all the prisoners had debarked from the Silver 
Cloud, Spelford gave the orders.
	"Move. This way. Stay in single file."
	The line crossed the field and passed through a sec-
ond airlock. Leaving the field behind, they entered a 
large manufacturing area. Several dozen men were 
working feverishly at massive tables and work centers. 
Sparks from welding areas were visible in the back parts 
of the area. Flashing lights from many desks lit up the 
faces of men with intent gazes, whose attention was 
fixed on close work on numerous small circuit boards. A 
few workers glanced curiously at the line of prisoners, 
but didn't waste time on a thorough investigation of the 
newcomers.
	Spelford and his detail escorted the prisoners through 
a immense double door, down a wide passageway, and 
into a large elevator. The elevator could accommodate 
fifty men easily. When all were inside, Spelford tapped 
a number into the control pad and the elevator began to 
descend. It stopped in seconds and the door opened into 
an area where several corridors came together. Two 
small elevator doors flanked the one from which the 
men emerged. The procession entered a dimly-lit corri-
dor that extended for about a hundred yards. Many doors 
were set into the walls, but none was open.
	Spelford led the way down the corridor. After cover-
ing about two-thirds of the distance, he stopped and slid 
open a plain, dark portal set into the right side of the 
passage. He glanced into the room beyond, then stepped 
back and said, "In here." The prisoners entered, and the 
door closed behind the last one.
	George St. George broke the silence. "We're not go-
ing to be able to absquatulate from these pirate yaps 
very easily, that's for sure. Guess we'll have to make the 
most of our stay here."
	Zip strode into the center of the room and looked 
around. Indirect lighting provided plenty of illumination. 
"Clearly a dormitory of some sort," he observed to no 
one in particular. Bunk-style beds were spaced around 
the walls. Through another door was a resting area with 
tables and chairs. In another room were washing facili-
ties. On one side of the room was a large window which 
overlooked the landing area and primary work center of 
the asteroid.
	"Nothing fancy, but everything we need," said one of 
St. George's men after a quick look around.
	"For a long stay, maybe," said another.
	"'K'intrishian' means 'wait,' if I remember correctly, 
Mark," said Joe.
	"That's thirty-three points for you," responded the tall 
Starman.

	Time passed. From the window in the wall of the as-
teroid, the three Starmen looked down and saw a buzz of 
activity. Several dozen ships were docked on the field, 
and workers were still hovering around tables in the 
work center.
	"Here comes another one," said Joe, as a spacecraft 
passed into view from the large tunnel that led to the 
outside.
	"How many is that since we've been here?" asked 
Mark. "Six?"
	"Yes, six in less than twenty-four hours," stated Zip.
The Starmen chafed under the burden of their power-
lessness. They had already scoured the rooms carefully 
and found no sign of weakness they could exploit. Their 
food was delivered through an automated shaft that they 
could find no way of using as an escape route. They had 
neither seen nor spoken to anyone since Spelford had 
brought them to their prison.
Once again Zip looked out the window. "This place is 
amazing! This could not have been anticipated by any-
one! It must have been quite a shock when you found 
this asteroid, George."
	"Oh yes, I was awestruck, completely, absolutely 
electrified. Imagine stepping into a remnant of an as-
tounding civilization like this. When I found it, it was 
abandoned. It seemed as if no one had been in it for 
probably thousands of years."
	"Tell us everything you know about this place," or-
dered Zip, looking intently at the asteroid miner and 
drawing him over to the nearest table. Zip gently pushed 
the miner into a chair, then turned another chair and sat 
in it, folding his arms over the back and facing George. 
The asteroid miner told the Starmen the story of when 
he had found the asteroid and how Troy Putnam had 
learned about it. They had already heard a brief version 
of the story from Oritz Konig back at Mars Base.
	"Of course, I didn't know this Putnam was a bad egg 
at the time. He just seemed like a friendly, curious 
spaceman to me."
	"What about the asteroid?" pressed Joe. "You're tell-
ing us that the pirates didn't make it?"
	"Of course not. As I said, it was abandoned when I 
ran across it. Some other race had to have built it. They 
couldn't have been too different from us, though. Same 
body type, same size, that's obvious. Look around you—
beds, chairs, everything, just the way we'd make them. 
Their language was quite different, though. Took me a 
long time to learn how to use some of their stuff."
	"How'd you learn your way around here?"
	"When I first came upon the asteroid, the airlock was 
open. A huge orifice, made for spaceships, as you can 
tell. I came through and landed. Went through one of the 
airlocks into the building portion here, where we are 
now, and just explored. Trial and error. It's not too dif-
ficult to get the basics down—opening and closing 
doors, and all that. Then figuring out the right mix of 
atmosphere. I had plenty of time. I got access to the first 
four or five stories, but I'm pretty certain the place is 
much bigger than that. I couldn't get any further than the 
first few stories though."
	"And then?"
	"What do you mean, 'and then'? I got bored with it 
and moved on. I'm a miner, not an explorer or a settler 
or a scientist. There's nothing here but iron. I told a few 
people about it but nobody much believed me or cared 
until this Troy Putnam fellow I met in Yellow City. He's 
the only person who got excited about it, so when he 
asked me to bring him here, I did it, as I said. Why not? 
He was impressed with it, as was I. Then I went looking 
for uranium and he went back to Ceres. Never saw him 
again."
	Zip pursed his lips, and his brow furrowed under his 
red hair—a common expression for the leader of the 
Starman team. "This has to explain why Zimbardo was 
looking for you," he said. "No one outside the pirates 
knows as much as you about his asteroid. But I can't 
understand why he has taken us prisoner. Zimbardo has 
no heart of mercy whatever. I would have expected him 
just to silence you for good. Obviously he is preparing 
this place for some new and big enterprise and is proba-
bly occupied, but now I think we'll be hearing from him 
before too long. Before that happens, I think we'd better 
be gone. This has become urgent now."
	"Escape? You talking about escape, Zip? From here?" 
asked Joe with amazement.
	Zip addressed St. George. "Tell us everything you 
know about how this asteroid works. Leave out no detail 
whatever. Everything you can remember. Joe and Mark, 
pay close attention! We have to come up with a plan!"

	A full day had passed since Richard Starlight had 
called the special meeting in his office in the towers of 
Starlight Enterprise. Now he sat silent and alone in one 
of the chairs around the great table. Suddenly he spun 
the chair around and stared through the clear wall in 
front of him. His gaze went far past the lunar mountains 
into the distant sky where Mars was just rising, a tiny 
red point.
	The President had issued his commands earlier that 
morning. A secret communication had been issued to the 
commanding officers of all the bases of Space Com-
mand. A similar message had been sent to the heads of 
large commercial enterprises such as Starlight Enterprise 
and Nolan Mining Enterprise, as well as the local au-
thorities of population centers in the Asteroid Belt and 
on Mars. The communication had provided what infor-
mation was known about the threat that the pirates mani-
fested. It ordered Space Command and urged the private 
parties to keep the information secret so as to avoid 
panic and to prevent the pirates from learning that their 
sheathing apparatus had been observed in action, and 
advised all parties to prepare for any attack the pirates 
may launch. They were put on high alert for visual at-
tack and to be ready for instant defensive response. 
	In Amundsen City, Keith Seaton sat at his desk, scan-
ning the Asteroid Belt with his telescope. His strong 
build filled the chair in which he sat. 
"There's Ceres," he said quietly as the image of the 
Belt's largest asteroid came up on the screen. Charlie 
Taylor and Allen Foster, who were sitting next to him, 
nodded. The fathers of the three Starmen weren't con-
versing much that night, but both were greatly com-
forted by each other's presence.
	On Ceres, Sim Sala Bim received the encrypted, en-
coded message on tight beam, and felt immense sadness 
come over him as he read it. "Where are those three 
young Starmen now?" he wondered.
	In the laboratories of Starlight Enterprise's main cen-
ter on the Moon, scientists were working around the 
clock to devise a method by which their ships could 
track distant objects by sight instead of radar. Addition-
ally, under a very rare Presidential command, techni-
cians were working frantically under Earth's pre-
eminent astrophysicist, Stephen Hoshino, trying to de-
vise an advanced means of detecting a ship that was in-
visible to radar.
	The Inner Planetary system was waiting for a strike 
which its defenders knew would surely come—but not 
when, where, or how. 



8: The Starmen Strike!




ALMOST an hour had gone by since George St. George 
had begun to tell the three Starmen what he knew of the 
asteroid. Zip, Mark, and Joe had listened intently, plying 
the asteroid miner with detailed questions as he contin-
ued his narrative. At last, no one had anything else to 
say.
	"No more questions?" Zip asked. Both Joe and Mark 
shook their heads. Their energy level had gone up ap-
preciably since they had sat down with George. They 
had become spirited, now that they were determined to 
find a plan of escape.
	"All right, then. It seems to me that this may be easier 
than we thought," stated Zip.
	"You have an idea already?" asked Joe, with a slight 
turn of his head.
	"It seems obvious that this asteroid was not intended 
to house prisoners. This room we're in is not a cell 
block—it's a dormitory."
	"Right," said Mark. "Therefore the locking mecha-
nism is not original to the asteroid's design. Is that 
where you're going, Zip?"
	Zip smiled. "Keep going," he nodded.
	"Whoever made this asteroid was far in advance of 
our science and it'll probably be a long time before we, 
or anyone else, learn how to alter their design. But the 
locking mechanism was most likely put in by the pirates, 
probably on short notice. It can't be too sophisticated a 
system. And again, since this is a dormitory and not a 
cell, the wiring is probably on this side of the door 
rather than in the hallway. Let's find where the pirates 
rewired the door. Whatever they can do, we can undo."
	The Starmen leaped up and began to investigate the 
door and the walls near it very carefully. Now that they 
had some idea of what they were looking for, they hoped 
it would be easier to find an access panel of some kind 
which their previous general search had missed. Minutes 
passed with no result. The walls had no apparent seams, 
and the door was set into the framework so closely that 
there seemed to be no space between the door and the 
edge of the wall into which it slid.
	"Try the floor," suggested Joe. Mark dropped down 
and scanned the floor minutely. Joe moved farther to the 
right and Zip to the left of the door, their fingers moving 
gently over the surface looking for some kind of irregu-
larity.
	St. George watched them with a mix of curiosity and 
amazement on his face. His men sat at the tables playing 
games, paying the Starmen little heed. Once in a while, 
one looked up, then turned back to his game. Others 
napped on the sofas.
	"Look here," said Mark. Zip and Joe came over to see 
what he had found. "What do you see?" he asked them, 
sitting back on his heels.
	"Where?" asked Joe.
	"You find it—see if I'm right," answered Mark.
	Joe pursed his lips and squinted. Zip watched care-
fully. George appeared almost impassive, but inside his 
heart was beating faster.
	"I see it," observed Joe after a minute.
	"What?" burst out St. George, then looked almost 
sheepish for showing his excitement.
	"The light reflects off this patch here just a little dif-
ferently from the rest of the floor. It's a perfect square 
about, oh, fifteen inches on a side."
	"Right," said Mark.
	"How do we open it—if it's a panel, that is?" asked 
Joe. He pushed the corners, tried sliding the panel in 
every direction, bounced the square with his fingers, all 
with no result.
	"Let me try," said Mark. He laid his hand gently on 
top. In a few seconds, there was a click and the square 
lifted up an inch, supported by a small, spring-loaded 
shaft in the center. Mark lifted the panel off and re-
vealed a recess filled with finely detailed circuit boards. 
Over and around them were a few dark wires that obvi-
ously did not belong to the original design.
Joe snorted. "How did you do that?"
	"Well, I thought that it had to be some sort of radia-
tion that would open it. There were no obvious signs of 
physical fasteners like screws. So I figured it had to be 
magnetism, or light, or maybe heat. I thought body heat 
would be the easiest to try, so I laid my hand on it, con-
centrated, and made it warm. And it opened!"
	"Good work, Mark, but let's not waste time! We're in 
a hurry now," urged Zip. "What do you see in there 
Joe?" By now George and several of his men had come 
over and were watching over the shoulders of the Star-
men.
	"Yeah, really simple circuit. I can disconnect it in a 
minute even without tools and we can be out the door." 
Joe reached in.
	"Wait!" Zip grabbed Joe's wrist. "Is there any evi-
dence that the circuit is tied into a larger system, like a 
master computer, that would tip anyone off that the door 
has been opened?"
	Joe peered into the aperture and carefully traced the 
wiring.
	"Sorry, Zip. Sorry, everybody," he said, chagrined. 
	"You're right. There is. But I can fix that too." He 
reached in and twisted two wires together. "Okay, that 
should bypass the door circuit and tell the master com-
puter that the door is still closed. I can open the door 
now. Are you ready?"
	Zip stood up. "There are fourteen of us. We don't 
know what we'll face when we get out, so I'd like 
George to lead us. He's been through the asteroid. Take 
us somewhere, George, where we won't be found eas-
ily."
	George shook his head in a big arc. "Now Zip, I ha-
ven't been on this chunk for over fifteen years. I'm not 
real sure where to go!"
	"George, no one else has been on the asteroid at all. 
There's no one but you."
	The asteroid miner looked down, dejected. "I don't 
like any of this. But you're right. Okay. We'll go out the 
door and back to the elevators. We'll take the one on the 
left. I'll take us to a floor one level down, then through a 
huge storeroom. On the other side are other corridors. 
I've been through there, and there are places to hide and 
more elevators to get us other places on the asteroid. 
After that I'm not sure. Maybe I'll remember when we 
get there."
	"Everyone got that?" said Zip. "Stay together and 
move quickly." No one had anything else to say. Zip 
turned to Joe.
	"Let's go," decreed Zip. Joe removed one end of a 
black wire and touched it to another terminal. The door 
slid open.
	Outside was a scene that none of the Starman had ex-
pected. Two pirates, dressed in their gray and black uni-
forms, were seated opposite one another at a small table 
on the far side of the corridor. The one on the right was 
a well-muscled, large man with dark hair, weighing well 
over 200 pounds; the other was blond, of medium build. 
He was leaning on his elbow, pondering his next move 
in a board game. When the door slid open, they both 
looked up, utter surprise written over their faces.
Starmen and pirates froze for a split second, then both 
sides moved at once. Mark charged for the big man and 
Joe for the blond. Simultaneously the huge pirate bel-
lowed and threw the table toward the charging Starmen, 
scattering the game pieces. Mark stopped the flying ta-
ble without slowing his pace and slammed it hard back 
at the pirates, legs first. The blond man managed to 
evade the table, but the big pirate took two table legs on 
his left thigh and upper chest. He groaned, and the laser 
pistol he had been drawing was caught behind the table. 
Mark quickly threw the table upside-down to his left, 
reached with both hands for the pirate's right arm, and 
pulled the man quickly down and toward himself. His 
right knee came up and caught the man in the solar 
plexus. The pirate went down with a whoosh of air and 
lay still. Mark picked up his pistol.
	Meanwhile, the blond pirate had screamed for help in 
a panicky voice, turned, and was dashing down the cor-
ridor toward the elevator. Joe took hold of the table's leg 
nearest him and skated the table forcefully down the 
corridor after the escaping pirate. It caught the man be-
hind his left ankle as he was running. In the low gravity, 
the pirate turned almost completely over, his pistol fly-
ing. Joe caught up with him and delivered a quick punch 
that rendered the man unconscious. The entire fight had 
taken less than ten seconds.
	Zip stepped into the corridor calmly. "Did either of 
them have a chance to set off an alarm?"
	"I think this one did," responded Joe, pointing to the 
fallen pirate at his feet and picking up his laser pistol. 
	"He had about five seconds while he was running to 
send an emergency call."
	Zip grimaced. "That was stupid. I should have thought 
that they would have a guard. I just didn't think of it, 
with all the electronic gadgetry around here and their 
obvious need of manpower. My fault. Sloppy thinking. 
But it's worse to stand here and feel badly about it. 
We've got to disappear fast."
	"This way!!" shouted George and began to run toward 
the elevator. The asteroid miner who had previously 
been so sedate and hesitant now led the way. The Star-
men followed him and the ten others brought up the rear. 
George reached the elevator door and pressed the panel. 
In seconds a door opened and the men hurried in. Just as 
the last man rushed through the opening and the doors 
began to close, the elevator doors in the next shaft 
opened and a troop of pirates poured out, guns drawn. In 
front of them they saw their two comrades lying mo-
tionless in the corridor, table and chairs in full disarray.
	"Come on!" commanded their leader, leaping forward 
and turning toward his men to enforce his order. His 
eyes opened wide as he saw the doors of the adjacent 
elevator closing on the escaped prisoners. The Starmen's 
last view of the scene was the pirate leader's shocked 
face, mouth agape, pulling his laser pistol up to fire. 
Then their doors sealed and they began to descend.
	Almost instantly, it seemed, the door opened. The 
only light came from the interior of the elevator. It shone 
on an uncountable number of enormous crates, stacked 
three high and set in rows, extending beyond the range 
of the minimal light. Though the walls of the room could 
not be seen, there was a distinct feeling that the open 
space was huge—larger than a gymnasium, perhaps lar-
ger than a stadium. No one said a word. No one moved.
	Suddenly Zip grabbed the laser pistol that Joe was 
carrying and leaped out of the elevator. He whipped 
around and fired at the control panel next to the large 
central elevator. The panel flared red for a second and 
then sparked like fireworks. Zip released the activation 
trigger on the pistol and stepped back. A few pops ech-
oed in the darkness against a background of the soft siz-
zling sound of molten metal dripping down the wall. Zip 
ran to the third elevator, calling out, "Move away from 
the elevator! Mark, destroy the controls!" Simultane-
ously Mark and Zip demolished the control panels of the 
remaining two elevators. When the controls were oblit-
erated, the lights in the elevator went out and the four-
teen erstwhile prisoners stood in the utter darkness of 
the immense chamber. The sole illumination was pro-
vided by the fading red glow of the superheated panels 
that had been their targets and a few bright orange dots 
in the gaping holes that remained.
	"George! Where do we go?" Zip asked.
	"Does anyone have a light?" responded the asteroid 
miner. Just then a pale glow like early dawn rose around 
them and filled the chamber.
	"What's that?" cried a frightened voice.
	"Automatic lighting, probably," answered Joe. "When 
someone moves far enough away from the elevator, or 
when its light goes out, the automatic lighting goes on."
	"Follow me," directed George. He led the procession 
to the right of the elevator shafts. On one side was a 
blank wall at least 25 feet high. On the other were row 
upon row of crates. Each box had a mark on it, but none 
of the Starmen could recognize its meaning. Far down 
the rows was the opposite wall of the chamber, at least 
200 yards away.
	George St. George was fast-walking, leading the band 
of fourteen onward. There was no opportunity for con-
versation, but Mark stepped up close to Zip, who had 
taken the last position in the march.
	"Think what this place is, Zip!" the mystically-
oriented Starman breathed, his eyes alight with excite-
ment. "This was made by an intelligent, extra-terrestrial 
race we've never heard of! The Titanians certainly 
didn't make it! And whoever made it was shaped just 
like us! As George said before, the controls, the beds, 
the chairs—all are designed for people like us! Same 
size! And imagine what must be in these storage units!"
	"I have been thinking about it, Mark," answered Zip. 
"I'll want more time later to sift through my impres-
sions, but there are too many questions here to deal with 
at the pace we're going."
	"Of course, but think! Who made this place? How big 
is the complex? When and why did they abandon it? 
Where are they now?"
	"Yes—and above all, what else will we find in here?"
	Just then the screech of tortured metal sounded loudly 
throughout the chamber. Everyone turned and stared 
back at the elevators, where the sound was coming from. 
A spot on the left door of the central elevator began to 
glow orange, then red, then white. Iridescent metal be-
gan to spew forth in chunks. Then a mechanism about 
the size of a basketball shot through the hole. A few 
bright green and yellow lights the size of small coins lit 
up its dull silver surface.
	Zip's blood ran cold. "It's a seeker!" A seeker was 
an armed robotic flying device which, among other uses, 
could be programmed to track down fugitives, drawn by 
their body heat. Zip and Mark lifted their laser pistols 
and fired simultaneously. Their beams lit up red dots on 
the surface of the flying ball but scattered harmlessly, as 
the Starmen knew they would. The seeker quickly ori-
ented itself to the escapees and began to fly toward 
them.



9: A Vision in the Night




"RUN! Go! Scatter! Move!" shouted Zip frantically. He 
ran forward to the closest aisle between the stacks of 
crates, wheeled right, and sped down the narrow space. 
He heard the quiet, efficient "zzap" sound of the 
seeker's disabling beam, but apparently not directed to-
ward him yet. Desperation powered his legs and they 
pumped at peak speed. He didn't know where the others 
were or what they were doing. Someone else was racing 
behind him but he didn't stop to find out who it was.
	It was not cowardice that inspired his flight, but the 
desire to preserve the team. Scattering and flying gave a 
slight hope that some of the men might escape the re-
lentless search of the seeker—or at least put off the in-
evitable. The rotation of the asteroid provided artificial 
gravity, but it was low enough to enable the men to 
move quickly, covering a lot of distance as they ran.
	"Zzap. Zzap," he heard again, more distant this time. 
He came to the end of the aisle and had to slow to keep 
from slamming into the wall in front of him. He reached 
out his left hand and grabbed the corner of a crate to 
help him execute the turn. As he made the quick right 
angle twist at the end of the row of crates, he glanced 
behind him with his peripheral vision. Joe was behind 
him and several yards farther away were two of the min-
ers. Even as he looked, he saw the seeker fly over the 
crates into the aisle he had just cleared, missing the ceil-
ing by less than a foot. With the hated "zzap" sound, it 
fired one beam toward the miner at the rear of the head-
long retreat, and the man went limp and collapsed. His 
momentum carried him forward several feet before he 
stopped moving.
	Zip saw it all in a split-second as his inertia carried 
him out of view. He looked forward again and sped 
down the aisle; after passing a few rows he turned again 
to the left. Far ahead of him he saw the elevator door 
with the bulging rupture through which the seeker had 
burst into the warehouse. Suddenly the seeker flew over 
the stack of crates to Zip's left and appeared about fif-
teen yards in front of him. A feeling of panicky horror 
surged through Zip as he saw the seeker re-orient itself 
in his direction. All at once every point of light on the 
seeker went out and it hung motionless in the air. Then it 
sped back to the elevator door as if jerked by a cable. It 
smashed through the hole it had made and flew into the 
shaft. Instantly there was a dull "whump," more felt in 
one's tissues than heard aloud. A bright light came 
through the opening like a spotlight, then faded.
	"What happened to the seeker?" Joe's amazed voice 
behind him asked the question that was in Zip's mind.
	"Let's go," said Zip. "Let's find out who's down and 
carry them away." Both the Starmen were breathing 
hard, but quickly returned to normal as they paced the 
aisles. In moments they had assembled those whom the 
seeker had not found. Only four men had been disabled 
by the seeker's beams.
	"Take us out of here, George," ordered Zip. His voice 
was quiet but carried the authority of leadership that 
people welcome when there is a crisis. Using the fire-
man's carry, eight men easily transported the four who 
were unconscious. 
	George St. George turned without a word and led the 
way. Everyone followed. St. George came to the end of 
the walkway and turned to the left around the last row of 
storage units. On his right was a bank of elevator doors, 
some large and some small. He came to the first one and 
pressed some numbers into a control panel. His hands 
were shaking and nothing happened.
	He looked up to Zip with a countenance marked with 
anguish and pleaded, "I can't do it. My fingers won't 
work. Mr. Foster, you press the numbers, please." Zip 
stepped up to the panel. As the asteroid miner called out 
the directions, Zip pressed the buttons.
	"Top center. Right center. Top right. Top right again. 
Bottom left. Center. Sorry, I'm a little shaken up."
	"That's okay, George. I think we'll be fine now." The 
elevator door opened and all the men stepped into the 
conveyance. The door closed. George reached out and 
pressed one button. The elevator began to move—not 
down or up as the men expected, but away from the 
chamber where they had fought the seeker.
	"What's wrong with these men?" asked one of the 
miners. "They're completely unconscious and their arms 
and legs are swinging around like they're puppets or 
something."
	"They're just out temporarily, not hurt," answered 
Joe. "Seekers disrupt certain neural connections to bring 
on sleep and complete relaxation of all muscle func-
tions. I'm not sure how high the seeker's beam was set, 
but I'd guess pretty high. They'll probably sleep for sev-
eral hours but they'll be fine when they wake up."
	"What did you do to that machine that was chasing 
us?" asked another of St. George's companions.
	"I didn't do anything to it. I don't know what hap-
pened to it," answered Zip. "I suppose it malfunctioned. 
Lucky for us." Joe and Mark both looked at Zip side-
long, then looked away. The Starmen knew that what-
ever had happened to the seeker, a malfunction was not 
one of the possibilities.
	Another of the miners spoke up. "I've never been on 
an elevator that moved horizontally before. Where are 
we going, George? This transit is taking longer than just 
moving between floors."
	"The elevators inside this rock can move in just about 
any direction except slantindicular. If I remembered ac-
curately, this one'll take us to a control and information 
center of some kind. I don't know where it is in relation 
to where we started, but we should be safe there and if I 
don't forget where we come out, I can always get us 
back to the warehouse if we want to return."
	The elevator came to a stop and the door opened onto 
darkness. As before, the elevator light illumined a small 
space, in which the men could see a few counters. When 
the first passenger debarked, soft lights went on. The 
illumination revealed a room of about 2,000 square feet, 
filled with viewscreens, computer stations, cabinets and 
shelves, tables and chairs, and a few sofas. At least a 
dozen doors led from the room. The four unconscious 
men were laid carefully down onto the sofas.
	"What is this place?" Zip asked St. George.
	"Haven't any idea, Starman. I don't mind pushing 
buttons at random when it comes to elevators, but you 
won't find me playing with any machine I don't under-
stand. I don't want to find the ejection seat or rocket 
launchers by accident."
	"What do you think, Mark, Joe? Let's look around 
here." The Starmen began to examine the keyboards and 
controls systems spread throughout the room. There 
were symbols written beside most of the controls, but 
none of it was recognizable.
	"Alien writing," observed Mark. "I'd sure like to 
know what it says."
	Joe was at the next console, thoughtfully pressing but-
tons, but there was no response.
	"We need to find food and water," said one of the oth-
ers.
	"Right," said Zip. "Everyone check through the 
shelves and cabinets. Open the doors, too, and look 
through, but don't go anywhere." Zip didn't speak aloud 
what was on his mind. The workings of the asteroid, no 
matter how technologically advanced, had been aban-
doned for probably thousands of years. There could be 
no water or food anywhere except where the pirates 
were. The Starmen and miners may have escaped captiv-
ity, but their freedom would do them no good until they 
found food, water, and a spaceship. Success in finding 
even one of those items without being recaptured was 
highly unlikely. And even if they could board a ship, 
escape from the asteroid was just about impossible. He 
wondered how long it would take before someone else 
realized these things and voiced them.
	"There's nothing, Mr. Foster," said one of the men 
after everyone had searched thoroughly.
	"Mm hmm," Zip nodded. "Well, let's sleep and start 
again in the morning. Maybe some of us can go back to 
the warehouse and open up a few of those crates. There 
may be food and water in some of them. And others can 
investigate some of the passages that lead away from 
here."
	The men arranged themselves around the room and 
lay down. "I think I found the light switch, anyway," 
said Joe and pressed a button next to one of the door-
ways. The room became dark.

	"I assure you, Mr. Zimbardo, there was nothing wrong 
with the seeker," asserted a large man, standing before 
the pirate leader with a half dozen of his partners. "I 
don't know what threw it back into the elevator shaft 
and I don't know what made it explode—but there was 
nothing wrong with it. The prisoners must have done 
something to it."
	"These prisoners are more than asteroid miners! None 
of St. George's men has the capability of knocking out 
two armed men the way those two were knocked out. 
None of them has the know-how to disable a seeker!" 
Zimbardo turned to his chief assistant. "Gene! Get me 
Lather right away. Tell him to bring up all information 
he has on the prisoners he brought in from Z25. Tell him 
to bring especially the video-record of the prisoners." 
He turned back to the others. "You're dismissed!"
	Lather appeared with a handful of records.
	"Let's see the video-record first," said Zimbardo, and 
pushed his computer a little closer to his lieutenant. The 
man inserted the disk. In seconds, a view of the prison-
ers appeared on the screen, each one shuffling by as they 
entered the Silver Cloud.
	When all the prisoners had passed by, Zimbardo 
turned his head down in disgust. Lather opened a file 
and brought out another disk. "I've got—" he began.
	"You fool!!" spat out Zimbardo through gritted teeth. 
"I don't need to see any more! I know who we've got 
now! How could you miss seeing that the three Starmen 
who completely destroyed our plans on Mars were your 
passengers for three days! How could you miss it??" He 
was shouting now. "They've been on the news for two 
weeks! How—" Zimbardo paused and tried hard to get 
control of himself. "They were our prisoners! And now 
they've escaped! They're loose inside this asteroid, and 
we don't know where!"
	"But sir," inserted Lather when Zimbardo paused to 
take a breath and clutch the air. "There aren't many 
places they can hide. There's not much to the inside of 
the complex—only five floors."
	Zimbardo turned to the ship captain. With words that 
smoldered, he said, "The complex of this asteroid is far 
larger than you think! I have barely begun to explore, 
and St. George knows more than I do!"
Back in control now, Zimbardo punched his desk 
communicator. "Gene! Get a search party together and 
have them scour every part of the asteroid they can 
find." He filled in the details about the Starmen. But he 
knew that neither the miners nor the Starmen would be 
found. With George St. George leading them, they could 
be anywhere—anywhere but where his men would be 
able to search.

	Mark came out of a deep sleep into a light doze. He 
knew he was sleeping, but he was also mindful of his 
surroundings. It gradually washed through him that he 
was hearing voices. Two voices were conversing in very 
low tones, far away. He had a feeling that the air was 
thick and the sound had to struggle to get to him. He 
became aware of his eyelids, and they fluttered. Fully 
conscious but deeply relaxed now, he slowly opened his 
eyes. Darkness, but not absolute.
	He turned his head slowly to the left. Through an 
open door, about twenty feet away along a corridor were 
two tall, vaguely humanoid beings wrapped in shadows. 
Mark's heart leaped and began to race, but outwardly he 
showed no trace that he was alert. His eyes narrowed in 
an attempt to see more clearly. He knew instinctively 
that the creatures were alien. They walked in utter si-
lence and stepped into the room. Mark lay frozen. After 
they looked around for a few seconds, they went back 
into the corridor to the place where he had first seen 
them.
	The creatures began conversing in low voices. They 
manifested no ill intent toward the sleepers, but Mark 
sensed a deep sadness in their tone. He strained to hear 
what they were saying, what their words sounded like.
	Suddenly he heard something that sounded familiar. 
"A coincidence," he thought to himself. They couldn't 
have said "Zimbardo." After several more exchanges, 
one of the figures pressed a series of buttons on the wall, 
next to a blank screen. It came alive with a dull silver 
glow. Bright green lines appeared in the configuration of 
a map or blueprint. Mark strove to see as well as to hear. 
Slender fingers pointed to one part of the screen or an-
other as the conversation continued.
	Then he heard it again, this time clearly. "Zimbardo." 
Mark lifted his head a little and turned so he could ob-
serve the screen better. "A plan of the surface control 
center," he thought. He recognized the floor plan by its 
telltale major portal through which the prisoners had 
been marched.
	The scene changed as one of the figures pressed a but-
ton. A series of diagrams appeared, diagrams that indis-
tinctly suggested a power plant to Mark. One of the tall 
figures began talking animatedly, pointing to various 
locations and repeating the word "Zimbardo" frequently.
Suddenly Mark understood what was going on: the 
aliens were talking about shutting down the power plant! 
Mark strained to get a closer look at the diagram they 
were examining. "The aliens!" His mind raced. "They 
must be the builders of this base! Shutting down the 
power plant—why, they must want to stop Zimbardo! 
They're on our side!"
	Then the other figure spoke up. He seemed to agree 
with the animated one, but his voice had a sorrowful 
tone to it. He pressed a few buttons on the screen and a 
picture of a warship appeared. As the alien pointed to 
the ship and talked, all the life seemed to drain out of his 
companion and he began looking hopeless and despon-
dent. He turned the screen off.
	Mark didn't understand—what was that ship? Why 
did it bring such hopelessness?
	As the panel went dark, Mark realized with a crushed 
heart that, for some reason, the aliens were not going to 
deactivate the power plant after all. He buried his face in 
his hands. Something was stopping them, something 
having to do with the space ship that had appeared on 
the screen last.
	Mark looked up and saw that the figures had van-
ished!



10: Both Sides Move




THE GREAT AIRLOCK on the pirates' asteroid opened. 
From the depths of the abyss five ships came forth. 
Emerging from the stone tunnel, they moved into forma-
tion and then headed for the Asteroid Belt. Lurton Zim-
bardo's lieutenant Crass held the authority over the 
small fleet. Each ship was sheathed with the radar 
bender, making it invisible to the normal means of de-
tection used by Starlight Enterprise, Space Command, 
and other Earth-based entities.
	As the ships came into the Belt, Crass gave the com-
mand to the other four pilots. "The target asteroid has 
been located. Proceed with the destruction of the sats." 
The sats were small, unmanned electronic satellite ob-
servers, distributed throughout the Asteroid Belt to aid 
in research and navigation. They monitored movement 
in the Belt and provided constantly updated information 
on the location, speed, and direction of major asteroids.
	The four ships moved into pre-determined areas in the 
quadrants around a small, heavy, black, iron asteroid 
that was speeding smoothly along on its course.
	Crass stood on the deck of his ship and gazed out at 
the small asteroid. He spoke as if to himself. "There it 
is, the first of five surprise packages for our beloved 
Mars." The pirate leader waited patiently for the pilots 
of the four companion ships to report back. He expected 
that their assignment would take about 45 minutes—
maybe as long as an hour. The first report came in 42 
minutes later.
	"Mr. Crass, this is Slant. We located three sats in 
quadrant two and destroyed them all." The other reports 
came in only moments later. A total of fourteen sats had 
been located within 600 miles of the asteroid where 
Crass was waiting, and all had been destroyed. Crass 
opened the intercom on his own ship.
	"We're clear. Go to it."
	Over a dozen space-suited men spilled out of the air-
lock. They had been waiting for the order from Crass. 
Each carried a large crate, nearly weightless in the As-
teroid Belt. They maneuvered easily through space and 
floated gently to the surface of the asteroid—a dark 100-
yard wide clump of dirty rock. Immediately the men be-
gan to distribute the crates evenly over the surface of the 
rock and clamp them to its exterior. The grim, forbid-
ding, pocked asteroid became the site of frenzied work. 
The crewmen removed sheet after sheet of dark metal 
and fastened them to the floating chunk of iron. Tiny 
flames showed where the irregular metal of the asteroid 
was being shaped to fit the plates the pirates were an-
choring to its surface.
	In one hemisphere three other men were attaching 
power and propulsion units. They sank holes several feet 
deep and inserted tubes, fuel tanks, and a control mecha-
nism. At one place near the asteroid's equator a techni-
cian was installing a communications unit.
	The four companion ships had returned and remained 
on guard less than a quarter mile from the asteroid. In 
less than two hours the work on the asteroid was com-
pleted and the crewmen had reentered their ship.
	"Take us home," ordered Crass. The five ships left the 
Belt and began the quick journey back to their port. 
Crass smiled most of the way back.

	On Mars in the tower of Eagle City, technician Mel 
Golden was puzzled. Some of his data had just dried up. 
He was responsible for monitoring the sats in a large 
segment of the Asteroid Belt, and a section over a thou-
sand miles in diameter had gone dark. He called to his 
superior.
	"Will, I've got something curious here." A slender, 
middle-aged man with long gray hair walked over to the 
console.
	"What is it, Mel?"
	"Look at this. You asked us to report anything out of 
the ordinary. Occasionally one sat will malfunction, but 
it looks as if at least a dozen have stopped reporting all 
at once. I haven't plotted out the details yet, but there's 
an entire section of the Belt where nothing's happen-
ing."
	"When did it start?"
	"Just a moment ago. So whatever happened out there 
happened about…" he thought for a second, "about 
eleven minutes ago."
	"Thanks, Mel. This could be the surprise we've been 
waiting for. I'll report this immediately." Will went over 
to the master communicator in the tower and sent a top 
priority message to Space Command's headquarters on 
Mars, describing the situation. Space Command head-
quarters sent the information on to its centers on Earth 
and the Moon, as well as to Oritz Konig, SE's Head of 
Security, in Mars Base.
	Konig's report to Richard Starlight included these 
words: "It looks probable that the pirates have taken 
some sort of action in the Belt. There are no population 
centers of any size within 10,000 miles of the place, and 
no known solitary miners. It's a completely dead spot, 
and sats are spaced very thinly there. Yet fourteen sats 
in a sphere at least a thousand miles in diameter were 
put out within a ten-minute period. No natural phe-
nomenon can explain that. Space Command has the 
closest ship, but it won't get to the site for a little more 
than 22 hours. And the nearest backup ship is more than 
three hours after that. It's on the way too. SE doesn't 
have a ship of any kind at all within four days of the site. 
We'll have to depend on Space Command for the first 
reports."

	"Wake up! Everybody wake up!" Starman Joe Taylor 
was shouting.
	"What is it? What's wrong?" Voices came from sev-
eral men, jerked awake by Joe's outburst.
	"Food! There's food here!" he burst out. "And water! 
Someone brought us food and water! Lots of it!"
	Within seconds everyone was up and crowding 
around Joe. Now that he had roused his companions, he 
was bent over a half dozen large boxes, one of which 
was partially open. He reached in and took out a con-
tainer filled with fruit. He handed it to one of George St. 
George's men, reached into the box again, and withdrew 
a vessel with water in it. It had a spigot on it as if it were 
made for traveling. The men began passing it around, 
drinking deeply. Joe dug in again and brought out an-
other box. He opened it and held it up so that others 
could see. It contained several layers of items like large 
crackers.
	"Where did it come from, Joe?" Zip asked.
	"I don't know, Zip! I woke up before anyone else and 
noticed these crates. I jumped up, looked around but 
didn't see anybody. I opened the first one and saw the 
fruit. That's the whole story."
	"You don't know it's safe! You took a chance, Joe!"
	"What kind of chance, David? Where were we going 
to find water, much less food? We were done for with-
out this."
	"Not too much of a chance, I think, Zip," whispered 
Mark to the red-haired Starman. Zip turned his head and 
looked at Mark curiously. "The food's okay. Let the 
men distribute it and I'll tell you what I know."
	"Okay," Zip nodded. He turned to George. "Let the 
men take the crates apart and see what we've got here. 
We'll eat and then we'll make plans." George took over 
operations while the three Starmen stepped aside.
	"What do you know, Mark?" asked Zip. Mark told the 
other Starmen what he had seen in the middle of the 
night.
	"Hmmm. Hard to credit it, that the original builders of 
this wonder are still here," mused Zip. "And why would 
they let Earthmen come in and take over? I gather from 
what we've learned and what we've overheard that the 
pirates have been active here for over a dozen years. 
And George found this place over fifteen years ago."
	"The pirates haven't really taken over, Zip," said Joe. 
"It looks as if they haven't gone beyond the first few 
levels! Something's kept them out. Only George was 
able to get beyond the floor where the warehouse is. 
Maybe that's why Zimbardo wanted to find him and 
kept him alive. George doesn't know too much about 
this, this, I don't know what to call this place, but he 
knows more than any human living."
	"Whatever the truth is, we have some friends," con-
tributed Mark. "They don't want to be seen, but they'll 
help us. I'll bet a golden asteroid that they're the ones 
who destroyed the seeker. I think we need to be ready to 
see what happens next, because they're on our side."
	"You're right, Mark," said Zip. "We'll have to be pre-
pared to move." The Starmen went back to the group. 
Everyone was seated on the floor or on chairs, eating 
their breakfast. The four men who had been rendered 
unconscious by the seeker had benefited from a good 
night's sleep and were back to normal.
	Mark reached into one of the crates and took out one 
of the items that looked like a large cracker. He saw that 
several of the miners were eating them. As he raised it to 
his mouth, a slight shudder ran through the room. Its 
intensity diminished in a few seconds and then became 
unnoticeable. 
	"What was that?" he asked. No one answered. He 
completed his bite and began chewing. A second shud-
der permeated the room, and then tapered off in the 
same way as the first one had.
	"Spacecraft launching," said Joe. "I can tell." In the 
next two minutes there were three more launchings.
	"Five. Five ships," said Zip.
	"Nothing we can do about it now," answered Joe. 
"What do you think of these crackers?"
	"Survival food," opined Zip. "The fruit is delicious, 
though."
	When everyone had finished breakfast, George St. 
George asked, "What should we do now, Mr. Foster?"
	"I was just going to ask you the same question, 
George," answered Zip. "Let's get the men together and 
make some plans." George called the miners together. 
Zip delivered a short speech, informing them that he, 
Joe, and Mark were Starmen and gave a brief summary 
of their assignment. With a nod, Zip asked Mark to tell 
what he had seen during the night. Then a number of 
men began to ask questions.
	All at once the room dimmed. The voices stopped 
suddenly. After a few seconds, one of the corridors lit 
up with a soft, pleasant light. "That's the way we go, I 
think," said Zip. "Pack up the food." The contents of the 
remaining cartons were distributed among the men and 
Zip led the way. He felt more hopeful than he had since 
the Starmen had landed on Z25.
	The corridor extended for several hundred yards in a 
straight line. Many doors and other passages led off in 
different directions, each marked with one or more fig-
ures, none of which was familiar. The passageway was 
plain and utilitarian. After more than five minutes of 
walking, the men came to an intersection of passages in 
a large room, faintly illuminated. The lights in the corri-
dor faded behind them. Across the room was a row of 
elevator doors. A row of lights lit up over one of them. 
Zip strode boldly across the floor to the elevator which 
had been indicated, and the others followed without a 
word. When he was within twenty feet of the door, it 
opened. The men entered the compartment and laid 
down their burdens. The door closed.
	On a control panel, one light gleamed and Zip pressed 
it. When he had done so, another light went on. He 
pressed that one. After he had pressed six lights, no 
more came on, and the elevator began to descend. After 
about a minute, the movement stopped and a door be-
hind the men slid open, opposite to that through which 
they had entered. The men turned and inhaled sharply.
	"Oh my! Oh my!" exclaimed Zip, but no one heard 
him.
	In front of the men was a power plant of impossibly 
immense size, in dusky darkness. There were low mur-
murs as of engines pulsing far away or of winds passing 
through trees, but they were quiet sounds. The ceiling 
was out of view, lost in blackness above them. A seam-
less iron floor, perfectly level, stretched out before the 
men as far as they could see. The left wall was beyond 
their vision; the right wall was about thirty yards away. 
Lights were located sparsely throughout the facility.
	Gargantuan tubes, gleaming silver in the lights and 
ribbed like a torso of a dragon, snaked through a heavy 
latticework of girders. Iron pipes a foot in diameter ran 
by the dozens through the open spaces. There were cat-
walks and enclosed spiral staircases in strategic places. 
Great metal containers bearing dials and lights of vari-
ous colors took up much of the space.
	"Go," said Zip. His voice came out as a whisper, 
which he had not intended. He swallowed and said it 
again, a little louder this time. "Go on, move out. It's 
okay." The men stumbled forward, filled with an awe so 
overwhelming that it paralyzed their vocal cords.
	Finally Joe caught his voice. "This is great! Wow! 
This is GREAT! FANTASTIC!!" He pushed through the 
miners in front of him and ran forward about twenty 
feet. He shouted as loudly as he could. "HEYYY!!" 
	There was no echo. His yell disappeared as if it had 
been damped. He suddenly felt chilled and afraid. He 
turned back to the others and rejoined the crowd. He 
sidled over to Mark. "This place is great," he whispered 
with a smile. Mark's eyes were upturned and shining 
with appreciative wonder.
	Zip moved to the front of the company. In a quiet but 
determined voice, he said, "Let's go. We'll just follow 
the main aisle, straight in front of us." He began to walk 
and the others followed. "And don't forget the food," he 
threw over his shoulder. Two men turned back to re-
trieve their supplies and then ran to join the others.
	Joe moved up to the front and walked next to Zip. The 
Starman leader was setting a brisk pace.
	"Isn't this place fantastic, Zip? Just think of the peo-
ple who can build a thing like this!"
	"I am thinking of them," answered Zip. His brow 
wore the characteristic furrow that showed he was not 
completely at ease.
	"What's wrong?" asked Joe, as if he hadn't a care.
	"Something bothers me. Our unseen friends, if they 
are the ones who built and maintain this asteroid, are 
highly advanced technologically. But from what Mark 
told us, it's obvious that they're afraid of something. I 
can't see that they'd be afraid of Zimbardo and his cro-
nies. They're afraid of something else, something we 
don't know about yet. And that makes me afraid."
	He continued his fast pace and Joe kept up with him. 
But Joe's eyes glanced into the shadows as they walked.




11: An Asteroid is Missing




THERE was a breeze. A very light breeze, a mere breath. 
Mark could feel it on his cheek, just a slight chill that 
was pleasant. He had not felt air moving since he had 
been on Mars.
	"Surely, the air cannot move in here," he thought to 
himself. He lifted his eyes upward. As he expected, the 
lights failed before they revealed the ceiling immensely 
far above. "How far?" he wondered. "A half a mile? A 
mile? More?" The lights looked almost like stars, placed 
in the strategic joints and balconied work areas of the 
monstrous iron latticework.
	The refugees from Lurton Zimbardo's prison had 
been walking through the power plant for some time—
long enough to have covered at least a mile, and proba-
bly closer to two. Though the surroundings were obvi-
ously nothing more than the power station of the aster-
oid, the men were hushed as if they were in a cathedral. 
They were small figures in an enormous place, reminded 
of their smallness and filled with awe.
	Mark remembered when he was a child of about six, 
and his parents had brought him to Carlsbad Caverns in 
New Mexico. He had stood in an immense room below 
ground, large enough to contain several football fields. 
He had exulted then, identifying his restlessness inside, 
his search for something larger than himself, something 
that could fill a universe.
	He spoke aloud to no one in particular. "When I was 
in Carlsbad Caverns about a dozen years ago, the ranger 
told us that the temperature inside the caverns was con-
stant. This is like that."
	"Sure," responded Joe. "This is a kind of cave. Look 
at the floor. Perfectly smooth, like glass. Artificially 
shaped, of course, and sealed, but it is the substance of 
the asteroid—no manufactured flooring. We must be in 
the deepest part of the complex here. I feel almost as if 
we are on the bottom of an ocean."
	"Joe! Mark!" called Zip from the front of the proces-
sion. The men stopped walking and the two Starmen 
joined Zip. "Look at that," said Zip, with a lift of his 
chin.
	A computer screen about four feet square was set into 
the side of a huge, gray fabrication of metal, shaped like 
a cube at least fifteen feet on a side, made of thick 
plates, and held together with rivets. Dozens of pipes of 
an tremendous variety of sizes came into the cube and 
extended away, disappearing into the dark distance. 
Some were the diameter of soda straws and a few were 
large enough for a man to crawl through. Most were as 
thick as a man's wrist.
	Mark stepped up to the screen at once. Below it was a 
keyboard without markings. He pressed the button 
which was located in the same place on the board as the 
button he had seen the midnight visitors press to activate 
their screen. A few buttons lit up with tiny green lights, 
but the screen remained black. He tried a few more but-
tons, but there was no response.
	"Nothing doing. If you'd like to take a break here, 
Zip, I'll try a few more combinations. We're so far away 
from the surface of the asteroid, I'm sure Zimbardo will 
never find us now." When Mark said "Zimbardo," the 
screen flashed briefly on each syllable.
	"Hey!" exclaimed the Starman. The screen flashed 
again. "Zimbardo!" he said again, and the screen re-
peated its performance. "It's voice activated! And it rec-
ognizes Zimbardo's name!" Mark tried a series of stan-
dard commands for voice-activated computers, but got 
no response to any words other than "hey" and "Zim-
bardo."
	"Take your time, Mark; I don't think we're in a hurry 
down here," said Zip. For half an hour, Mark tried voice 
commands and combinations of keyboard strokes, but 
made no progress.
	"This place is oppressive," said one of the miners, 
after a long silence. "I don't like being closed in by 
darkness."
	"Right," said another. "On the asteroids we can see 
for thousands of light years, but here it seems as if life is 
swallowed. I feel as if I'm in something's stomach."
	"Mr. Foster," said George St. George. "I think we had 
better move on. We need to come to the end of this giant 
room and get back to light and living quarters of some 
kind. With all this excitement we've had, I think the men 
are just about completely exfluncted."
	Zip paused a moment and looked into the distance, 
then nodded. "Okay," he agreed. "This room can't go on 
forever. Let's find the end of it."

	Lurton Zimbardo was in the control center of the as-
teroid. A small group of his most trusted assistants stood 
silently by. Through the wall of glass on his right he 
could see the cavern where the pirates' space ships were 
anchored to the landing field. Five of them were out on 
assignment in the Belt. As the work crew on the asteroid 
was able to produce sufficient sheathing, power, and 
propulsion units, a space crew was assigned the task of 
outfitting the asteroids that Lurton had previously cho-
sen.
	The first, under the leadership of Crass, had returned 
that morning. Another had gone out almost immediately 
afterward and one more would depart the next morning. 
By the end of the following day, the last two crews 
would be launched.
	Crass' assignment had included the destruction of the 
sats while he performed his task. Now that the pirates 
knew how easy and fast it was to complete the work, 
they did not bother to destroy the sats in the remaining 
four sites. Zimbardo knew that the destruction of the sats 
would alert Space Command, but that the authorities 
would not be able to stop the project before his ships 
returned. Once they learned what he was doing, they 
would expect that he had only one asteroid to command. 
The remaining four would be a shock to them and give 
him, Zimbardo, a powerful psychological edge. He 
would need it for his last demand. Even his most trusted 
lieutenants had no inkling of the enormity of his last 
ploy.
	"Now in contact with G670," uttered Zimbardo, refer-
ring to the asteroid that Crass and his crew had rigged. 
The screen was lit up before him. "Two minutes and 
four seconds to go from right…now!" A countdown 
clock was set at his left. The pirate captain checked his 
figures one more time. He had plotted the orbit of Mars, 
the thrust and direction of the power units on G670, the 
speed of the red planet in its course and its rotation, the 
anticipated acceleration of the asteroid, and the time 
delay involved in making adjustments to its course. He 
had checked his computations half a dozen times and 
then commanded three others to do so.
	Three, two, one… read the countdown clock. Zero. 
Zimbardo pressed the button. He remained motionless 
for at least ten seconds. Then he sat back and exhaled 
loudly. He had not noticed that he hadn't been breath-
ing. Then he turned and smiled broadly to his audience.
	"Five and a half days from now, everyone in the 
Earth-Moon-Mars system will know who we are!"

	Oritz Konig was making another report to Richard 
Starlight. "The Space Command ships came onto the site 
and found no sign of human presence. They quickly re-
placed the sats, got them activated, and then checked 
data. I don't know how to explain it, Richard, but an 
asteroid is missing. Other than that, there is nothing dif-
ferent in the area of the Belt that had gone dark, but ob-
viously the pirates have done something with an aster-
oid. It's not a very big one—only about 100 yards in 
diameter, maybe a little more—but it's vanished."

	The Starmen and miners had been walking more than 
three hours, and covered a distance of about ten miles.
	"A wall," announced Zip. "We've come to the end of 
it at last."
	"You'd think that a race that can make elevators go 
sideways could have come up with a way to traverse this 
gymnasium quicker and easier than walking," grumbled 
Joe.
	"Didn't I hear you say that this place is great?" in-
quired Zip.
	"It is. Back then, I meant 'great' like 'magnificent;' 
but now it just feels like 'great' as in 'really big'."
	The company came up to the wall. There was a bank 
of elevators in front of them and several sets of doors to 
their right. In a large open gathering place, there were 
many platforms like flat beds, with rods coming out of 
one end and sticking up perpendicular to the beds.
	"Joe," said Mark, investigating one of the beds. 
"Here's your easier way to travel. These things must be 
some sort of dolly or truck. I saw a lot of them where we 
first came out of the elevator, but I didn't recognize 
them."
	"And we didn't know how big the room is, either, so 
we didn't look for means of transportation," added Zip.
	"No wheels," said Joe, peering at the apparatus, "and 
doesn't need them. Magnetic, probably, with this iron 
floor. Man," he said with exaggerated disgust, "we 
could have floated in comfort the whole length of the 
place."
	"We're here now," said Zip, matter-of-factly. "What 
happens next? We'll see if our friends are still with us."
	The men waited for some sign of guidance, but there 
was only silence. No lights were activated over an eleva-
tor. Minutes dragged on. "Try the doors," said Zip at 
last, and walked to the nearest elevator. He pressed but-
tons, but nothing happened. "Go on, try the other ones," 
he called out with a wave of his hand. Some of the men 
went to the other elevators and pressed buttons. Others 
went to the standard doors adjacent to the elevators, but 
they did not open.
	"Well, I guess we have to go back," said Joe. No one 
laughed.
	"This one's open," called one of St. George's men. 
They all turned and saw an open door—the tenth in a 
row of identical, unmarked doors along the wall. The 
man didn't go through it but waited for Zip. The leader 
of the Starmen went through the portal onto a metal 
deck. Stairs went upward. He began to climb, with the 
others following after.
	Three flights up he came to another door, which 
opened as he set foot on the landing. He went through it 
into a room outfitted as a small hangar. Five space ships 
of alien design were clamped to the floor. At the far end 
of the hangar was an airlock.
	"We're almost free," he whispered.



12: First Impact




 "ALIEN SPACECRAFT!" murmured Joe, slowly. "Mag-
nificent!"
He and Mark had followed Zip into the hangar. 
George St. George and his men came after. They hud-
dled close together and remained at the door while the 
Starmen strode across the floor of the hangar toward the 
spacecraft.
	The five ships were sleek craft with a highly swept 
delta wing design. The hulls were a startlingly reflective 
deep forest green color. The craft looked identical to 
each other, each about 75 feet long with a wingspan of 
about 45 feet. The windshields were black and opaque. 
They lay horizontally on the floor of the hangar, all 
pointed toward the airlock.
	"Beautiful! Just gorgeous!" exclaimed Mark. As he 
approached the alien craft he noted that the hull was not 
merely colored, but patterned. "Oh my! Look at this!"
	Joe and Zip were right behind Mark and came over to 
see what the big Starman was showing them. The hulls 
were not only beautifully colored, but showed evidence 
of leaf patterns. Subtle gradations in color gave the im-
pression that the ships were almost camouflaged—that 
they could land in a deep forest and become almost in-
visible.
	"This is a work of art, a work of genius!" exclaimed 
Joe.
	"How do you get in?" asked Zip, looking for a door. 
He was running his hands over the surface. There was 
no sign of a doorway, no seal or join anywhere he could 
see or feel. He could see his reflection in the side of the 
spacecraft as if he were looking into a still pool in a for-
est.
	"So close, yet so far," said Mark. "Here are ships, 
there is an airlock, but we're not any closer to escaping 
than we were before."
	"This'll take some time," said Joe, with a grimace. 
"It's probably voice-activated, like the computer screens 
below." The company had passed large computer 
screens regularly on their trek through the power plant. 
"All we need to do is learn the language of an alien race 
we don't know, have never met, and whose language we 
can't read. Then we can break free of here."
	"Let's get busy," said Zip. "I like a challenge. We 
were led here by our hosts. There has to be a way."
	Zip went back to George St. George and his men. 
"We'll be working on getting into one of the spacecraft 
and learning how to use it. You can help by exploring 
this place and finding out what's here. George, would 
you please take an inventory of what we've got in the 
way of food and drink and make a plan for making it last 
as long as you can. We'll also need spacesuits. We can 
probably fly without them if we have to, but it's a bad 
risk."
	"Okay, Zip. We'll do our part," responded George. 
His men scattered throughout the hangar. There was a 
lot to investigate. It was only about 200 yards long and 
50 yards wide, but was lined with cabinets. There were 
shelves and racks with equipment of various kinds, some 
recognizable and some decidedly not. More than a dozen 
doors opened into the hangar. Zip went back to the 
spacecraft the Starmen had chosen for their escape vehi-
cle.
	Joe and Mark were at the closest work station, where 
there were tools of curious manufacture.
	"What can you guess about the alien race which built 
this place?" asked Joe as he ran his hands across a set of 
tools, picking one up and putting it back down. "What 
do we know about them?"
	"They're humanoid, definitely," replied Mark as he 
gazed at a rack of instruments. "We've already agreed 
on that. I assume that the two figures I saw last night are 
from the people who constructed this amazing facility. 
Can't guess why they're not out in force here, unless 
there are only a few of them aboard. Can't guess why 
they don't show themselves. Don't know how old this 
asteroid is or what it is for. But they're definitely hu-
manoid. Even if I hadn't seen them, we could tell that by 
the shape of the tools and everything else we've seen."
	"And the food they gave us is not too different from 
what we're used to. And think about this: they put fresh 
fruit in those food packages. They must have a hydro-
ponic orchard somewhere in this asteroid. There must be 
a huge portion of this complex that no human has ever 
seen—and maybe can't get into! This place is big 
enough to house an entire city. Maybe there are thou-
sands of them here! George said that he only explored a 
tiny part of the inhabitable region when he was here. 
And everything we've seen tells me that they're a lot 
like us."
	"That might tell us something about the nature of the 
universe, Joe. I like to wonder about things like that."
	"And look, these spacecraft have wings. They're not 
just for travel in the void; they're made for flight on a 
planet with an atmosphere."
	Zip came over the joined the conversation. "If they 
helped us get from the warehouse area to this hangar, 
why aren't they helping us get into the space ships?"
	"Maybe there're only two of them—the two I saw last 
night," suggested Mark. "Maybe they're caretakers or 
something like that, and not spacemen. Maybe they 
don't know much more than we do how to get into these 
beauties."
	"Well, whatever the reason, I guess we're on our own, 
at least for the time being."
	"Looks like some sort of laser here," said Joe, picking 
up an object that resembled a flashlight. It had two dials 
on it with signs of calibration, and a button that was 
probably intended to activate it. "If it is a laser, and if 
these dials move the power from low to high, who 
knows which end is which?"
	"Take it into the power plant and aim it at the floor. 
An instrument that small can't have too much power and 
won't hurt a half mile of solid iron. See what happens," 
suggested Mark. 
	Joe shrugged. "Okay." He went over to the door 
through which they had come a half hour before. He was 
back in a few minutes.
	"It's a laser, all right. This dial here changes the in-
tensity of the beam from low to high, and this one—
well, watch. There's a barrel of powder over here. Tal-
cum or something." He reached in, took a handful of the 
dust, and dropped it back into the barrel. A cloud of dust 
rose up. He activated the laser through it. A bright blue 
beam appeared. He turned a dial and the beam became a 
brilliant green.
	"Lasers of different frequencies, all in one tool!" 
Mark exclaimed.
	"Yeah, and it's got red too!"
	"Lots of possibilities with this," said Zip. "I'll bet it 
can be used to open the spacecraft. The doors can't be 
only voice-activated, or they couldn't open the door in a 
vacuum. What else is there? Heat, magnetism, light? 
They used heat, body heat, on the panel back in the 
room where we were kept prisoner. Heat won't work in 
deep space. Let's try light. We've got the tool here."
	The Starmen went back over to the spacecraft. Joe set 
the laser for blue light and ran the beam over the surface 
of the ship. For several minutes he tried various colors 
and intensities. When he set the laser for yellow light, 
there was a change in the surface of the ship.
	"Ah!" said all three Starmen at once. The outline of a 
door appeared, with markings in several places. Joe ex-
perimented a little more, placing different intensities on 
the markings. In a moment he was rewarded. The door 
recessed a few inches into the ship, and slid aside with 
quiet efficiency. Joe immediately stepped through the 
portal.
	The furnishings of the alien spacecraft were similar to 
what the Starmen were familiar with, but the control 
panel was more challenging. Some controls were obvi-
ous, since they would be necessary for any spacecraft; 
others were completely new.
	After about an hour of looking around, Joe sighed, 
"This'll take us some time, Zip."
	"I know. We'll just have to dedicate ourselves to it 
until we feel safe enough in taking the ship into space."
	"I'm making some progress here," announced Mark. 
He was at a side panel near the navigation station. As he 
worked the keyboard, various schemata appeared in 
quick sequence. "I can't read anything, but it's obvious 
that these are engines. I can't recognize everything that's 
coming up, but most of it I can. See, here is a circuit dia-
gram, and this part here can only be a reaction chamber. 
I think this ship might use cold fusion for power, but I 
can't know for sure until I can read this stuff, or see it in 
action."
	"You figure it out, Mark, and I'll fly it," said Joe, 
confidently.
	"Well, this stuff is you boys' specialty," said Zip. 
"I've got to think ahead to the next problem. Assuming 
we can get this rig to fly, and assuming we can open the 
airlock, we've still got to escape the pirates. I doubt this 
ship is one of the invisible ones, and they'll have us 
spotted and speared in less then three minutes if we just 
fly out of here, saying, 'Thanks for the hospitality, sorry 
we have to leave so soon'."
	"You can figure it out, Zip! We'll get this grand ma-
chine ready!" Joe was enjoying the challenge. It was 
hard to keep him down.

	After eight hours of work on the spacecraft and with 
dinner behind them, Joe said to Mark, "Let's go back 
into the power plant and see if we can't find some way 
to sabotage the system so that the pirates can't find us 
when we take off. You can bring up some files on those 
huge screens. Maybe we can even find some way to 
close down their whole operation."
	"Sounds good to me," said Mark, picking up a glass 
of water. He took a sip and swished his mouth with it, 
then swallowed. "Best we can do without toothbrushes, I 
guess."
	"If it were that easy," said Zip, "our hosts would 
probably have shut down the pirates long before this. 
After all, it's their plant and they know it better than 
anyone."
	"You've got to be right, Zip, but I don't like sitting 
around. We've been in this room all day and I'm ready 
for a break. And I really do like that huge plant. Man! 
Imagine a room ten miles long!"
	The three Starmen descended the metal stairs and ex-
ited into the enormous plant. A few yards away was one 
of the large computer terminals. Mark went over to it 
and activated it.
	"I can recognize a few things, now that I've been 
through so many of the files upstairs," he informed his 
partners. "This, I think, is the lighting system." He 
pressed a button. There was a loud "chunk" sound and 
the plant lit up brightly.
	"Ow!" said the three Starmen and covered their eyes. 
They were not prepared for the sudden brightness. When 
they could tolerate the light, they looked above them. 
Without a word, Mark lay down on his back and just 
stared upward. Rank after rank of lights went up on the 
iron framework for nearly a mile. A ceiling the color of 
charcoal was barely visible, with what looked like rec-
tangular viewports imbedded in it.
	Joe and Zip remained standing and looked to their 
left. The lights blazed for about half a mile. Beyond that 
point there was darkness.
	"It will take a lifetime to learn everything there is to 
know about this place," said Mark dreamily.
	"I think we'll be back someday," replied Zip. "What 
else can you do, Mark?"
Mark got up and turned the lights off. It took nearly a 
minute for their eyes to adjust to the dimness. Mark 
looked through file after file. Joe and Zip wandered 
through some of the iron latticework, climbing spiral 
staircases for a level or two before descending again, 
and examining the connections of tubes, pipes, and cir-
cuits.
	"I've got something!" called out Mark. The others ran 
to him. He pointed at the screen. "See, this is the main 
power generator. I can tell because of the coils over here 
and the way the circuits are connected. There are about 
eight of these; they must be spaced in a row a little over 
a mile apart. They can operate singly or in combination. 
But look! They don't just power the life-support sys-
tems—in fact, I haven't found that part at all yet. But 
these are thrust systems! Do you know what that means? 
This asteroid is a spacecraft! It's made to travel!"
	"Can't be!" said Joe, flabbergasted
	"It is. Look." Mark flipped past a few more files, 
pointing out the connections and the diagrams of cham-
bers, coils, and energy field generators. "I'm just barely 
getting a glance at this stuff, of course, and I don't un-
derstand it all, but I have no doubt about what I've seen 
so far."
	"Why don't you look for that life-support file and see 
if you can turn off the pirates' energy or something?" 
Joe suggested.
	"Can't be that easy, Joe," said Zip. "As I said before, 
if it were a good idea, our hosts would probably have 
done it already. I think that whatever they're not doing, 
we shouldn't try to do. Remember, even St. George 
didn't want to fiddle with something he didn't under-
stand."
	"George is a real nice guy, Zip," said Joe, "but I still 
think he's breathed a little too much vacuum for his own 
good. You have to experiment in life, sometimes."
	"I want to learn more about this power system! This is 
amazing!" exulted Mark. "If I'm right, this button here 
will…" He pressed it. Almost at once a stream of paper 
began to feed out of a slot to the right of the terminal 
and lay down, sheet by sheet, into a gathering tray. Mark 
picked up the first sheet.
	"It's printing out the diagrams of the thrust system. 
Just like that. You're right, Joe—this place is great!"

	On the northeast edge of the massive space on the 
surface of Mars technically called the Mare Hadriacum, 
there was a complex of domes and cylinders. Made of 
metal and glass, it stood on an open plain about 35 de-
grees south of the equator and 85 degrees east of the 
central meridian. It was one of five atmosphere-
generating plants on Mars, and the only one in the 
southern hemisphere. In a small crater nearby was the 
settlement of New Emmaus, with a population of about 
12,500.
	The long process of terraforming Mars had begun 
when a meteor shower struck the fourth planet in 2009, 
significantly raising the temperature of the atmosphere 
and altering the weather systems. With this jump start 
serendipitously provided by the meteorites, Earth had 
used artificial means to hasten the process of making 
Mars livable, scattering the surface with spores and 
seeds, introducing desert-hardy animals, and establish-
ing the atmosphere-generating plants. The planet's tem-
perature had continued to rise. Eventually water had 
emerged from below ground and from the ice caps 
around the poles, and the air was gradually thickening.
	Terraformation had been taking place for almost 150 
years, and would take at least another two centuries be-
fore it would be possible to live everywhere on Mars 
without a space suit. The atmosphere-generating plants 
were critical to the process. The plants themselves were 
automated, with all systems operated and monitored by 
robots, but the major centers of population were located 
in craters not far from each plant. The complexes were 
on the open surface of the planet rather than in craters, 
but the air they created flowed first into the nearest de-
pressions in the surface, and it was here that most set-
tlements were located.
	The plant located in the southern hemisphere was the 
most remote, but had been filling the Mare Hadriacum, 
locally known as the Red Sea, for decades. This great 
depression was 2,500 miles in diameter. When much of 
the southern ice cap had melted, it filled the Red Sea 
with water up to about three-fourths capacity, making 
the region a delightful place for quiet living.
	In the early morning of August 15, 2151, the cloudless 
sky was a brilliant violet, and the sun was rising like a 
bowl of molten gold. Marshal and Averette North, a re-
tired couple, had climbed to the top of the crater wall to 
enjoy the sunrise. Six miles away was the atmosphere 
plant, gleaming in the newly-risen sun.
	They were the only ones to see what happened next, 
but it happened so quickly that there was almost nothing 
to see. In the thin atmosphere, there was only a slight 
vapor trail and a short-lived but powerful whine; then 
with a dull, gut-churning thud a ball of black and orange 
flame slammed obliquely into the desert floor within a 
quarter of a mile of the atmosphere plant. An enormous 
wave of pinkish-ochre sand rose up in front of the im-
pact site like a great wall. The shock wave quickly blew 
the wall of sand upward and outward, so that it sparkled 
like luminous rain until the sand particles became too 
scattered to be seen.
	The shock wave struck the atmosphere plant and 
shoved it aside as if a giant, invisible hand were vio-
lently clearing a table of unwanted crockery. The crater 
wall where the Norths were standing rocked and heaved 
as if in an earthquake. The shock wave passed them, 
blowing their hair and rippling their clothing as if it 
were a pleasant breeze that died away as quickly as it 
had come.
	The elderly couple stood frozen in shock, watching 
the cloud of dust that gradually filled the entire sky to 
the east. After a few minutes, the dust was thin enough 
to reveal a horseshoe-shaped crater almost a mile across. 
On the southwestern edge of the crater, where it trailed 
off into the desert without a sharp boundary, was the 
place where the atmosphere plant had been. Now the 
wreckage of the plant was broken into thousands of 
pieces and scattered for three or four miles in a wide fan 
across the sand.



13: The Brink of Disaster




THE ALIEN SPACECRAFT was beautifully planned and 
well equipped. The Starmen had spent more than two 
days exploring it fully and tracking its electronics sys-
tems. It was designed for a crew of twenty. The galley 
was not stocked, but Zip assigned some of St. George's 
men to store their food in it. The storage area included 
spacesuits for the entire crew. The suits were shaped 
slightly differently from what the Earthmen were used 
to. They squeezed a little in the chest and were some-
what baggy between abdomen and knee, especially for 
the shorter men, but they could be used.
	Joe and Mark were working to the point of exhaus-
tion, figuring out the controls in the cockpit. Mark had 
to trace innumerable leads from the panel back through 
the walls of the craft to the wings, tail, and especially 
the propulsion compartment. The Starmen found the 
work exhilarating but time-consuming. Mark estimated 
at the end of the second day that he had figured out 
about 80% of the control panel, including all the major 
systems. Joe confirmed his reckoning and, without even 
igniting the power, was learning to pilot the alien craft. 
Both Starmen kept Zip informed of their progress. It was 
still up to Zip to find a way to escape from the asteroid. 
Even if they could pilot the ship, it was to be depended 
upon that the pirates would locate them by radar within 
seconds of their departure and the chances of their es-
cape then would be practically nil.
	The atmosphere tanks supplied with the spacesuits 
were empty, so Zip had to fill them from large storage 
tanks of pure gases he found to one side of the hangar. 
Unable to read any labels, he had to analyze the gas in 
each supply tank to determine which gases the tanks 
contained. Once he had succeeded in identifying nitro-
gen, oxygen, and hydrogen, he was able to fill the tanks 
for the spacesuits with a mixture similar to that of air on 
Earth. This project was tedious and physically demand-
ing, but for the heavy work he was assisted by St. 
George's men. Since the gravity was so low, two men 
were easily able to move even the largest of the equip-
ment needed for the work. By the end of the second day, 
all the tanks had been filled.
	That evening, Zip put on one of the space suits. He 
operated it inside the hangar and practiced moving in it. 
When he was satisfied that the mixture of air was suffi-
cient and that he could maneuver in the suit, he took off 
the helmet and walked over to where Joe and Mark were 
sprawled under the spacecraft with a panel open over 
their heads. The deep green of the highly reflective 
metal hull was marvelously soothing to the eye. For a 
moment, Zip wondered about the race that had built the 
ships.
	"Joe, Mark," he called out, "I'm going through the 
airlock to see what's out there."
	Joe skidded out from under the hinged panel. "Are 
you sure that's wise, Zip? We don't know where the 
pirates are."
	"That's why I'm going out. I have a plan for our es-
cape, but I have to explore a little bit outside to see if 
it'll work."
	"Want some company?"
	"Thanks, I do, but I'll take St. George. You and Mark 
keep up the work." Zip went over to where George St. 
George was sitting at a table with several other miners.
	"George, could you come with me? I'd like to see 
what's outside."
	"Sure, Zip," said the blond man, standing up. The as-
teroid miner suited up and the two men walked to the far 
end of the hangar. Zip was carrying a small iron plate. 
There was a huge panel that would open to permit 
spacecraft to pass through the airlock, and there were 
two sets of doors on either side to allow men through. 
These doors entered a hallway that proceeded to the out-
side of the asteroid and allowed passage without the ma-
jor airlock's having to be emptied.
	"Ready?" asked Zip through the suits' intercom sys-
tem.
	"Sure. Let's go." Zip opened the door into the airlock. 
They passed through and closed the door behind them. 
Zip operated the controls that sucked the air out of the 
hallway. The two men walked about 50 yards to the far 
end of the passage and opened the door to the outside. 
They stepped out onto the surface of the asteroid.
	They looked around, but could see no evidence that 
there was an airlock adjacent to where they were stand-
ing!
	"Camouflaged!" said Zip.
	"Whoever made this wondrous thing," commented 
George, "apparently had a reason for wanted to be hid-
den. Let's make sure we can still get back in. Can you 
open the door we just came out of?"
	"Oh yes! I'm not about to close a door behind me for 
good until I know I can open it again." He took the small 
iron plate and used it to jam the door open. From the 
inside, the door was clear; from the outside, it looked 
like the surface of the iron asteroid. Its hinges were com-
pletely hidden. "Now. Let's see what's out here."
	For the first time, the two men gazed outward. The 
Milky Way blazed above and to the right, its countless 
stars bright enough to cast slight shadows behind the 
two men.
	"I never tire of seeing that view," said George. "I've 
missed it, just in the few days we've been inside."
	"Yes, it's inspiring," answered Zip, but he was al-
ready in motion, walking and scanning the ground on 
both sides of him. George followed him. Their asteroid 
boots gripped the surface of the asteroid.
	"What are you looking for Zip?"
	"Evidence of the pirates. I've got a plan for escaping 
them, but our exit point here can't be too close to their 
entrance."
	"We've walked a dozen miles through the asteroid 
from their headquarters, Zip—they can't be too close."
	"I'm sure you're right, but there may be other en-
trances. We found one, didn't we?"
	"Even if there were other entrances, they're bound to 
be as invisible to the eye as the one we just came out 
of."
	"Right again, I'm sure, George, but I don't want to 
take any chances. Our escape depends on our being un-
seen—at least for most of the time. Then I want to be 
seen."
	"What do you mean, Zip? I— " George suddenly 
stopped talking, almost as if his communicator had been 
turned off. Zip looked over.
	"What's wrong, George?" Through his helmet, 
George's eyes were opened wide and his mouth was 
agape. "What is it?" Zip repeated.
	"We, we, we're not in the Asteroid Belt," George 
stammered. "Look, there's the Belt over there." He 
raised his hand and pointed. The slow rotation of the 
asteroid that gave it its slight gravity had brought the 
Belt into view over the horizon. Motionless on the aster-
oid's surface, Zip and George were slowly moving into 
the dawn. A golden line of light began to grow over the 
45-mile-long chunk of almost pure iron. A pale sun far 
away was coming into view. The spacesuits' faceplates 
automatically darkened slightly. The sunlight came 
through a scattering of asteroids orbiting at least a thou-
sand miles away.
	"He's moved the asteroid. He knows more about it 
than I gave him credit for," Zip said grimly. "My plan 
will still work, but the situation has changed. Now we 
have to hurry. Let's go back."
	Back inside the hangar, Zip called a meeting of the 
fourteen men and explained his plan for escape.
	"Sounds good, Zip," affirmed Mark, and Joe agreed.
	"What about food and water?" asked one of the min-
ers.
	"What's left?" responded Zip. "How many days can 
we go if we ration even more strictly?"
	"About five until the food runs out. And there's about 
a gallon of water for each man left."
	"We can do it. No choice anyway. Let's get some 
sleep and start things rolling first thing tomorrow."

	Immediately after they awoke, the Starmen put Zip's 
plan into action. Joe opened another of the alien space-
craft. The Starmen had taken a quick look at the other 
ships and found them to be identical. Quickly they made 
the ship look as if it had been abandoned in panic. When 
they were finished, two men carried a small tank of oxy-
gen into the storage area. Joe piloted the ship through 
the airlock to the point where it just hovered above the 
asteroid. Zip, Mark, and two miners were outside on the 
ground. An explosion rocked the ship, and a panel was 
blown out from the wall of the storage area. Joe had 
detonated the oxygen tank to make it look as if some 
cargo had ignited and destroyed the ship.
Joe emerged from the main door and jumped to the 
ground. He had been tethered and the others pulled him 
in. They went back through the airlock and shut the 
door. They were still able to watch what happened 
through the immense window, transparent on their side. 
The ship began to drift away from the asteroid on a pre-
arranged course Joe had set.
	"The pirates should be seeing that on their radar in a 
few minutes," said Zip. "I figure the ship has to be at 
least a quarter mile from the surface for it to register on 
their screens."
	But it was nearly ten minutes later that three pirate 
ships appeared. They could easily see the ripped panel 
on the ship and took only a few precautions on ap-
proaching the derelict. Zip turned to a "reception only" 
channel on the communicator his suit provided.
	"It's not an Earth ship, sir," said a voice. "And it's 
empty. Completely derelict. Must have been clamped to 
the surface of the asteroid and got shaken off when you 
moved it out of the Belt."
	"Go inside! Make sure there's no one in it!" It was the 
commanding voice of Lurton Zimbardo. "Look for any 
sign that the Starmen had something to do with it!"
	"Yes sir!" The orders were given and six men left one 
of the pirate ships and went through the open door of the 
alien craft. It took less than a minute to get a report.
	"Nothing here, sir," said one of the spacesuited men 
to his officer. "The cargo area has been completely de-
stroyed in an explosion, and the wall has been blown 
open into empty space. There are no suits, no signs of 
any habitation."
	"It's an old wreck, sir, and so damaged that it can't be 
used," reported the pirate officer to headquarters.
	"Probably left by the beings who built the asteroid," 
said Zimbardo. "Come on back to work. I'd like to take 
a look at it, but we don't have the men or time right 
now. Other matters are pressing."
	"Yes sir." The communication terminated. The pirate 
ship took back its six crew members and the three ships 
cruised over the horizon.
	"Part one, the least risky part, successful," said Zip. 
	"Let's get going on part two, right now. Joe?"
	"Ready Zip," the lanky Starman responded. He 
stepped through the airlock and leaped off the iron sur-
face of the asteroid toward the derelict. Powered by 
small jets of oxygen he sped to the ship and disappeared 
through the open door.
	"Everyone else get busy," said Zip. They ran back 
through the airlock to the hangar. The others were al-
ready aboard their escape craft. Zip piloted it through 
the airlock and kept the ship close to the surface of the 
asteroid. The airlock closed behind them. Joe had 
caused the damaged ship to drift back down toward the 
asteroid out of radar range. He and Zip brought the two 
ships toward one another and then made a link. Joe left 
the broken ship and entered the escape ship.
	"Ready, Zip" he announced, once he was aboard. Zip 
put the slightest possible power into the escape ship, 
then turned it off. Both ships began to drift away from 
the asteroid, so slowly as to be almost unnoticeable. 
Zip's plan was that when the pirates saw the blip on 
their radar, they would conclude it was the derelict and 
pay it no mind. He was ready to drift for as long as it 
took to escape the notice of the pirates before turning on 
the power and escaping. But now that the asteroid was 
not in the Belt any longer, he knew that they would have 
to drift for much longer than he had anticipated.
They were free. But the tension was thick. It would 
not dissipate for a long time. 

	Forty-two hours later, Marshal and Averette North 
witnessed the impact of an asteroid that turned their at-
mosphere plant into rubble. Within an hour, Lurton Zim-
bardo opened a channel that allowed him to speak 
through nearly every communication system on Mars. 
Gene had previously discovered a method for entering 
and using all communication bands on Mars except the 
most closely guarded. He had surreptitiously placed 
automatic signal points into the Martian system without 
activating them until this moment. Now that the moment 
had arrived, the voice of the pirate leader was heard 
throughout Mars.
	"This is Lurton Zimbardo. The atmosphere plant at 
New Emmaus has just been destroyed by an asteroid 
impact. You were not able to detect the asteroid by ra-
dar. It struck without warning. This is to prove that I am 
able to render asteroids invisible and send them wher-
ever I wish. You cannot see them and you cannot stop 
them. Within a day the four remaining atmosphere 
plants on Mars will be similarly destroyed.  This will 
convince you that I have more power than you can imag-
ine, and that you are helpless to oppose me. After the 
last asteroid has struck your planet, I will announce my 
demands."
	Lurton Zimbardo shut off the microphone in the con-
trol center of the asteroid. A crowd of at least fifty men 
jammed the center where Zimbardo sat at the console. 
The rest were standing in the factory or at their assigned 
work places in the facility. All had heard the broadcast. 
A feeling of immense power and invulnerability surged 
through them. A few men began to cheer, and within 
seconds the enthusiasm had infected the rest of the pi-
rates, and the cheer became a roar. It rang throughout 
the control center and along the corridors, and filled the 
factory. Zimbardo's smile was wide. He looked down 
almost modestly, as if he were reluctant to accept the 
men's accolades.
	When the cheers had died down at last, Zimbardo said 
simply but so that all could hear, "And now for the last 
step in the plan." The room was quiet. He took out a set 
of notes from his pocket. The paper was marked with 
scrawls, lines, and columns of figures. His eyes flicked 
rapidly from the notes to the controls. His fingers began 
to fly over the keyboard. He punched in coordinates and 
set the power grid. He marked the timing of various op-
erations.
	Gene, Zimbardo's closest associate, was watching. 
Gradually his smile narrowed. His eyebrows creased. 
Then his eyes widened and his face drained.
	"Sir!" he exclaimed in a quiet voice. "Those are the 
coordinates of Earth! If you use those, you'll take this 
whole asteroid directly to Earth!"
	"Exactly," nodded Zimbardo. "In about 32 days, as I 
figure it." He was smiling widely again as he pressed 
	"Enter" and activated the asteroid's propulsion system.



14: The Shield of St. George




THE CONVERSATION was very quiet, but the microphone 
picked it up. The words that passed between Lurton 
Zimbardo and Gene were heard by every pirate on the 
asteroid. There was complete silence. The pirates' en-
thusiasm and their complete trust in Zimbardo's leader-
ship was instantly badly damaged. Though no one 
spoke, many of the men began to doubt their leader's 
sanity, and became afraid.
	"But sir," pleaded Gene. "This asteroid is the key to 
our success, and we're all its passengers. If you program 
it to collide with Earth, I…" words failed him.
	Zimbardo smiled indulgently. "Gene," he soothed, as 
if explaining something obvious to a confused child, 
"I'm not going to cause us to smash into the Earth. We 
want to control Earth, not destroy it, and how better to 
do it than from a close orbit around the planet in this 
magnificent flying base. I'm taking us to Earth, and 
there will be plenty of time to adjust our course once we 
get close. We will accelerate until about midway there, 
then decelerate until we achieve orbital speed.
	"I will, however, inform Earth that I have sent an as-
teroid more than forty miles long on a collision course—
an asteroid they can't see and can't stop! They will meet 
any demands I make! They will definitely meet any de-
mands I make, after we destroy the five atmosphere gen-
erators on Mars with near pinpoint accuracy. Relax now. 
In a month or so, we will be the undisputed masters of 
the third planet—and all without leaving home!" He 
laughed.
	Gene grinned and also laughed, but where Zimbardo's 
laugh was deep and genuine, Gene's was a little forced. 
He was relieved, but his trust in Zimbardo's leadership 
had suffered a severe setback. He would be on his guard 
from here on. He looked up and caught the eye of Mr. 
Lather. His face was hard and unsmiling. Difficult to tell 
what he was thinking. Gene turned and looked at Geb-
beth. His expression was marked with merciless deter-
mination. He, at least, appeared convinced and prepared 
to follow Zimbardo all the way. But Gene was no fool; 
he looked around and surmised that the majority of 
those in the room were harboring secret reservations.
Gene didn't blame them. He felt the same way. He 
would stay with Zimbardo for the time being, but he 
would keep a careful eye on the situation and would 
look for a way to ensure his personal safety if it ap-
peared that the pirate leader had lost touch with reality. 
The pirates were looking for power and prestige, not a 
suicide mission.

	For almost two days the Starmen and the miners had 
been drifting in space, not using power of any kind, 
afraid that even using lights might draw the attention of 
the vigilant pirates on the asteroid. The distance between 
the ship and the massive iron asteroid with its fascinat-
ing interior was increasing incrementally, but not 
quickly enough to please Zip. He chafed with impa-
tience.
	Mark's first duty once the fourteen men were aboard 
ship was to discover their location. His readings had 
shown them that they were 1,023 miles from the nearest 
edge of the Asteroid Belt and drifting roughly parallel to 
it. He had also learned that the nearest supply post to 
them was an unmanned Starlight Enterprise station on 
O344, a medium-sized asteroid coming their direction. 
As soon as it was safe to use power, Joe would pilot the 
alien ship to the station.
	"We'll be okay in a few hours, Zip," said Joe. "You 
got us out of the asteroid with food and a ship. We all 
thought that would be impossible. We ought to be able 
to turn on the energy and get blasting out of here before 
too long."
	"I know," responded Zip, with his characteristic fur-
rowed brow. "We're caught between taking a chance on 
being recaptured by the pirates and depleting the food. 
We'll run out of supplies in a couple of days."
	"I know—and the closest base is roughly four days 
away, depending on how speedy this beauty proves to 
be. But we'll make it." Joe went off to visit with Mark, 
who was gazing out of the window at the immense 
spread of the Milky Way.
George St. George came up to Zip, who was sitting 
alone at a table, doing nothing but staring down at his 
hands. He sat down opposite him; when Zip looked up, 
the miner smiled.
	"You've brought us back into the heavens, young Mr. 
Starman," he said. "so you've got no reason to be cov-
ered with gloom. You won't get us to safety now any 
faster by worrying."
	Zip pursed his lips and looked into St. George's eyes. 
"The man seems to be protected by a shield of inno-
cence all around him," he thought. "He and his men cap-
tured, his base destroyed, taken into a massive iron as-
teroid by the Solar System's greatest enemy, and now 
floating in the void with only two days' food left, and 
he's still calm and trying to encourage me the way he 
encourages his men. Who is the real leader of these 
men? I make the decisions, but he strengthens their 
hearts. He even strengthens my heart."
	St. George smiled. Almost as if he could read Zip's 
mind, he added, "Each of us has a gift according to the 
grace given us, which we are to use to benefit others. If 
it weren't for you, we'd still be locked up inside that 
room—or worse—under the control of Lurton Zim-
bardo. I have my gift, and you have yours, and we both 
employ our gifts well. We haven't come this far to fail 
now. Our success doesn't depend solely on you, you 
know. Relax and just do your part. There's still a lot to 
do, but the outcome isn't in doubt."
	Zip smiled, and before he could say anything St. 
George had risen and strolled to the window where Joe 
and Mark stood.
	All at once, Mark pointed and cried out, "Hey, look at 
that! Do you see what I see?" Several men came to the 
window and peered out. Zip Foster joined them. Joe an-
swered.
	"Yes!—the asteroid's moving!"
	The dark bulk of the pirates' asteroid, which had 
loomed so close to them for two days, was gradually but 
visibly moving away. Its silhouette had been blocking 
half their view of the Asteroid Belt and the gleaming 
array of stars behind it, but now, even as they watched, 
its profile diminished and stars were winking into view 
around its edge.
	"They're heading out somewhere—moving that entire 
asteroid. I wonder what's going on?" asked Mark.
	"We'll be able to power up before too long, now! 
We'll be on our way ourselves," announced Zip, ani-
matedly. "And we can get in touch with Starlight. It's 
been over a week since we've been in contact. We've 
got a lot to tell them." The shadow that had lain over Zip 
for two days had been lifted. "How long until we can 
turn on the power, Mark? When will we be out of the 
pirates' radar range?"
	"Less than an hour, I'd say."
	Zip raised his voice so everyone could hear. "We get 
under way in an hour, men!"
	It was sooner than that. In 26 minutes, the asteroid 
was no longer visible to the eye. Zip waited a full 45 
minutes then turned on the ship's power at its lowest 
setting. Using the radar, he scanned the quadrant where 
the asteroid had last been seen and turned up no object 
of significance. He hadn't expected to.
	"That doesn't mean they can't see us," he mused to 
Mark and Joe. "That asteroid is probably sheathed just 
like their ships. But I think we're safe now—safe 
enough, anyway, to get moving."
	"Right. Let's go," said Joe. "I'll jettison the derelict 
and power up! I've been looking forward to this mo-
ment!"
	Zip ran the power switch up to maximum and com-
manded everyone to prepare for acceleration. Joe ignited 
the propulsion system. With the lanky Starman at the 
controls the alien ship began its journey toward the As-
teroid Belt. As the ship began to cruise easily, Zip began 
to think of communicating with Starlight Enterprise.
	"Mark, contact SE right away. Fill them in on our re-
cent adventures and see if, by any chance, there's a ship 
closer to us than the base on O344."
	George St. George spoke up. "What if the pirates 
overhear your transmission, Zip? Won't they know 
we've escaped and be able to locate us?"
	"I think it's worth the risk, George. They probably 
think we're still inside the asteroid and won't be looking 
for us out here. And even if they do overhear the trans-
mission, I doubt they'd send some ships after us. The 
distance between us and them is growing too rapidly for 
that, and if we have to we've got plenty of time to hide 
in the Belt. And I'm worried about our dwindling sup-
plies; we need some relief soon, and SE needs our in-
formation as soon as we can get it to them. Go ahead, 
Mark."
	"I'm on it," said Mark. 
	"Provide them with a concise but complete report," 
Zip went on. "Tell them about the destruction of Z25, 
describe the asteroid with an estimate of the number of 
pirates and their ships, and especially the asteroid's lo-
cation. Don't worry about details of our escape, other 
than to say that we are in an alien spacecraft and head-
ing for O344 with a minimum of supplies. Ask Sim Sala 
Bim to sent someone to O344 with the Star Ranger for 
us and another ship to take St. George and his men back 
to Ceres or wherever they want to go."
	"Got it," said Mark and began to prepare his report. In 
less than five minutes he had sent it. He wouldn't get a 
response for nearly half an hour.
	"We'll get to the base a little faster than we thought, 
Zip," said Joe. "This ship is cruising very efficiently. 
We can learn a lot from it, in time." The sleek, forest 
green cruiser sped through the vacuum, rapidly ap-
proaching the edge of the Asteroid Belt.

	Six hours and 23 minutes after the destruction of the 
atmosphere-generating plant on the edge of the Red Sea 
on Mars, a small iron asteroid struck the plant located 
just south of the Oxia Palus on an open plain about five 
degrees north of the equator and fifteen degrees west of 
the central meridian. It was a few minutes past 4:00 a.m. 
local time. Six miles away was the settlement of West-
cott.
	Most of the local populace had not heard Lurton Zim-
bardo's radiocast, since it had come in just before mid-
night. The second asteroid followed a near-vertical 
course and slammed with tremendous force into the 
earth a half mile from the atmosphere-generating plant. 
The sun rose onto a land choked with dust. When it set-
tled back to the surface about midday, the people of 
Westcott saw only a crater a mile and a half wide. There 
was no sign that any human artifice had ever existed on 
the spot.
	Almost sixteen hours later, on an overcast afternoon 
in the empty northwest, the third asteroid struck. Its tar-
get was the atmosphere plant located 51 degrees north of 
the equator and 141 degrees west of the central merid-
ian—southwest of a small crater which was the home of 
a town called Morris. It was centrally located for miners, 
prospectors, farmers, arborists, and mobile scientists, 
who lived near or roamed throughout the locale.
By this time Zimbardo's message was known all over 
the planet and the utter destruction of the first two at-
mosphere generators had shown that his threat was to be 
taken seriously. Morris had been abandoned, its 25,000 
residents in panicky flight to the northeast, opposite the 
plant. Few people saw the asteroid make a direct hit on 
the two billion solar complex.
	Seven hours and 12 minutes later, the fourth asteroid 
demolished the atmosphere plant located nine degrees 
south of the equator and 167 degrees east of the central 
meridian. It was evening, and the resulting cloud of dust 
created a sunset of spectacular beauty, with colors rip-
pling through the drifting sand like fire seen through a 
translucent curtain.
	The final impact occurred in the early darkness hours. 
The atmosphere plant located northeast of Eagle Crater 
at 26 degrees north of the equator and 85 degrees east of 
the central meridian, was instantly turned into rubble.
	In a thirty-two-hour period, Mars had been scarred by 
five new craters, each one a mile to a mile and a half 
across. More than ten billion solars in damage had been 
done. Atmosphere generation on the red planet could not 
be restored for at least five or six years.
Much more satisfying to Lurton Zimbardo was the 
fact that the entire population of Mars was held ines-
capably captive by an hysteria of fear. No one doubted 
that Zimbardo had spoken his threat accurately. The five 
asteroids had arrived unseen until the last few seconds, 
and had pulverized their targets with accuracy of less 
than half a mile of error. The fearful populace of Mars 
awaited the promised communication from the pirate 
leader, in which he would reveal his demands.




15: A Microwave Net




SPACE COMMAND and Starlight Enterprise were filled 
with intense activity. The previous day had been a 
roller-coaster ride of messages from Mars and the As-
teroid Belt. First came the dismal news of the destruc-
tion of the Martian atmosphere-generating plants, one 
after the other. Then just before the tidings that the plant 
near Eagle City had been demolished, the message from 
the missing Starmen had come into Starlight Enterprise. 
The euphoria with which that word had been received 
was quickly dampened with the ultimatum Lurton Zim-
bardo had issued.
	In words similar to those Troy Putnam had used 
weeks earlier, Zimbardo demanded control of Earth's 
wealth and resources, with specific demands for access 
to Earth's coded defense mechanisms, authority over 
major ports of travel, and power over the major deci-
sion-making processes and information systems. He 
closed his threat with the chilling announcement that he 
had already directed a sheathed asteroid more than forty 
miles long into a collision course with Earth. When his 
demands had been met and verified, he would then turn 
the asteroid aside.
	The President had called a meeting in one of his maxi-
mum-security offices on Earth. Joining him at the table 
were some of his senior advisors; Richard Starlight and 
his chief assistant John Rwakatare and other repre-
sentatives of SE; and Robert Nolan with his chief assis-
tant Beowulf Denn and other representatives of Nolan 
Mining Enterprise.
	"Although he has demanded control of Earth's sys-
tems of communication, exchange, and security, I be-
lieve, ladies and gentlemen, that Zimbardo's real object 
is not clear." The President was drawing conclusions 
after a brief introduction of the facts. "It is impossible 
for one man simply to become dictator of the entire 
planet, no matter who he is or what engines of destruc-
tion he can call upon. I suspect that his aim is other than 
he has announced, and I am determined not to provide 
the access codes to our most sensitive systems."
There was a slight rustle of movement around the ta-
ble. Whatever course of action was to be decided at this 
meeting, calling Zimbardo's bluff had not been consid-
ered by many to be a viable option. The President con-
tinued.
	"His ruination of the atmosphere plants on Mars 
proves that he is able to direct asteroids to targets with 
high accuracy, and that we are unable to detect them. 
Although the loss of the plants is a severe blow, it is not 
crippling. They can be rebuilt in a few years. At worst, 
the process of terraformation will be delayed for that 
long. Replacement will cost about ten billion solars, and 
that is obviously a huge amount of money.
"The plants were over a century old however, and in 
the long run replacing the plants will be more effective 
and probably achieve the goal of terraformation faster 
than if we had continued to use the plants that were de-
stroyed. Frankly, there were plans already in the works 
for modernizing the plants.
	"No, the real damage has been psychological. The 
people of Earth and Mars are terrified. This, undoubt-
edly, was Zimbardo's major goal in destroying the 
plants, and he has achieved it completely and thor-
oughly. His demands to us are clear, but it is difficult for 
us to perceive what he would achieve, even if we capitu-
lated—which we do not intend to do."
	Robert Nolan could not contain himself any further, 
and lurched backward as if he had been struck. "You 
don't intend to cooperate with him?" he almost 
screeched. "But he'll destroy the entire planet if we 
don't! There is no way we can detect an asteroid he's 
made invisible to radar!"
	"Dr. Nolan," responded the President, "we believe 
that we have a method which will allow us to locate the 
asteroid that Zimbardo has directed toward Earth. We 
have a very good chance of locating it and destroying 
it."
	"A chance? Mr. President, you're gambling with the 
very existence of life on Earth! If an asteroid forty miles 
long strikes Earth, it will not only cause the extinction of 
every life form there is, there is every likelihood that it 
will crack the Earth's crust! There will be no escape! No 
escape!! Don't you see that we have to cooperate with 
Zimbardo? It will be easier to meet his challenge once 
he has turned away the asteroid!"
	"You have not yet heard our plan, Bob. Believe me, I 
can sympathize with your quandary, but I am simply not 
going to deal with any evil force as if it had a right to 
negotiate. It doesn't. This has been the principle behind 
the decisions we have made in order to meet the threat 
of the pirates from the first day."
	"Principle?" Nolan was almost shouting now. "For 
your principle you're willing to risk the destruction of 
all life on Earth? That's the evil we're facing here!"
	"Bob—please listen to what Dr. Hoshino has to tell 
us. There is a plan. Dr. Hoshino?"
	Robert Nolan leaned forward, placed his elbows on 
the table, and cradled his head in his hands. He was 
trembling. Richard Starlight looked over at his friend 
and colleague and felt very badly for him. He knew that 
Robert was under a tremendous strain. Richard agreed 
that the fate of the Earth was at stake and would proba-
bly be decided at this meeting. He was tremendously 
anxious himself, but he was eager to hear what Dr. Ho-
shino had to say.
	Dr. Stephen Hoshino was a brilliant astrophysicist 
whom the President had commanded to work on a plan 
to counteract Zimbardo's chief weapon—the radar 
bender. He was a slight man of Japanese ancestry who, 
in spite of his compactness, exuded power. Even his 
smallest movements were made with precision. Al-
though he was only in his middle thirties, from his late 
teens he had been granted virtual carte blanche in his 
research. Even at that young age, his genius had become 
known throughout the inhabited Solar System. His voice 
was calm and mellifluous.
	"Thank you, Mr. President. My team and I have been 
working around the clock for eight days to develop a 
system for detecting an object which is invisible to ra-
dar. We have succeeded. The theory was not difficult to 
develop, but the method provided somewhat of a chal-
lenge. We have now designed a technique for locating a 
body as small as, very roughly, two-thirds the size of the 
average spacecraft, by detecting its gravitational field."
	As he spoke, many of those listening to him felt the 
level of their anxiety diminishing slightly. Robert Nolan 
lifted his head. Though his expression was drawn, he 
was paying attention.
	"We must manufacture millions of tiny probes and re-
lease these into space in a systematic fashion over many 
millions of cubic miles. Each probe will be about the 
size of a microwave. The laboratories and manufactur-
ing centers of organizations like Starlight Enterprise, 
Nolan Mining Enterprise, and other companies can cre-
ate these probes in vast quantities, using robotic tech-
niques. Each probe will have gravity instrumentation. 
They will be connected by a vast neural network and 
thus act as one, with all data being fed back to various 
information centers.
	"With the data from these probes we should be able to 
detect any massive objects in places where they 
shouldn't be. Certainly a large asteroid cannot be hid-
den. The very size of the asteroid with which Zimbardo 
threatens our planet will work in our favor, since detect-
ing such a large object can be achieved easier and 
sooner than if he sent, for example, a number of small 
asteroids such as those that struck Mars."
	"Where will the probes be deployed, Dr. Hoshino?" 
asked Richard. "Our time is short, very short indeed, if 
we have to manufacture, launch, and deploy the probes 
in time to locate and then destroy the asteroid. Even if 
we produce millions of probes, as you have said, we 
have millions of cubic miles of space to search through. 
In the time available, even trillions of the little probes 
can't help much. Theoretically, the asteroid can be any-
where. There are asteroids inside the orbit of Mercury 
and outside the orbit of Jupiter. But I suspect that you 
already have an idea where we are to search."
	The President answered. "When Zimbardo sent his 
first message to Mars, evidence of his tampering with 
the Martian communication system was discovered. This 
allowed us to trace how his tampering was done and 
therefore where the signal came from—at least in a gen-
eral direction. After he sent his second message, the one 
to Earth yesterday evening, the signal was traced again. 
We have learned that his base is moving toward Earth 
and we have an idea of the speed his base is moving and 
its direction. The information the Starmen provided con-
firms what we had learned through our investigations. 
Of course, our figures are somewhat imprecise, and we 
still have a lot of searching to do, but we have an excel-
lent chance of locating him. It is highly logical that the 
asteroid he harnessed is from a place in the Belt close to 
his own asteroid. From what the Starmen said, he just 
didn't have time to locate an asteroid as large as he 
claims to have launched toward Earth from any place 
too distant from his own base. The probes will therefore 
be cast in a net in the space between Earth and the area 
of the Asteroid Belt in which the pirates' asteroid was 
found."
	Richard Starlight, Robert Nolan, and others had a 
number of technical questions for Dr. Hoshino regarding 
the manufacture and deployment of the probes, and a 
time schedule. At the end of the discussion, it was 
agreed that the two companies, with others, would begin 
to manufacture the probes according to Stephen Ho-
shino's design. Launch was planned for five days later, 
with deployment six to seven days after that.

	"O344 coming up on the screen, Zip," announced 
Mark.
	"Not a moment too soon!" shouted Joe. "Food at 
last!"
	It had been a week since the fourteen men aboard the 
alien spaceship had left the pirates' asteroid. They had 
been traveling under power for four days. Although they 
had been very sparing in their consumption of the food, 
they had run out two days earlier. A few ounces of water 
per person remained in the containers; it had been care-
fully measured and rationed to last the entire journey to 
O344. Everyone was thirsty but no one was in danger of 
becoming dehydrated. All, however, suffered from the 
pangs of hunger. Mark had a headache that blurred his 
vision and made his responses slow.
	"If it's on the screen, we ought to touch down in a few 
minutes," said Zip. He was moving slowly and often sat 
down with his eyes closed. Of the three Starmen, Joe 
seemed to be the least affected by the two days' lack of 
food. The miners were lying down on their bunks. Other 
than Joe, only George St. George had exhibited much 
energy in the previous two days, coming forward to the 
flight deck every few hours to chat with the Starmen.
Zip asked George to prepare his men for touchdown. 
Deceleration had been gradual, so there was no need for 
the men to strap into the acceleration chairs. However, 
they would need to be in spacesuits in order to leave the 
ship and enter the SE facility.
	An asteroid about ten miles across loomed up on the 
screen. Joe circled it slowly.
	"There it is," he said as a landing pad came into view. 
A small dome next to the pad was barely visible, since 
the landscape that had been artificially shaped was away 
from the sun. The site on O344 was one of dozens of 
such places marked on the navigational maps. They 
were unmanned stations stocked with supplies and main-
tained for explorers, scientists, and others in the employ 
of Starlight Enterprise. They contained large quantities 
of food and water, other basic necessities, and provided 
rustic living facilities.
	It didn't take Joe long to land the ship on the surface 
of the small asteroid. It settled down gently just a few 
yards from the dome.
	"I'll need someone to go into the supply cache and get 
some bolts, Zip. This ship doesn't have any to keep it 
fixed to the asteroid—or if it does, I haven't found the 
controls for them. I'll have to stay aboard until the ship 
is secure."
	"Okay, Joe," Zip responded. "Great flying. You pilot 
this ship as if you were trained in it."
	"That's my job," said Joe. "Don't take too long, 
though. I'm hungry!"
	The men went through the ship's airlock, made the 
brief walk across the surface of the asteroid, and entered 
the dome. The dome contained a small airlock leading to 
a ladder that descended about 15 feet into the asteroid. 
Zip asked two of St. George's men to locate bolts and go 
back up to clamp their ship to the surface. Within min-
utes the alien ship was fastened down tightly and all 
fourteen men were inside the supply station.
	"Food! Toothbrushes! Showers! Clean clothes!" 
shouted various voices as the men scattered to look over 
the spartan facility.
	"Food!" shouted Joe, and headed for the pantry where 
George St. George was already standing.
	"Relax, Starman!" said St. George, placing his hand 
on Joe's chest. You three men have worked without rest 
to get us here. Just sit down. Let us show our gratitude 
by fixing up the best meal this larder can make possi-
ble." The three Starmen were only too ready to comply. 
They slumped down in the rest area of the quarters and 
then stretched out on sofas. The miners who were not 
assisting in the preparation of the meal lay down on 
bunks in the sleeping quarters.
	"I don't know if I need sleep or food more," said 
Mark. He had been at the navigation and communica-
tions stations almost without respite for all of his waking 
hours—and he had slept little. Zip had relieved Joe at 
the helm some of the time, but the trip had not been an 
easy one. They had made the journey as quickly as they 
could in an unfamiliar ship, having to keep watch at all 
times against a surprise attack from any pirate ships. 
Their communications with SE had been limited only to 
those most urgent, to minimize their exposure to any 
possible enemies.
	SE had made an immediate and joyful response to the 
Starmen's initial communication. That had been fol-
lowed within an hour by a report to inform them of Lur-
ton Zimbardo's ultimatum about a large asteroid on a 
collision course with Earth. The latter message had 
draped the men in a somber mood. SE had also assured 
them that a rescue mission was under way from Ceres. 
Several ships, including their own Star Ranger, were 
due in nineteen hours. The Starmen and the miners 
planned to put that time to good use by resting.
Under St. George's direction, three of the miners put 
together a feast of canned goods. St. George made a 
blend of canned meat, potatoes, and vegetable soups, 
and warmed it to create a hot stew that was more than 
passable. Dried biscuits, quickly rehydrated and quick-
baked, were added to the feast. A huge pot of strong, 
brewed coffee soon added to the savory smells coming 
from the kitchen.
	"It's ready!" called out Sabbath George. He and the 
others brought huge serving bowls to a large table that 
was situated in the middle of the room, adjacent to the 
kitchen. Places had been previously set.
	Tired as the men were, it took them only seconds to 
assemble at the table. George said a few words of thanks 
and passed the first bowl to his right where Joe was 
seated. Joe grasped the large serving spoon and ladled 
out about a pound of stew onto his plate. The bowl was 
steaming with the mixture and wisps rose lazily from the 
ladle as it made several trips from serving bowl to Joe's 
plate. He shoved the bowl on to the man at his right and 
took two biscuits from the central supply.
	"Only two biscuits, Joe?" prodded Mark. "Has hunger 
made you too weak to eat?"
	"I'll show you whether I'm too weak to eat. Watch 
this!" He shoveled a heaping spoonful of stew into his 
mouth. His chin lifted a notch, his eyes closed, and a 
satisfied moan escaped his closed lips. He placed the 
spoon on the table and both hands came up as if he were 
about to embrace someone.
	"Taste good?" asked Zip, reaching for the aromatic 
bowl as it came his way.
	Joe chewed and swallowed. "Someone back at the 
Academy told me once that there was no such thing as a 
dumb question. He was wrong. That was one." Joe 
turned to George. "George, this is delicious! I've never 
tasted anything better!"
	George glanced over at the food cans that had been in 
storage for several years. "A hungry man will enjoy any-
thing. A very hungry man will consider even canned 
goods to be ambrosia." But by that time the serving 
bowl had gotten around to George, and he stopped to fill 
his own plate.




16: A Dark Spirit




TO STARMAN David Foster, it was a soft, rainy morning. 
He had just awakened after a night on the SE supply 
asteroid O344, and the only sound was the faint hum of 
the operating system. He wrapped himself a little more 
snugly into his blanket and kept his eyes shut. His 
imagination easily turned the murmur into the soft sound 
of rain sifting through the leaves of the tree outside his 
bedroom window on his uncle's farm in West Virginia. 
With slightly more effort he could imagine a drizzle 
drumming lightly on the wooden shingles above and 
drifting out onto the empty fields in the early autumn 
days shortly after harvest.
	His Uncle Francis and Aunt Clare were dear to David. 
Although he had been raised on the Moon, close to his 
father's work, he had been born in Clark's Bridge Cross-
ing, the village near their farm. From the time he was 
old enough to show any notice of the world around him, 
David had loved the stars. Even now, he loved inter-
planetary travel, exploration, and adventure better than 
anything, but in his heart was an emotionally-intense 
place where he kept his memories of the West Virginia 
farm where he had spent so much of his childhood.
	The small towns and family-owned farms had become 
indispensable to the rebuilding of America after the Col-
lapse. In the United States the nuclear devastation of 
those horrifying years had been severe. Most major cit-
ies were destroyed, but the outlying and rural areas had 
survived. In the latter half of the 21st century, new 
leadership arose from these areas, and the American 
spirit, which for a hundred years had gradually been 
eclipsed by special-interest groups, lobbyists, fringe 
organizations, and major corrupt economic interests, 
was largely purified. The "old values" became popular 
again, if not always followed. A generation of leaders 
arose with a popular appeal similar to that enjoyed by 
the "log cabin" presidents. A candidate who claimed to 
have simple values and homespun philosophy was 
guaranteed to win support from the remaining American 
population.
	With his eyes still closed, David smiled. He tried to 
imagine the aroma of his Aunt Clare's freshly-ground 
coffee coming from the kitchen, mingled with the smell 
of hot-off-the-griddle blueberry pancakes. The 
dawnlight of the newly-risen sun was sending sparkles 
through the rainy haze that shrouded the fields, and 
crowning the eastern fields with the arc of a rainbow. 
The fine drizzle would stop soon and the haze would 
burn off, leaving leaves dripping and the dark earth 
sodden. He smiled even wider. He could hear his aunt's 
voice now …
	"Come and get it, Starmen!" pealed the voice of 
George St. George. "Got some more of that engine-oil 
coffee steaming away, and I managed to whip together 
some biscuits from some powdered stuff I found!"
	Zip's eyes shot open and took in the neutral walls of 
the cubicle where he, Mark, and Joe had slept. The faint 
hum of O344's system was drowned out now with the 
rustle of human movement as the asteroid miners gath-
ered around the table.
	"There's some sort of orangy liquid I mixed up from 
some other powder, too! Probably has some good vita-
mins in it!"
	In minutes the Starmen and miners were tucking in to 
the best that George St. George could do with the sup-
plies at hand.
	After breakfast, the Starmen sat in the lounge. Mark 
was poring over the printout which he had taken from 
the power plant on the pirates' asteroid. He had a digital 
copy of much of the layout of the asteroid, combined 
with information on the power plants, propulsion 
structures, and sheathing equipment. It was a lot of 
charts, maps, and diagrams. None of the written parts 
was recognizable. He couldn't even tell which were 
letters and which were numbers.
	"I hope they didn't use a pictorial alphabet like Chi-
nese," said Joe, looking over Mark's shoulder.
	"No," the big Starman answered. "There are plenty of 
recurring symbols, so I assume it's a language like our 
own, with letters and words. Somebody will be able to 
decipher this without too much difficulty. It's far 
beyond my skill, though." He ran his hand through his 
hair. "But I can recognize a lot of the machinery."
	Zip was sitting nearby. He hadn't spoken much during 
breakfast. The images of the farm pulled at him again. 
"Mark, Joe," he began. He hesitated a moment while 
they turned to him. They could see he was puzzling 
through something, and waited patiently for him to 
continue. "SE says that Zimbardo has targeted Earth 
with an asteroid over forty miles long. What'll that do to 
home?"
	Mark was suddenly deeply saddened. Zip always re-
ferred to the Moon as home. He spoke softly.
	"One of my professors at Starlight University talked 
about a study conducted in the early 21st century. Back 
then, scientists started becoming concerned about 
asteroid impacts, and they built a complex computer 
model to see what would happen if a large asteroid 
struck Earth."
	"What did they find?" whispered Joe.
	"Well, the model found that, depending on the angle 
of entry, the impact can produce a massive corridor of 
incineration ahead of the impact site. In that area, just 
about all life ends in minutes. But the model predicted 
other changes that destroyed nearly all life on Earth 
within a few years."
	"Like what?" Zip's voice was dusky.
	"I'm sounding like a textbook," complained Mark.
	"Go on," insisted Zip.
	Mark closed his eyes and tilted his head back. "A few 
hours after the impact, clouds of noxious gases billow 
up and block out the sun for months. Temperatures drop 
drastically all over the Earth and corrosive acid snow 
and rain fall. These short-term effects alone—intense 
cold, darkness, and acid rain and snow—kill plants and 
photosynthetic plankton, the base of most food chains. 
Herbivores starve, and then the carnivores that feed on 
the herbivores starve. This is enough to kill most of the 
remaining human life on the planet. After the clouds 
clear, the atmosphere is thick with carbon dioxide from 
fires and decaying matter. Then the carbon dioxide 
contributes to global warming that lasts for many years."
	Tears slowly escaped from Zip's closed eyes and 
made tracks down his cheeks. He remembered when he 
was small that his aunt and uncle had taken him on a 
two-hour flight in their small plane to the place closest 
to their home where there was a field of nuclear 
devastation. His first view of the terrain beyond the 
boundary had been indelibly burned into his seven-year-
old mind. The cities and towns surrounded by fields, 
orchards, streams, ponds, and woods had rapidly tapered 
off below a slight rise into a land of gray, utterly lifeless, 
gasping dust reaching as far southeastward as the eye 
could see. The center of the field had been the nation's 
capital, the third of the great American cities to be 
destroyed in the holocaust of 2048.
	"How big was the asteroid they modeled?" asked Joe.
	"About six to ten miles across," said Mark.
	"And the one Zimbardo has aimed at Earth is forty 
miles long?"
	"Bigger. A little bigger than that," answered Zip qui-
etly. "Bigger." He felt a chill darkness come over him, 
almost as if he had walked into an inky refrigerator. He 
shivered uncontrollably for a moment, then sat up and 
took control of himself.
	"Today we get the Star Ranger back!" he announced 
in a clear voice. "And we're heading back to Earth! Be 
ready for immediate departure!"

	An immense metal and glass wheel, half a mile in di-
ameter, rotated slowly in the jeweled heavens. It was the 
primary manufacturing and launching headquarters of 
Nolan Mining Enterprise. It orbited the Moon about 500 
miles above the surface.
	Robert Nolan was burning with a zealous flame of 
energy. Although often close to burning out, he never 
went over the edge. His apparently bottomless resources 
had allowed him to achieve remarkable things in twenty 
years. Now he was in the command bubble that lifted 
like an antenna from the heart of the space station. A 
tower two hundred yards long lifted out from the plane 
of NME's manufacturing and launching facility. At its 
end was a large observation and control center which 
commanded a view of every aspect of one side of the 
plant.
	"Launch in forty-three minutes exactly," said an op-
erative in the command bubble. Nolan stood, looking 
intently over the man's shoulder at the screen in front of 
him. Nolan's eyes shifted repeatedly back and forth 
from the screen to the actuality that lay spectacularly 
open to view before him.
	"Sir?" said another technician, turning toward Nolan. 
"The Lux Mundi has now completed docking." The Lux 
Mundi was Richard Starlight's personal spacecraft.
	"Excellent, John," said Robert Nolan. "Please have 
Mr. Starlight sent up here without delay."
	"Yes sir." The technician turned back to his station 
and issued commands. In less than two minutes, Richard 
Starlight's elevator brought him into the center of the 
command bubble of Nolan Mining Enterprise. He 
stepped out onto the floor and looked around quickly.
	"Over here, Rick," said Nolan, stepping toward his 
friend.
	"Bob! Good to see you!" The men embraced briefly. 
"All went well at our end," Richard whispered.
	Nolan stepped back and spread his hands toward the 
launching arena of the space station.
	"Terrific news," he said. "And we'll be launching in 
about forty minutes."
	The two men went into Nolan's office and sealed it. 
Though everything was visible through clear partitions, 
no one could hear what went on inside.
	"I'm so sorry I fell apart at that meeting, Rick," 
Robert began.
	"Don't give it a thought, Bob. You've done very well 
for the project since then. This is a great offering you're 
making."
	"The least we can do, in addition to making as many 
of the microwave probes as we could, is provide these 
freighters."
	"Ahead of schedule, too, by a little bit. All the compa-
nies pulled together and made the probes to Dr. 
Hoshino's specifications. And I like his design. His plan 
should work very well, very well indeed!"
	"It's a wonderful design, Rick! Dr. Hoshino is a 
genius to a degree above everyone else of this 
generation. We ought to be able to locate any asteroid 
that Lurton Zimbardo throws at us. But stopping it is a 
different problem."
	"If we find it in time, that shouldn't be too hard, ei-
ther."
	The two friends talked for a little longer, then went 
out to watch the launch. Seven unmanned NME 
freighters were prepared to carry Earth's hope into 
space. They would be accompanied by a dozen armed 
ships supplied by Space Command. The rendezvous of 
freighters and warships was only a half-hour's flight 
time from the space station. Then they would proceed on 
the eight-day journey to the site of deployment.
	In a private office and laboratory below, Robert No-
lan's chief assistant Beowulf Denn finished making a 
voice recording of the details of the launch. He included 
the number of freighters, the number and type of Space 
Command warships appointed to guard them, their 
course, hour of departure, and timing of the deployment 
of the probes.
	When he had finished the recording, he inserted the 
disk into a computer independent of the NME computer 
system and speeded up its contents so that the entire 
message was less than 0.03 seconds long. He then 
encrypted it and transmitted the result on a tight beam 
communicator to coordinates in space which he kept 
only in his head. After the message had been sent, he 
destroyed the disk and removed all signs on his 
computer that the action had occurred.

	Seven ships had arrived at O344. The Starmen were 
outside, having sped through the airlock with the first 
news that the ships from Ceres were at hand. They stood 
on the edge of the landing zone and watched the ships 
come close to O344. Only the Star Ranger and one other 
ship touched down. Sim Sala Bim was the first to 
debark.
	"So pleased to see you young men are safe!" he 
spouted. "So much has happened in these three weeks! 
And here is your Star Ranger, ready for duty!" The In-
dian was ebullient. Zip had shaken off his own dark 
mood and was rising to the challenge. The other two 
Starmen were eager to lift off and get back into the 
battle against Lurton Zimbardo.
	"Nice to see you, Sim!" cried out Zip, as he and the 
man from Ceres shook hands through their spacesuits. 
"George and his men will be ready in a moment. They 
are wonderful people! Salt of the earth types, though I'll 
bet none of them has been on Earth for years!"
	"We'll get them back to Ceres safely, don't worry 
about that!" advised Sim. "You just go on and stop this 
crazy fellow."
	"Let's get going, Starmen!" urged Zip. They had al-
ready made their farewells to the asteroid miners, and 
had decided to leave the alien ship on O344 for research 
in a less anxious time. Joe had sealed it and seen that it 
was securely clamped to the asteroid's surface.
	Within a few minutes, the Starmen were aboard the 
Star Ranger and in their accustomed places.
	Just before they lifted off, Zip turned on his communi-
cator.
	"George," he said. "Thanks for your friendship. You 
gave me a gift I don't think you're even aware of."
	"Oh yes I am too aware of it, David." responded the 
cheery voice. "The gift of confidence. Do your Latin and 
find out what 'confidence' really means. Blessing and 
peace go with you men." A chorus of voices sounded in 
the background, also offering farewells.
	Zip signed off. In minutes O344 was behind them.
	
	When Lurton Zimbardo had first announced to Earth 
that he had aimed a huge asteroid through space on a 
collision course, the news of impending doom spread 
over the farthest reaches of the globe, bringing with it 
hysteria and despair. Pockets of unrest and violence 
sprang up but the phenomenon was short-lived. The 
memory of the Collapse was too recent, and the 
populace would not permit violence to prevail—but 
there was nothing to take its place. Cities, nations, and 
then continents ground to a standstill as people left their 
jobs and homes and wandered from place to place 
aimlessly. The thought of utter, unprecedented 
destruction for the whole planet, the home of mankind, 
struck at the very heart of the people. The very elderly, 
who remembered the worst days of the Collapse, felt 
their spirits quail within them.
	It was a time such as the world had never seen before. 
In the years to come it became known as The Day the 
Earth Stood Still. No one knew where to flee, how to 
flee, or even if fleeing could do any good. After a time 
the panic quieted down to a heartless agonizing despair, 
and a heavy, dark spirit fell over the planet.

	"Crass, Lather, Bolcher! Get your men and go! The 
Earthmen have launched their detection equipment!" 
Lurton Zimbardo was giving orders over the intercom 
from the control center of his asteroid. Moments earlier 
a message had been received which informed the pirate 
leader of the launch time of Earth's freighters.
	"There are seven freighters accompanied by twelve 
Space Command warships! Each of you take five ships. 
Find the convoy and destroy the freighters! At all cost, 
destroy the freighters!"
	Zimbardo slammed down the communicator and 
watched his men scurry for their ships. At the speed they 
could travel, they should be able to intercept the convoy 
in about a week—a full day before optimal site for de-
ployment of the microwave probes. Zimbardo had little 
doubt of the outcome of the encounter. Earth had no 
idea that their plans were known to him, and the pirate 
ships were invisible to their radar.




17: The Enemy Revealed




FOR NEARLY seven days, the convoy of seven NME 
freighters and twelve Space Command warships had 
sped away from the Earth-Moon system. The warships 
flew in a spherical configuration about five miles in 
diameter, at the center of which were the unmanned 
freighters in compact formation. The urgency of the 
mission gave the convoy no choice but to utilize the 
most direct route to the site of deployment, so that the 
probes could be put into action at the earliest possible 
time. There was simply no time to follow any evasive 
flight plan. On the success of the microwave net rode 
the hope of Earth's survival from the enormous asteroid 
Lurton Zimbardo had unleashed.
	"There they are!" announced Mr. Lather, pilot of the 
Silver Cloud, as he looked at the radar screen. He was 
followed closely by five other pirate spacecraft. Two 
other groups of six pirate ships were not far away, also 
searching the area of space in front of them for the con-
voy. "Inform Bolcher and Crass and give them the coor-
dinates. Tell them that since I was the first to locate the 
freighters, I will attack first. Their ships will follow me 
according to our plan."
	"Yes sir, Mr. Lather," responded the Silver Cloud's 
navigator. The communication was completed and the 
details of the plan agreed upon. Then the intership com-
munications system was deactivated. The pirates' ships, 
being sheathed to radar, were equally invisible to each 
other as to the men of Space Command, but each pirate 
captain knew where the others were supposed to be. The 
ships usually communicated by closed-system radio and 
thereby kept in close contact with each other, but could 
not risk radio contact during engagement without reveal-
ing their position.
Moments went by without a word being said. Lather 
could feel the adrenaline surging through him. He was 
eager to give the command to attack.
	"One minute," he said to his own crew. "All hands 
prepare for battle." After the designated time had 
elapsed, he said, "Go!"
	Followed by five spaceships protected by the radar 
bender, he sped undetected  through the sphere of Space 
Command warships. On the screen before him the mas-
sive freighters loomed up. "Fire!" he shouted. "Fire! 
Fire!" A laser canon locked onto one freighter and 
ripped open the hull. In seconds the Silver Cloud was 
past it and through the other side of the sphere. Behind 
him came another pirate ship, and then another. As each 
passed through the sphere, it fired laser canons at the 
freighters.
	None of the lasers struck a vital point in any 
freighter's fuel system, but the potent canons, each set 
on highest power, ripped into the unmanned ships and 
tore them open to the vacuum. Lather's six ships shot 
through the sphere of guard ships without being detected 
or even shot it, but none of the freighters had exploded. 
Lather cursed when he saw that the damage he had 
inflicted was not crippling.
	The Space Command warships were immediately 
aware of the attack and began to scatter the freighters by 
remote control. Some freighters decelerated, others 
accelerated, still others moved away from the center. 
The pirates would have a more difficult challenge now 
to destroy the NME ships.
As his fleet circled, he waited to see what Bolcher's 
ships would do. Lather knew where Bolcher was sup-
posed to be but could not communicate with him 
without the risk of revealing his position to the warships 
of Space Command. Lather could only watch the screen.
	Suddenly one of the freighters exploded into 
incandescent fury. The detonation destroyed the two 
freighters closest to the one that Bolcher's ship had hit. 
Within seconds a fourth freighter erupted into flame as 
its fuel system ignited. The three remaining freighters 
began to weave in a random pattern, and the Space 
Command warships began to close in, narrowing the 
window of access to the center of the field.
	Crass' ships began to zoom toward the remaining 
freighters, laser canons ready. Being the most experi-
enced pilot, Crass was confident that his team could 
eliminate the last three ships. Coming in at a fast clip, 
each pirate ship only seconds after its predecessor, he 
strafed the freighters, scoring two direct hits. 
	With a grin of satisfaction, Lather saw that he would 
have one more chance to attack. The protective warships 
had drawn into very tight formation to protect the last 
freighter. Its hulk was already torn with a long rip, but 
its engine still worked and it responded to controls. The 
freighter turned and twisted in a random, spiraling for-
ward motion with the warships close around it. Lather 
brought the Silver Cloud in for the kill.
	Shooting smoothly through an opening in the 
protecting ships' formation, he saw his target and fired. 
The last freighter blew up almost in his face. All seven 
freighters—and their contents—had been turned into 
diminutive pieces of whirling space junk. The Silver 
Cloud sped through the detritus and passed the far 
boundary of warships. As soon as he had passed the last 
Space Command ship, three of them fired at him almost 
at once. Though he was invisible to radar, he was visible 
to the eye at the moment he was close to the exploding 
freighter.
	One Space Command laser pierced the Silver Cloud—
a narrow but tight beam. The shaft of weaponlight punc-
tured the crew's living quarters, and air began to escape 
from the pirates' spacecraft. Automatic seals quickly 
stopped the leak and Lather sped on. The exultation he 
had felt at having fired the final destructive bolt had in-
stantly changed into a cold dread at his narrow escape. 
Followed by the other pirate ships, he sped on, back to-
ward the great asteroid where Lurton Zimbardo awaited 
news of their successful mission. 
	Commander Benjamin Bennett of the Space 
Command ship Ignis sat motionless for ten minutes after 
the last freighter had blown up. He was a topflight 
career space pilot who governed one of the few standard 
Space Command Fleets of Twelve. His black hair 
showed no signs of gray. Because of his unspotted 
record and eminent trustworthiness, he had been given 
the responsibility for guarding the freighters. Usually 
looking much younger than his forty-one years, now he 
appeared much older.
No one approached him. Then he spoke, as if into the 
air.
	"I suppose the pirates are gone now."
	"So it would appear, sir," said a crewman.
	"Obviously they weren't concerned with destroying 
us—just the freighters. I suppose in the long run it 
amounts to the same thing, though." No one responded. 
"Please raise headquarters and hand me the communica-
tor." A crew member complied. Commander Bennett 
took the communicator. His message was terse but 
complete. Pirates had attacked the convoy and all seven 
freighters had been lost.
	Twelve minutes later the news came into Starlight 
Enterprise and was directed immediately to Richard 
Starlight, working in his office. He finished listening to 
the message, then turned and looked out over the stark 
moonscape. Slowly, he smiled.

	The next day, just after noon, Richard was again in 
his office. Joining him for lunch were John Rwakatare, 
Robert Nolan, Beowulf Denn, and Commander John 
Lewis and a few other visitors from Space Command. 
Though the food was delicious, the meal was a dismal 
affair. Long faces and few words expressed the 
atmosphere of the gathering.
	Richard, however, and Robert seemed not to share the 
gloom. Richard was an attentive host, carefully seeing to 
his guests' needs. "A little more water, John?" he asked, 
offering the crystal decanter. "Could you please pass the 
biscuits, Robert? Thank you. Good, aren't they?"
	"Yes, Rick, they are, especially for biscuits made on 
the moon," responded the head of NME. "Your chef is 
highly skilled."
	Beowulf Denn couldn't take it any more. "You seem 
awfully lighthearted about everything, Richard," he said 
in a tone that verged almost on disrespect. Richard 
smiled but said nothing.
	When the lunch things had been cleared away, 
Richard spoke.
	"Thank you for coming, gentlemen. I apologize for 
not sharing your distress. Please forgive me for what 
must appear to be an appalling lack of empathy. When 
you see why I have brought you here, you will forgive 
me, I think. I am expecting a message any moment now, 
and I wanted you to be here when it came in." His guests 
waited expectantly. Richard glanced at Robert. The two 
friends shared a subtle smile.
	"Encrypted message from Captain Mark-Leslie, sir," 
came an artificial, mellow voice through the high-level 
communication system.
	"Ah!" said Richard. "Transmit to my office."
	The large screen on the wall behind Richard lit up. He 
turned his chair. The visage of a tall and slender woman 
appeared, with high cheekbones and honey-dark hair 
drawn back and held in place with a small circlet.
	"Captain Mary Mark-Leslie on the Starlight 
Enterprise ship Tempest, reporting on top security beam 
to Richard Starlight. Starlight fleet is in place. There 
were no incidents, and we are ready for your command, 
sir."
	Richard smiled widely and said clearly, "Excellent 
work, Mary! Deploy the probes immediately!"
Beowulf Denn gasped loudly. "What is this?" he burst 
out.
	"Surprised, eh?" said Richard jocularly, turning his 
chair back to the table. "Of course, she won't get the 
message for about ten minutes. But when she does, we'll 
be able to say, 'mission accomplished!'"
	"What is this?" Commander Lewis echoed Beowulf 
Denn.
	"It was Robert's idea, really," began Richard, "and he 
ought to be telling the tale, but he is too modest to do so. 
Robert and I cooked up the plan between us and told no 
one else. Just in case there was a leak somewhere—and 
apparently there was!—Robert made a fuss about want-
ing to offer his freighters to convey the probes to the 
deployment site. He offered rather expensive freighters 
for service. Robert felt badly about, well, about making 
a scene when we met with the President and wanted to 
make up for it."
	Robert glanced down at the table so as not to meet 
anyone's eyes, but it was evident that the success of his 
plan was deeply gratifying to him.
	"The NME freighters were decoys. The real probes 
were sent out on SE freighters to different spots along 
the face of deployment. They were sent out without any 
fanfare whatever on the normal delivery schedule we 
follow for all shipments to Mars and the Asteroid Belt. 
It would never have done, anyway, to send the probes 
out in a tight bunch as the seven NME freighters; 
deployment must be simultaneously effected from 
several sites, and this is the command I just gave Cap-
tain Mark-Leslie.
	"If the pirates took the bait, then they would go back 
to their base believing that they had stopped us. And if 
they didn't know about our plans or the decoy, well, no 
harm done. Deployment would still go on as scheduled. 
And that's about two minutes from now."
	The visitors were stunned. "Why, that's terrific!" 
stammered Commander Lewis. "And no one else knew 
about this? Not even the President?"
	"No one," said Richard. "Only Robert and I. And it's 
a good thing we did it that way, too. Without the decoy, 
the launch would have gone as planned with everyone 
knowing about it. As it is, we're safe now."
	"Not only that—" contributed John Rwakatare in his 
deep bass voice, "we've learned something of immense 
value. There is a leak somewhere. Someone informed 
the pirates of the launch from NME."
	"Yes, there's that," said Robert Nolan with a sigh, 
finally speaking up. "But for now, deployment of the 
probes will take place successfully. We'll have to check 
for the leak, and I initiated a careful search as soon as 
we received news of the attack."
	Richard turned back toward the screen. "Computer," 
he said. "Give me a tie-in to the master control aboard 
the Tempest." The screen showed a scene in space.
	"There is a delay, of course, but the feed is 
continuous. Deployment of the probes is taking place 
about now, but we won't see the results for about ten 
minutes." Time passed.
	"Coming up on the time now," announced Richard a 
little later, breaking into the light conversation that was 
going on around the table. All heads turned toward the 
screen.
	"This is a map of the expanse of the site of the de-
ployment. This is not the actual scene, of course; it is a 
computer enhancement, programmed to show us what is 
actually happening."
	From twelve points at once, scattered about evenly 
throughout the area, small points began to glow. From 
each emerged a fine, golden strand of light. 
	"Dr. Hoshino's design propels each probe at about 
one-twentieth the speed of light. Complete deployment 
should take about an hour and a half."
	The men waited nervously. Some browsed Richard's 
books and others peered through his small telescope at 
the moonscape. Occasionally two or three would come 
together for quiet discussion.
	On the screen, the golden lines gradually lengthened. 
From time to time, one would burst into a flower of lines 
like summer fireworks, and then later each of those lines 
extended and burst again.
	When deployment was complete, the entire screen 
was filled with a complex pattern of golden points, like 
dawn-illuminated mist hanging in a huge spider's web.
	"Success!" said Richard quietly, but his voice 
trembled with excitement. "Captain Mark-Leslie will 
now initiate the program that will unify the probes into a 
single system. At the same time, she will enter a 
program that will allow the system to read the 
gravitational forces attendant upon every object within 
its range. The known asteroids and other heavenly 
bodies and the scheduled flights of spacecraft will be 
filtered out. What will be left will be the positions of 
unknown craft and any uncharted natural objects." As he 
spoke, the web began to shimmer in dozens of places, 
each the site of an object with enough mass to ripple the 
gravitational-detecting field of the net.
	"Ah! Now the known ships are being filtered out," 
Richard observed as many of the ripples disappeared. In 
a moment, he leaped to his feet.
	"There it is! There it is!" he shouted. He ran to the 
screen. "Look! Here are the pirates' ships that attacked 
Robert's freighters yesterday!" He pointed to a small 
ripple in the pattern and scanned the readings at the 
bottom of the screen. "Yes, eighteen ships. Here are 
their masses provided down here. And over here," his 
finger swept across the screen to a large ripple in the 
upper center, "is the asteroid coming our way!
	"Computer! Extrapolate the course of this object"—
he gave the particulars—"and provide information on its 
trajectory."
	In eight seconds the mellow voice of the computer 
spoke. "Object is a natural body of approximately 
20,625 trillion tons, currently traveling at a rate of 
approximately 260,000 miles per hour. If present speed 
and course are maintained, object will fly by the Earth. 
Closest approach will be attained in 15 days, 8 hours, 3 
minutes, 14 seconds at a distance of approximately 
10,689 miles."
	There was silence in Richard's office for over a min-
ute. Then someone said, "It's going to miss."




18: Collision Course!




EXHAUSTED with relief, the party broke up. The men 
from Space Command left the Starlight Enterprise plant 
and returned to their headquarters. Robert Nolan and 
Beowulf Denn lifted off from a launching deck not far 
from Richard's office and set course for the space 
station that was the central facility for Nolan Mining 
Enterprise.
	Richard had already given orders that ships from Star-
light Enterprise be assigned the immediate task of pursu-
ing and capturing the eighteen pirate ships that had de-
stroyed NME's decoy freighters the day before. The SE 
freighters that had actually carried the probes into space 
had been joined by SE ships gathered quietly from vari-
ous sources. They had converged during the journey so 
that many were in place throughout the area of the 
search, waiting any orders that might come. Inside many 
of them were the firewasp fighters SE produced for its 
use mostly in the Asteroid Belt. The firewasps were 
small, tremendously fast and amazingly maneuverable 
two-man ships that had been concentrated in several SE 
bases in the Asteroid Belt. They had been named for the 
menacing dangerous insect in certain hostile swamps on 
Mars. The tiny craft served mostly as a deterrent, since 
smugglers and other lawless types avoided any 
settlement that showed it was ready to defend itself 
against marauders.
	Commander John Lewis was to issue similar orders to 
Space Command ships in the vicinity of the microwave 
net. There were enough SE ships close to the course the 
pirate fleet was taking that firewasps could be launched 
to intercept the pirate ships within an hour.
John Rwakatare and Richard Starlight remained alone 
in Richard's office. They were seated at a sofa, looking 
out over the vast lunar landscape. An enormous dark 
gray field stretched out for several miles before breaking 
up at the far side into jumbled, lighter gray boulders.
	"What do you make of it, Rock?" asked Richard. 
"Why did Zimbardo tell the entire planet that he was 
going to pulverize it, and then set his projectile on a fly-
by course?"
	"I don't think he merely made a mistake," said Rock. 
"He's shown he can guide asteroids to near-pinpoint 
accuracy."
	"Hmm, yes…but those were much, much smaller as-
teroids aimed at much closer targets. You don't think he 
could have just…aimed and missed?"
	"Possible, Rick, but I'm not convinced. Consider this: 
where did the communications from Zimbardo come 
from? An asteroid base. The Starmen told us about this 
hollow asteroid and that it could be 'flown' like a great 
space ship. And we have seen only one large asteroid 
coming toward Earth. To be blunt, I think Lurton Zim-
bardo is a liar. The asteroid he aimed at Earth is his own 
base! His threat to slam it into Earth was intended to 
cause panic. And he did. He achieved that without actu-
ally having to carry out his threat. I think the real threat 
is this hollow asteroid."
	Richard was listening intently. The relief he had felt 
before was evaporating rapidly. He respected John 
Rwakatare with intense admiration. Rock had a remark-
able and rare combination of a filing-cabinet mind and 
an ability to dream. He was eminently logical at all 
times, but could also come up with "leaps beyond logic" 
in which inspiration confidently answered a challenging 
situation. Now was one of those times.
	Richard remembered when Rock had graduated from 
Starlight Academy fifteen years earlier. Richard was in 
his early forties at the time, and recalled the shock that 
went through the Starlight world when Rock was offered 
the position of Starman but had turned it down. He was 
the only person ever to have refused the honor. He had 
chosen instead to stay close to a young woman whom he 
loved. They had married and now had four young chil-
dren. Rock rarely left his family, and Richard had placed 
him second in command of Starlight Enterprise.
	Rock continued. "We already concluded that the 
ability to sheath spacecraft and even asteroids comes 
from an alien intelligence more advanced than our own 
race. I think it highly likely that the source—at least the 
immediate source—of that knowledge is the asteroid 
Zimbardo has taken over. We don't know what other 
capabilities this asteroid-base has. But we do know that 
Lurton Zimbardo is bringing it to Earth—very, very 
close to Earth, and that he will be here in fifteen days."
	Richard swallowed hard and looked away. "Gosh, 
Rock—I'm sure you're right. In fact, what other possi-
bilities are there?"
	"But unless he has defenses or weaponry we haven't 
seen yet, we have an advantage. A slight advantage."
	"What's that?"
	"He doesn't know that we know where he is or that 
we have guessed what he's really doing."

	Robert Nolan and Beowulf Denn made the twenty-six 
minute journey from the Moon to the space station. Rob-
ert had been full of chatter on the way back, but Wulf 
had responded only with short sentences. After they had 
docked, they went their separate ways. Robert went to 
his office to call the President. Richard had urged 
Robert to be the one to inform him of the successful 
deployment of the probes, that the microwave net had 
found the asteroid, and that Earth was not in danger of 
collision. Robert felt the honor deeply and was eager to 
announce the good news.
	Wulf found his way to his own private sanctum, 
saying he wanted to take a nap. He set a "do not disturb" 
code on his communication system. Then he prepared 
another audiodisk, making a brief report of the luncheon 
meeting at Starlight Enterprise. He played it through 
twice, making changes until he felt comfortable with the 
message. Then he speeded it up so that the complete 
message lasted 0.27 seconds, encrypted it, inserted the 
disk into his personal computer, and transmitted it. After 
the message had been sent, he destroyed the disk and 
removed all signs on his computer that the action had 
occurred.
	He stared out the window at the third planet, a beauti-
ful blue and white globe, thinking nothing in particular. 
After a moment he stretched out and tried to take a nap. 
But he couldn't sleep.

A red light pulsed rapidly on the console near Lurton 
Zimbardo's chair. Seeing the flash from the corner of his 
eye, he jerked his head around and stared at it as if he 
couldn't believe that it was lit.
	"What's this?" he thought. "There's no message due 
now." He pressed the button that deactivated the light, 
placed headphones on, dialed a few knobs on the 
console, and pressed "play."
	Fifteen second later he leaped up from his chair and 
bellowed. With both hands he jerked the headphone 
cord out of the control panel. The wires whipped 
through the air with a noise like a scourge. Zimbardo 
twirled, his eyes bulging. He flung the headphones from 
him with all his force. The set flew through the 
command center and collided with the opposite wall. 
Everyone in the room froze and turned to look at the 
pirate leader, and were appalled at what they saw. He 
was trembling with demoniacal fury. No one moved or 
said a word. Even Gene was afraid to speak.
	"They found us!!" Zimbardo shouted. "They found us! 
The Earthmen know where we are! They've located the 
fleet!! The freighters those fools destroyed yesterday 
were decoys! The Earthmen deployed the real probes 
and they've already found us! They outsmarted us!" He 
cursed vehemently, then growled as if his teeth were 
grinding on gravel. "But I've never been outsmarted! 
And I won't be outsmarted now!"
	Zimbardo jumped back into his chair. "Gene! 
	GENE!!" He screamed like a man possessed.
	"Right here sir," said the man, coming up quickly to 
the pirate leader's side.
	"Crank up all the power this asteroid can give me! I'm 
going to create the biggest electromagnetic pulse this 
Solar System has ever seen, and BURN every last one of 
those probes out of the void!!"
	"But sir," pleaded Gene, almost desperately. "That 
would take a lot of power. It would be highly inefficient 
and might work against us. I don't know the power ca-
pacity of the asteroid. It could burn us out."
	Zimbardo stopped moving for a moment, then turned 
his head very slowly around and stared at Gene. His 
eyes glinted with an unearthly light. "Do it," he hissed. 
Gene stepped back half a pace, then pivoted swiftly and 
ran to the power breakers on the far side of the room. He 
began to pull switches, override safety indicators, and 
turn power dials to maximum output.
	In a little less than three minutes, he turned and 
looked back at Zimbardo. The pirate leader had not 
taken his eyes off of his assistant for a second. With his 
mouth slightly open, Gene looked into Zimbardo's eyes 
from across the room and nodded with a quick jerk of 
his head. Zimbardo smiled, inclined his head slowly, and 
turned back to his console. He laughed out loud and 
pressed the switch that activated a general direction 
EMP.
	There was a deafening sound like that of a huge metal 
block falling to the floor and then grinding along an un-
even surface. A wailing screech filled the room and eve-
ryone but Zimbardo covered his ears. The screech in-
creased in intensity until men fell to the floor and 
writhed, pressing their hands firmly to the sides of their 
head. Then there was sudden silence and the lights went 
out. Men began to moan, and someone's voice quavered: 
	"The atmosphere recycler has stopped!"
	"Everything has stopped," said Gene from the dark-
ness.

	Twelve firewasps had come upon the eighteen pirate 
ships with a suddenness that took the pirates completely 
by surprise. The firewasps used narrow but highly dense 
laser weaponlight to remarkable effectiveness. Skilled 
pilots and marksmen had quickly disabled the pirate 
ships by piercing their power supply, effectively casting 
them adrift in space. The small spacecraft moved so 
quickly that the pirates could get off only wild shots that 
never came close to any of the SE craft.
	The battle was over in less than two minutes. Captain 
Mary Mark-Leslie and Richard Starlight received the 
news within minutes of each other. The eighteen pirate 
ships were derelicts. Their crews would no doubt be 
eager to be picked up by the nearest Space Command 
ships. Without power their air would not last more than 
twenty-four hours.
	Richard and Commander Lewis made the next order 
jointly. With a few exceptions, all Starlight Enterprise 
and Space Command spacecraft were to journey to the 
pirates' asteroid at once and prepare for battle. They 
would bring the attack directly to Lurton Zimbardo.
After issuing the order, Richard reset his communica-
tion system to contact the Star Ranger. Now that the 
need for secrecy was past, he wanted to bring the 
returning Starmen up to date and urge them to come to 
the pirates' asteroid with the others.
	Inside the Star Ranger, Mark cried out, "Hey! Listen 
to this!" He directed the communication system to 
public announcement mode and restarted the message 
from Richard Starlight. In exultant tones, Richard 
related the events of the previous two days, concluding 
with the capture of the eighteen pirate ships and the 
coming attack on Zimbardo's asteroid.
	The Starmen cheered. They all jumped up and 
danced. After a moment, Zip asked, "How soon can we 
get to the asteroid, Mark?"
	Mark sat down and quickly figured. "We're only 
about a day and a half away."
	"What are we waiting for?!" exclaimed Joe.
	"Let's go!" said Zip. "We could use a little diversion 
on our way back to Earth."
	Mark set a new course and Joe initiated it. The Star 
Ranger turned slightly to intercept the asteroid where 
they had been imprisoned nearly three weeks before.

	As the power system aboard that same asteroid 
screeched into disruption and then silence, a massive 
electromagnetic shock wave was dispensed from its sur-
face. A great cone of destruction moved through space 
at the speed of light. As it swept past the microwave 
probes, they winked out in flashes of golden light.
On the master screen aboard the Tempest and in Rich-
ard Starlight's office, viewers could see the golden net 
disappear. Although it was past midnight, Richard and 
John Rwakatare were wide awake with their eyes glued 
to the screen. From the center where the asteroid was 
indicated, an expanding circle of darkness went forth, 
gradually swallowing up all the probes. It was obvious 
to Richard that the microwave net was doomed.
	"Computer," he said in a dull voice. "How much 
longer until the net disappears?"
	"Four minutes, twelve seconds," came the mellow 
voice.
	"The eighteen ships are still sheathed but adrift," 
Richard said. "We can't lose them. But if this asteroid is 
maneuverable, as it must be, Zimbardo can speed up, 
slow down, or change course and avoid our attack. He 
can disappear."
	Richard's body tensed and he raised his voice. "How 
did he know about the probes?!" he exclaimed, with ex-
asperation.
	"The spy," responded John Rwakatare.

	Aboard the pirates' asteroid, the power was returning. 
An emergency backup system was kicking in. The lights 
flickered on and the atmosphere recycler hummed 
quietly back into efficiency. With covert glances back at 
Zimbardo, the men returned to their stations.
	"Status report!" demanded Zimbardo.
	"Right away, sir," said Gene, taking his own seat. He 
attended to various dials and incoming signals.
Zimbardo stood up and walked over to the great win-
dow that overlooked the huge rocket pad outside. There 
were seven ships left—six belonging to the independent 
smugglers, John Jenner, Lorry, and Captain Kimball, 
and his own personal ship, the Tartarus. Even the Silver 
Spear had been taken by Mr. Lorry. The asteroid was 
nearly empty of men; only his support crew, the smug-
glers and their crews, and a few others remained.
	"Sir," spoke up Gene. His voice trembled. He spoke 
as one apologizing. "Mr. Zimbardo. Mr. Lather has sent 
in a message that all eighteen ships have been disabled. 
They have detected three large Space Command ships 
approaching them. They are about to be captured, sir."
Zimbardo turned slowly and looked at Gene without a 
change in expression. "And?" he said. "There's more, I 
can tell. And…"
	"And there is a large fleet of ships belonging to Space 
Command and Starlight Enterprise converging on our 
location. In less than three hours, fourteen ships will be 
arriving within minutes of each other. And 
approximately the same number again will join them 
over the next twenty-four hour period."
	Lurton Zimbardo turned his eyes obliquely to the 
floor and he joined his hands behind him. He rocked for 
a moment on his feet, almost as if pondering a 
challenging philosophical question. "I see," he said at 
last. He walked quietly over to his console, sat for a 
moment without moving, then began to move dials and 
enter numbers into the navigational program. He 
consulted various tables of information and referred to a 
number of measuring devices whose sensitive detectors 
were on the surface of the asteroid.
	Minutes passed. Zimbardo grew increasingly agitated 
as he worked. His men had stopped their own work and 
watched him. Where his hands had begun to move 
gently and carefully, they began to exhibit higher and 
higher degrees of animation. Before too long he was 
pressing his keyboard vehemently and muttering under 
his breath. Once in a while he chortled.
	Finally he shouted, "Hah! That will do it! I won't be 
outsmarted!" He pressed the "Enter" button and then 
roared, "Yes! I win!" He leaped from his chair and lifted 
up both arms. "I win!" he repeated.
	As the program Zimbardo had activated was engaged, 
the power it required began to drain the emergency re-
sources of the asteroid, and the insides of the complex 
began to screech as they had before. The screech did not 
rise in intensity but gradually turned into a groan. The 
light slowly faded and went out completely.
	"What did you do?" asked Gene with trepidation. 
	"Even the backup power system has been drained."
	"Just keeping a promise," said Zimbardo jovially. "I 
told Earth I had sent them an asteroid. I wasn't very 
truthful at the time, I'm afraid. But now I have kept my 
promise. I have set the controls for irreversible accelera-
tion, and the course is set surely for a collision!"
	A soul-wrenching moan escaped from Gene's lips. 
"And the power is out for good now! And we're 
prisoners on the asteroid! It's a runaway! And we can't 
stop it!"
	"Why would we want to stop it? We'll take the Tarta-
rus and leave to fight again another day! Pack up, get the 
men, and let's go. We've got less than three hours, I 
think you said."
	Panicked, Gene fled from the room, feeling his way 
desperately through the darkness. "I've got to warn Kim-
ball, Lorry, and Jenner! We've got to escape!" Fear un-
like anything he had ever experienced or imagined filled 
his entire being.



19: Change of Guard




GENE FLEW down the corridor with his arms 
outstretched, not knowing exactly where he was going, 
as long as it was away from the control deck. He was 
breathing hard and fast, on the verge of panic. Realizing 
that he was in danger of losing his grip, he paused to 
catch his breath. He leaned against the wall.
	 A moment later, he saw moving lights in the stairwell 
a long way ahead. In the growing gray illumination, he 
dashed forward. Kimball, Lorry, and Jenner were 
coming up, carrying flashlights. When Kimball saw 
Gene hurrying toward him, he flashed the light directly 
into his eyes and roared, "What in blazes is going on in 
this place?"
	Gene threw his hands up over his eyes, but continued 
to stumble forward. "You've got to get out of here," he 
choked out. "Get your men, get your ships, go!"
	Jenner put a firm hand on Gene's shoulder, and Kim-
ball lowered the light. "What's going on? Where's Zim-
bardo?" Jenner's voice was a little quieter than 
Kimball's but just as demanding.
	Gene gulped and looked up. "He—, he's aimed the 
asteroid at Earth! It's on a collision course! He burned 
out all the power—all the power! He can't stop it! He 
doesn't want to stop it!"
	"Why did he do that?"
	"All the men in the fleets have been captured! We're 
the only ones left, and Space Command will be boarding 
us in less than three hours!"
	The three smugglers gasped in dismay. Jenner pushed 
Gene away and the three of them shot back down the 
stairwell. When they reached the lower level, Gene 
could hear them shouting for their men. The light 
gradually diminished until Gene was once again in 
complete darkness.
	"Gene! Gene! Where are you?" came the voice of 
Lurton Zimbardo from far behind him. Startled, Gene 
quickly turned and peered into the darkness. From far 
away came a sound as of scurrying feet. There were men 
coming—the men from the control center, with 
Zimbardo. Gene spun again and ran for his own room. 
He had decided what he was going to do. Frantically he 
rummaged through his belongings until he found his 
own flashlight. Without turning it on yet, he ran from 
the room and hastened further away from the control 
center.
	"Gene! Gene? Is that you?" came the voice of Lurton 
Zimbardo. Gene inhaled quickly and looked back. There 
was still no light. He hesitated for a moment, then an-
swered,
	"Yes, it's me." His voice was squeaky.
	"Where are you?" echoed down the corridor.
	"I'm not going with you! Go on without me!"
	"What?" Zimbardo's voice had a note of complete 
incredulity in it. "Why not? Hurry up, Gene! We have to 
go! I don't want Space Command on my tail."
	"I'm not going!" Gene shouted. He turned and fled. 
He sped down the corridor as fast as he could go, came 
to its far end, turned the corner, and kept going. In less 
than a minute, he was many turns and twists away from 
the main level. He switched on his light, put it on its 
lowest setting, and continued walking. "He won't wait 
for me! He won't look for me! He'll want to go! Soon 
he'll be gone and I'll be safe!" These thoughts came 
through Gene's mind almost like the flow of clear water.
He came to a storeroom, pushed the door open, and 
flashed his light around. There were stacks of boxes and 
various other items. Seeing there was no one else inside, 
he shut the door, crawled under a cabinet, and turned off 
his light. He waited, desperately hoping he wouldn't 
hear the sound of the door opening.
	After a short while, he felt the floor tremble slightly. 
He knew that a space ship had lifted off.

	After they left Gene, the smugglers Kimball, Lorry, 
and Jenner quickly gathered their men and supplies to-
gether and headed for the airlock to the launching pad. 
There were thirty-seven men altogether. All had their 
space suits on and most of them carried lights.
	"How are we going to get out of here?" asked one of 
the men as they approached the airlock. "The airlock 
won't open. Nothing's working."
	"Portable power pack," said Kimball. He took a small 
box from another man, set it down by the airlock, and in 
seconds had established a makeshift connection. The 
airlock opened. In that fashion, the men were aboard 
their ships without delay.
	Kimball lifted off first and entered the vast, stone tun-
nel that led to the outside. As soon as the enormous air-
lock became visible down the shaft, he fired a laser 
canon at it. Unable to resist an attack from within, the 
great door, thousands of years old, shattered into 
fragments. The atmosphere of the launching pad rushed 
out, hurling the shards of the airlock door into space. 
Kimball's ship then came through the tunnel and exited, 
followed in short order by the five other ships. They set 
a course for the Asteroid Belt and at top acceleration left 
the pirates' asteroid behind them.

	After Gene had fled out of earshot, Zimbardo turned 
to the few men who were behind him. "I'm lifting off in 
the Tartarus in ten minutes. It's the only ship left on the 
asteroid. Meet me at the great doors. Tell everyone else 
you see." He swiveled and walked to the stairwell to go 
to his own rooms. 
	None of the men said anything to each other, but scat-
tered, each going to his own quarters.
	Ten minutes later, Lurton Zimbardo was at the great 
doors. In back of him was the asteroid complex. In front 
was the manufacturing center and beyond that was the 
launching pad where the Tartarus stood in solitary 
splendor. Only five men had joined the pirate leader.
	"So," said Zimbardo. "Only five of you. Five men 
left. Who are you?" He lifted his light a little so he could 
see their faces. "Ah, Mr. Gebbeth. I said before that I 
knew I could depend on you. I've always known it. You 
are the pilot. And Mr. Slant. Mr. Stagnum. Mr. Withers. 
And Mr. Poppy. No one else. Well, then, there are six of 
us altogether. Let us go."
	There was almost no talking. Each man seemed to 
know what to do without being told. They opened the 
airlocks to pass through the manufacturing center, and 
then into the airless launching pad. Without haste but 
without unnecessary delay, they entered the Tartarus, a 
gleaming silver and red ship that could support a crew of 
eighteen.
	The six men strapped themselves into acceleration 
chairs with Gebbeth in the pilot's position. "Take us out, 
Mr. Gebbeth," said Zimbardo. "I will tell you where to 
go when we are free."
	"Yes sir," said Gebbeth, and initiated the launching 
sequence. In a short time, Lurton Zimbardo's spacecraft 
had left the asteroid behind.
	"Top speed, Mr. Gebbeth," said Zimbardo. "Make 
sure the sheathing equipment is functioning. Head away 
from the sun."
	"Of course, sir."

	When Zimbardo burned the asteroid's power out, 
much of the energy needed to power its sheathing 
apparatus disappeared. The sheathing plates could only 
be powered then by the solar energy panels, which did 
not provide enough energy to hide the asteroid 
completely. It appeared on radar as a faint blip, and the 
Earth ships were able to locate it without difficulty. 
About two hours after Zimbardo's flight, the Tempest 
came upon the asteroid. It was the first of fourteen ships 
from both Space Command and Starlight Enterprise 
expected within the hour.
	The smugglers' ships had not been sheathed and were 
being easily tracked by Space Command. They would be 
intercepted before they reached the Asteroid Belt.
The Tempest maneuvered carefully through the 
gaping orifice left when Kimball's ship had blown the 
massive airlock, and set down inside the airless docking 
arena of the asteroid. Captain Mary Mark-Leslie 
descended the ladder first, followed by several crew 
members. All were armed. Only the lights of the space 
ship lit up the cavernous hall of shadows.
	"Eerie," observed Captain Mark-Leslie as she set foot 
on the pavement. "Follow me. We'll see if the place is 
as abandoned as it looks." Nine space-suited figures fell 
in behind her as she approached the airlock into the 
manufacturing area. Unable to open it, she called for a 
portable power supply. Two additional men brought one 
from the ship, opened the airlock, and allowed the 
landing party to enter the complex. Once inside, the 
members of the crew were able to dispense with their 
helmets.
	Slowly and carefully they made their way through the 
blackness, pushing it back with the radiance of the lights 
they carried. They were in awe of the huge, obviously 
alien place.
	"The place feels almost haunted," observed one man.
	"Somewhat," agreed the Captain, "but there's more to 
it than that. There's something deeper. I don't think this 
is an evil place. It is a place that needs to be cleansed."
The party passed through the great doors. Before they 
had crossed the courtyard, a man emerged from the far 
side, carrying a light. The members of the landing party 
quickly spread out, and the Captain ordered, "Halt!"
	"Don't shoot!" came the voice from behind the tiny 
light across the room. "I'm unarmed. I've been waiting 
for you."
	"Who are you?"
	"My name is Gene Newman. I was the control officer 
for Lurton Zimbardo. He's gone."
	"Come forward slowly, hands up." Gene walked for-
ward cautiously with his hands extended over his head, 
holding his light in one hand. When he was a few yards 
away, Captain Mark-Leslie ordered him to stop and di-
rected two men to search him. When it was definite that 
he was unarmed, she called him to approach her.
	"What's been going on here?" she asked.
Gene explained that Zimbardo had aimed the asteroid 
at Earth, burned out the power system, and fled two 
hours earlier. The Captain's face paled as he told the 
story.
	"Radio the ships that are still en route and have them 
check the course of this rock," she ordered one of the 
men, who put on his helmet and contacted the ship. 
	"And tell Mr. Madera to come here at once." The order 
was given.
	While they were waiting for Mr. Madera, Captain 
Mark-Leslie quizzed Gene further. "Why did you stay 
behind?"
	"I—, I joined Putnam's organization because it 
seemed a sure thing. He was captured, but Zimbardo 
took over and made it seem an even better proposition. 
But I could see him getting crazier and crazier! I'm not 
ashamed to say that he began to frighten me—and he 
frightened others, too! And when he aimed the asteroid 
toward Earth—" Here Gene's eyes widened and he 
began to tremble, "I knew there was something seriously 
wrong with him! I had to get away! I wanted to fix 
things—if I could!"
	"Are there any others here?"
	"I don't know. There may be. I haven't seen anyone 
else. Apart from Zimbardo and the smugglers, there 
were seventeen men left on the asteroid. I don't know 
how many went with him. There were also some 
prisoners—three Starmen and some asteroid miners, but 
they escaped from the room where they were being held 
and disappeared into the depths of the asteroid. I don't 
know where they are now. We never saw a trace of them 
after that."
	"They escaped from the asteroid three weeks ago. In 
fact, they are en route here now in their own ship."
Gene's face showed out and out surprise at the news. 
	"They escaped? They got off the asteroid? How did they 
do that?"
	At this point, they were joined by the young man for 
whom the Captain had asked. He was about thirty years 
old, with thick brown hair and deep brown eyes. This 
was Jesus Madera-Cruz, Chief Ioneer for Starlight 
Enterprise. He was an adept with engines and micro-
electronics. Noted for his placid nature, nothing ever 
bothered him, and his expertise in power systems had 
never failed the trust which Richard Starlight had placed 
in him.
	"You asked for me, Captain?" he asked.
	"Yes, Mr. Madera. We need your skills urgently. This 
is Gene, one of Zimbardo's men. Zimbardo has been 
gone for two hours. Gene tells us that before he fled he 
burned out the power. He also redirected the asteroid on 
a collision course with Earth. I've asked our ships 
outside to confirm that. In the meantime, I'd like you to 
check out the power system and see if you can bring it 
back up." 
	"Yes, ma'am," answered the man, with a brief nod. 
The Captain detailed several men to go with Gene and 
Madera to wherever Zimbardo's former chief control 
officer wanted to take them. Gene took them first to the 
control deck.
	Captain Mark-Leslie detailed the rest of her men to 
searching the complex in pairs. As other ships landed, 
minutes apart from each other, she directed their crews 
to the search. After an hour, ten other pirates had been 
located. All had been eager to turn themselves in. They 
were taken into captivity and led to one of the Space 
Command ships, fed, and kept under guard.
	Before too long, there were over a hundred men 
searching the facility. Operations officers began to con-
nect portable power systems to various parts of the com-
plex and reestablish the lights and get the airlocks to 
work again. The atmosphere recycling system was not 
yet accessible, but the air would last for a long time.
A report came in to Captain Mark-Leslie during the 
search, confirming Gene's account that the asteroid was 
accelerating and was on a collision course with Earth.
	"Details?" asked the Captain.
	"The asteroid will collide with Earth in approximately 
eight days, at a speed of nearly 300,000 miles per hour. 
We have not yet determined precisely where it will 
strike, but we are forwarding the data to SE and that will 
be determined."
	At that point, Gene and Madera came up to Mark-
Leslie.
	"Captain," said Madera. "I have made a preliminary 
examination of the control system. Gene has been more 
than cooperative, I am happy to say. With his help, just 
by looking at the controls and hearing him describe what 
Zimbardo did, I can conjecture what kind of power 
we're dealing with. If we can get the power back on, we 
should not have any difficulty in changing the course of 
the asteroid. Restoring the power, however, will not be 
easy. Gene has never been to the power plant. In fact, it 
seems that no one has, including Zimbardo. No one 
knows where it is or how to learn its location."
	"Go back to the Tempest and contact George St. 
George and the Starmen. St. George is on Ceres and the 
Starmen are in the Star Ranger on their way here. These 
men have been inside the power plant and know how to 
find it. I don't need to tell you that time is the most 
pressing factor here."
	"Yes ma'am." Madera bowed his head slightly and 
turned toward the airlock that led out to the launching 
pad. He showed no signs whatever of being ruffled. In 
sharp contrast, Gene was visibly anxious.
	"Gene," said Mark-Leslie; "you've apparently been of 
good help. Mr. Madera is easy to get along with but hard 
to please. If he commends you, I am satisfied that you 
are not a threat to us. You go on to the Tempest also and 
get some food or some rest, as you need. We can't do 
more until we hear from the Starmen or St. George. 
We'll want you later, and you'll need to be rested."
	"Yes ma'am," said the distraught man. He turned to-
ward the SE flagship, swallowed hard, and stepped to-
ward the airlock. He ran to catch up to Madera.
	Captain Mark-Leslie watched them for a moment, 
then turned her attention back to the activity of the men 
who were supplying the temporary power to the 
complex before her.
	"This place that seemed so menacing when we first 
landed is beginning to look a little less threatening 
now," she thought. "Hard to believe we are aboard a 
runaway asteroid that will destroy Earth in eight days, 
unless we can turn it aside somehow."




20: Desperation




THE STAR RANGER sped through space toward its rendez-
vous point with the racing asteroid. With the urgency of 
the situation, Zip had ordered the maximum acceleration 
that their bodies could tolerate. Mark had programmed 
their course to bring them as quickly as possible to 
boarding speed with the asteroid. Having done that, he 
pored through the printed material he had taken from the 
asteroid's power plant. He felt desperation creeping over 
him since he didn't know what Zimbardo had done to 
burn it out. As he scanned the pages, he knew that the 
asteroid was continuing to pick up speed.
	Zip came over and stood near where Mark was seated 
with a dim lamp illuminating the papers in front of him. 
The lamp was designed to burn with a soft light with the 
faintest trace of light green, to be easiest on the eyes. It 
was devised for long study.
"Anything yet, Mark?" Zip asked, knowing that the 
question was pointless. If Mark had found a tiny piece 
of information which could be even remotely connected 
to the situation on the asteroid, he would have spoken 
up.
	"No, Zip," replied Mark. "I can follow the diagrams 
pretty well now, and I think I understand how one part 
connects to another, but I can't envision how any part of 
it could have burned out. I've tried to calculate how 
much power Zimbardo would have needed to generate 
the EMP of the size he did, but I can only estimate it. 
Even at my highest estimates, I can't see how it would 
burn out the power supplies of a huge iron asteroid that 
can be used as a spacecraft. All I can imagine is that 
much of the power supply of the asteroid had been shut 
down before."
	"You mean that its reserves were not in place?"
	"Something like that. We have guessed that the aster-
oid was a huge spacecraft. We also know that it had 
been stationery and abandoned—or at least unused—for 
eons. I suspect that the asteroid's full power had never 
been accessible to Zimbardo. He was able to operate 
life-support systems, lights, airlocks, and so forth in his 
own section without drawing much power. When he 
tried to 'power up' the asteroid and move it out of orbit, 
he reached the limit of its available power. And when he 
suddenly initiated the electromagnetic pulse to fry the 
microwave probes, he fried his own system. But the as-
teroid must have more power than that to be able to do 
what it must have been able to do in the past. You saw 
the power plant as well as I did! Did it look to you as if 
Zimbardo could have burned that whole thing out with 
one EMP, no matter how intense?"
	"Makes sense, Mark. Where, then, is the rest of the 
power?"
	Mark looked up at Zip with a wan smile. "If you want 
to find it, you can help me look through these papers, if 
you want."
	"All right, I will," said Zip, and sat down. Mark 
handed him a stack of paper, showed Zip what to look 
for, and went back to his own study.
	Joe remained on the flight deck, keeping careful 
watch on the instruments. He preserved the Star Ranger 
course precisely so that there would be no unnecessary 
delay in meeting the runaway asteroid. Before him was a 
scattering of white stars in the blackness. A few large 
ones stood out.
	"Mark would love this," Joe thought, but he didn't 
bother his friend.

	The best minds of Starlight Enterprise and Space 
Command had been working for more than twenty-four 
hours on the problem of diverting the runaway asteroid, 
and had not even been able to restore power. Twenty-
five ships had docked inside the landing area, and more 
than 300 men were inside the facility. Some had been 
detailed to explore and take an inventory of what was 
found, others had been ordered to provide temporary 
light and power using portable equipment from the 
ships, and others worked under Jesus Madera-Cruz in 
the desperate attempt to restore power to the asteroid.
	From the communications center aboard the Tempest, 
Mr. Madera had been in contact with SE's best 
engineers and the Starmen. SE's best hope was in the 
Starmen since they had been aboard the asteroid and had 
walked through its power plant, but their time of arrival 
had been set back at least a day due to the asteroid's 
acceleration. By electronic communication, Mark had 
been able to provide some of the plans for the power 
plant to Mr. Madera, but the plant was simply too large 
and too complex for the plans to be of much use.
	George St. George had given Madera the proper com-
bination of buttons in the elevators to give him access to 
the warehouse, but even after the portable units had re-
stored power to the elevators, they could not deliver men 
to the warehouse since Zip had previously destroyed all 
the panels when the pirates were pursuing them. Conse-
quently, Madera had to detail men to descend manually 
through the shaft to the warehouse floor and repair the 
controls at the warehouse level for one elevator. That 
had taken nearly eleven hours.
	Except for one brief nap, Madera had not slept since 
the Tempest had landed. Once the elevator had been re-
paired, he went with about thirty men through the same 
passages that the Starmen had done. Since the temporary 
lighting and power had been set up only in the facility 
that the pirates had been using, Madera and his compan-
ions walked in darkness as deep as the inside of a cave. 
Madera hefted a huge but lightweight lamp, and others 
carried personal flashlights. The shadows jumped with 
each step as they walked.
	After leaving the warehouse, Madera had to use the 
codes the Starmen had provided to come to the immense 
power plant. Although the men had been told in advance 
what to expect, when the doors of the elevator opened, 
they were just as awed as the Starmen and miners had 
been when they first beheld the scene. When Madera 
saw the extent of the plant, he smiled with deep 
appreciation, then encouraged the men to get to work.
	He assigned them to three groups. They were to 
spread throughout the plant and search for evidence of 
any burnout or other damage. The men went forth with 
lights, tools, and electronic equipment. Madera himself 
set out to study one of the power stations and try to learn 
its secrets by personal examination.

	At one end of the asteroid was the huge landing 
facility which Troy Putnam had taken over. About two-
thirds of the length of the asteroid away was the port 
through which the Starmen and miners had escaped. 
Between was an enormous complex of inhabitable 
space. At the lowest level was the power plant. Above 
the power plant was an immense compound. The 
compound was secure from any chance encounter by 
Earthmen. Access could be given only from inside, and 
no Earthman would be able to enter by force, short of 
taking the entire asteroid apart. Indeed, no Earthman 
even suspected it existed.
	Inside this compound, several tall, slender, humanoid 
figures were working frantically at a panel. Endless 
banks of dials, screens, switches, and other electronic 
paraphernalia were set out in the huge room where they 
worked. The room was dark. Several portable lights had 
been set in a semi-circle around the panel where the 
figures were working.
	Conversation was minimal and quiet, barely above a 
murmur. Tools were requested and exchanged. A light 
was brought over and placed so as to reveal the inner 
workings of a cabinet filled with circuits and 
connections.
	One figure walked slowly to the far end of the room, 
carrying a small light. He passed through a doorway, 
traversed a short corridor, and entered an enormous 
chamber. He paced along a catwalk. The power in this 
room was operative. Far above him was a dark blue sky 
with silver stars. A pale blue dawn was showing at the 
horizon. To his left was an extensive mirror-smooth lake 
in which the sky and stars were reflected in unutterable 
beauty. In the lake, trees grew in profusion. It appeared 
to be an orchard in flood time, but it was apparent that 
the trees grew best in a watery environment. Heavy, 
thick, almost circular leaves covered the trees. Fragrant 
white blossoms promised fruit in the next season. On the 
shore were numerous small boats for skimming and few 
large ones for working in the orchard.
	The catwalk led across one end of the lake and had 
several side passages, all on the right. At the fourth side 
passage, the walker turned and passed through an 
airlock. After he had come through the second door, he 
entered a lightless room that gave an impression of 
immense spaciousness. Revealed in the shadow of his 
light were many horizontal capsules about eight feet 
long and two feet in diameter, stacked in rows. Each 
capsule was connected to cables that led into a large 
box. Boxes were spaced about twenty feet apart and 
each was connected to about forty capsules.
	The walker opened the top of the box and peered in-
side. He raised a small communicator to his lips and 
spoke into it. After receiving a reply, he reached into the 
box with a long tool. A moment later, dim lights went on 
in the room and a very low hum started up. The walker 
smiled broadly and closed the box. Then he retraced his 
steps.

	Captain Mary Mark-Leslie woke Jesus Madera out of 
a deep sleep.
	"Mr. Madera," she said, approaching him gently 
where he had fallen asleep in his chair. He had returned 
to his office and workshop aboard the Tempest to study 
some diagrams he had made in the power plant. "The 
Star Ranger has arrived. The Starmen are waiting for 
you."
	"Thank you, Captain," said Madera, lifting his head 
and rubbing his brown eyes. He ran his hand through his 
hair quickly, left his room, put on his helmet, and de-
scended the outside ladder to the floor of the launching 
pad. He turned toward the control center and saw the 
Starmen on the other side of the wall. They all waved at 
him. Madera was one of the Starmen's favorite acquain-
tances from Starlight Enterprise. He strode across the 
tarmac and passed through the airlock and hailed the 
young men.
	After he had removed his helmet and exchanged hasty 
preliminary greetings, he led them across the quad and 
through the great doors.
	"What have you discovered?" asked Mark.
	"I think I can power up the computer system, but it 
will take a lot of energy to do so. I used submicroscopic 
robotic probes to provide detailed maps of the computer 
in the power plant, and some of the wiring, machines, 
and selected other equipment inside this amazing 
facility. I've detailed men to take portable power packs 
down to the power plant and arrange them in sequence 
to give us enough power to jump-start the computer. 
When we do that, we ought to be able to get into the 
files you found earlier, Mark. Getting the power packs 
down there is not easy, but with dozens of men working, 
I estimated that we could get it hooked up in a couple of 
hours. That was the time I was taking to study some 
diagrams I'd made, but instead took an involuntary 
catnap."
	"Why didn't you enter the power plant through the 
hangar from which we escaped?" asked Zip.
	"We looked for the opening in the place you'd indi-
cated, but found no evidence of any kind that there was 
an airlock. We even tried locating it with radar and 
sonar, but the entrance is concealed so effectively that 
we could find no trace of it. We needed the personnel at 
this end, so we abandoned the search. Getting to the 
power plant through the complex here is the long way 
around, but we knew that we could do it and just 
couldn't take the time to look further on the surface."
	"We'll have to find some way to open the airlock 
from the outside when we're not so rushed," responded 
Zip. "We haven't kept up with the time limit. What've 
we got?"
	Madera sighed. "If we can't move the asteroid, impact 
will take place on Thursday, September 8, at 2:33 p.m. 
That's about six days from now. It will strike in the At-
lantic Ocean just north of the West Indies."
"How much time have we got to turn it aside?"
"Just a coupla days. But we'll be able to move it."
	"You sound confident, Mr. Madera," said Joe turning 
his head briefly as the four of them approached the ele-
vators.
	"Don't worry, Joe," said Madera. "Earth is not ready 
yet for its Judgment Day."
	Somehow the Starmen believed him. He was not a 
Starman nor a reputed scientist, but he was a man of 
deep dignity who exuded confidence and easily won the 
affections of the people around him.
	Moments later, they were at the site of the activity. 
The last portable power pack had been set up and 
connected to the closest console in the power plant.
	"Set?" asked Madera of the technician who had over-
seen the procedure.
	"Yes sir, Mr. Madera."
	"Let's go, Mark." The big Starman stepped up next to 
the console with Madera. Mark felt a bit of stage fright. 
Anxiety coursed through him as he suddenly realized 
that there was so little time left and that the ability to 
turn the asteroid aside depended on him. Having an 
audience of more than thirty men daunted him.
	"It doesn't depend entirely on you, Mark," said Mad-
era, appearing to read Mark's mind. "Now let's power 
up."
	Mark felt the anxiety drain away. He pressed the 
power button he had discovered before, when the 
Starmen had been escaping from the pirates. The 
computer screen surged into life. The men cheered, and 
Madera smiled. Joe stretched exultantly and appeared to 
grow two inches taller.
	Zip's brow remained furrowed. He showed little emo-
tion. For him the time to exult would be when the 
asteroid had been diverted. This was only a vital step in 
the process. There were others ahead.
	For some time, Mark and Madera conversed as Mark 
flipped through file after file. Diagrams appeared and 
Mark's fingers flew over the screen as he pointed out 
what he had learned while journeying on the Star 
Ranger. Madera nodded, and pointed out several 
connections Mark had not seen.
	Once, Madera handed a small diagnostic pack to one 
of the technicians and sent him to climb the iron 
latticework. The man returned in a few moments and 
gave a report. Madera nodded again.
	Three hours went by. Joe was nodding, but Zip was 
still intent, his eyes on Mark.
	Mark clapped his hands and turned to Madera. 
Madera smiled and raised his eyebrows. With an open 
hand, he gestured to the control panel. Mark nodded his 
thanks and pressed several buttons. The files changed 
rapidly at each new command. Then Mark made fists 
and clenched a few times as if massaging his fingers. 
Then he reached out and pressed a button off to the side 
of the panel.
	A distant grinding noise as of gears engaging sounded 
from far away, then leveled off into a bare hum. The 
lights gradually came on. Mark slumped toward the 
floor as the men cheered again. Madera grabbed Mark 
before he fell and eased him to the iron deck. Zip and 
Joe ran forward.



21: The One That Got Away




"WHOO!" Mark breathed. "It worked! No, I'm all right, 
thanks, just drained. I can feel the tension flowing out of 
me and just leaving me limp."
	"You've been living on adrenaline for a few days, I 
think," said Zip, helping to pull Mark to his feet.
	"Is everything back on? Can we move the asteroid 
now?" asked Joe.
	"There should be power enough," answered Mr. Mad-
era. "We didn't try to find out what Zimbardo had 
burned out. Mark's idea that there had to be a lot of 
untapped power in the system turned out to be right. We 
spent our time trying to find and get access to what we 
suspected was already there. The diagrams Mark 
brought showed that there should be plenty of power. 
We just didn't know how to turn it on."
	"And Mark found how to do it?"
	"Yes, he did."
	"Well, I couldn't have done it without Mr. Madera, 
that's for sure. He was able to see things very clearly 
when it was most confusing to me."
	"We're still not finished," said Madera. "We have to 
steer the asteroid out of its collision course. For that, I 
think we'll need some help from an unlikely source."
	"Gene," stated Zip.
	"Gene," affirmed Starlight Enterprise's chief ioneer.
	The company made the short journey back to the ele-
vator. Within ten minutes they were back in the main 
hall. Through the great doors they could see more than 
two dozen spacecraft arrayed on the extensive launching 
pad. Jesus Madera reached for his communicator and 
asked that Gene be sent to him from where he was being 
held in the Tempest.
	Madera dismissed the men who had been with them in 
the power plant, then turned to the Starmen.
	"I'm sure that Joe or even I could pilot the asteroid if 
we had to, but it is best that Gene do it—best for him."
	"Of course, Mr. Madera," said Joe. "I understand."
	While they waited, the Starmen gazed around them. 
Far above was the roof of the great chamber like an iron 
sky. The natural lights of the complex once again blazed 
throughout the structures. The air seemed fresher.
	They watched Gene descend the ladder and jump the 
last few rungs to the pad. Then he turned and paced 
quickly to the closest entrance in the great wall. He 
came through the airlock, discarded his helmet, and 
hurried to the small group that was waiting for him. 
	"We have restored power," said Madera.
	"So I see!" said Gene with a great smile. "That's terri-
fic! Do you want me to pilot the asteroid away from 
Earth?"
	"That's exactly what I want you to do. Let's go."
	The five men made their way along the corridors, has-
tened past open doorways, and took the elevator up one 
flight to the control center. They passed dozens of SE 
men and members of Space Command. Captain Mary 
Mark-Leslie was supervising their work.
	Once in the control center, Gene took his seat at the 
main console, glanced at the Starmen and the other men 
in the large room, then stared at the screen before him. 
He scratched his head, then placed his hands on the 
keyboard and activated it.
	"Whew!" he exclaimed a moment later. "More than 
300,000 miles per hour, and still climbing. It would be 
better to turn this asteroid aside and pass by the Earth 
rather than try to bring it into orbit, as Zimbardo had 
planned at first. We're going too fast for that. We've 
been accelerating for—let's see—almost four days!"
	"My thoughts exactly," said Madera, seating himself 
on a stool next to Gene. "Let's see how you do it."
Gene plotted coordinates and tracked the trajectory of 
the runaway asteroid, then calculated the amount of 
thrust needed to pass the Earth at a safe distance. He 
figured how much he could slow the acceleration 
without putting too much stress on the inhabitants. 
When he was finished, he turned to Madera.
	"Okay?"
	"Looks right to me."
	"Well, then…here goes." Gene entered the figures 
into the primary guidance system and activated it. Tears 
suddenly came into his eyes. "Oh, please let it be 
enough, let it be right, let it work," he whispered.

	The Starmen woke after twelve hours of sleep aboard 
the Star Ranger. Uncharacteristically, Joe was the last 
up. He found a note in the washroom that read, "We're 
on the Tempest. Join us for breakfast whenever you're 
ready." He washed up quickly and hastened to the SE 
fleet command ship.
	Readily admitted, he found Captain Mary Mark-
Leslie and his two colleagues in the dining area. Mary 
was keeping the Starmen company without eating, but 
Mark and Zip were just finishing a large platter of 
scrambled eggs and cheese, potatoes, freshly-squeezed 
juice, and hot coffee. "I'll have the same, but with tea," 
he announced, and sat down.
	"Yes sir," came a voice from the galley. A few mo-
ments later, Gene came out carrying Joe's breakfast.
	"Gene!" exclaimed Joe.
	"Yes, Mr. Taylor. Just trying to help out a little," said 
the erstwhile pirate.
	"He cooks as well as he pilots," said Mark.
	"We're safe, then." Joe made it a statement rather 
than a question as he dug into the steaming eggs.
	"Yes," said Zip. "The asteroid will sweep past the 
Earth in about a week, missing it by about 50,000 miles. 
It will be visible for almost the whole night over the 
south Pacific, like a fast-moving star. Should be quite a 
sight!"
	"Then what?" asked Joe between gulps of juice.
	"Then what, what?" responded Mark.
	"Then where does it go?"
	"As Gene said yesterday," explained Zip, "it's moving 
too fast to enter an orbit around the Earth, so Gene 
steered it into an course around the sun. It will take 
about seven months to circle the sun just inside Earth's 
orbit. Then it will catch up to the Earth and can easily be 
placed into an orbit at that time. Scientists from Starlight 
Enterprise will live on it and try to learn its secrets. In 
fact, a ship will be launched from SE in a couple of days 
with a crew. They'll intercept the asteroid and start the 
exploration right away."
	Mark continued bringing Joe up to date. "The Cap-
tain's got a team repairing the huge airlock on the 
surface of the asteroid. And the temporary power supply 
packets are being reloaded on the ships. We're in 
complete control of the asteroid now."
	"And where's Madera?"
	"He finally got a full sleep, then went back into the 
complex. He can't wait to find out how it all works. 
He's hoping that Richard will put him in charge of the 
exploration team."
	Joe scooped a large helping of potatoes into his 
mouth, then talked around it to ask, "And when do we 
leave?"
	"I'm excited about this place, and would like to 
explore a bit myself," said Zip, "but more than anything, 
I'd like to go home. We can leave any time we want to."
	"I'd like to see Mr. Madera one more time before we 
go, and then take off for home."

	A day later, the Star Ranger was well on its way to 
Amundsen City. The Starmen were relaxed, seated com-
fortably at a small table in the lounge, with the ship on 
automatic pilot. The strains of Bach's Little Fugue filled 
the ship.
	Joe asked, "Is that the disk Montezuma Vly gave us?"
	"No," said Mark. "That was destroyed on the Vigilant 
Warrior. This is just part of our standard library. Beauti-
ful piece. But I sure wish we hadn't lost that disk 
Montezuma gave us. What a tragedy!"
	"Yes, well, Vly did say that we could visit him again. 
Maybe he'll give us another."
	"I'd like to see him again, but not for a while. I don't 
want to leave home for a long time!"
	At the end of their journey, the Star Ranger touched 
down gently on the tarmac at Amundsen Base, near the 
south pole of the Moon on the edge of the largest city in 
the Earth-Moon system—Amundsen City, with over 
eight million inhabitants. The Starmen debarked from 
their ship, crossed the field and entered the airlock 
which led into the receiving area. Through the second 
door, they could see an enormous crowd.
	"Wow! This place is jammed!" said Joe. "I've never 
seen so many people here!" The Starmen removed their 
helmets, tucked them under their arms, and passed 
through the airlock. Moments later they entered the 
public terminal. A roar went up from hundreds of 
voices.
	"What's this?" yelled Mark to Zip and Joe. He could 
barely make himself heard above the clamor.
	"Look!" cried out Zip. "Our families!" With a huge 
smile on his face, he pointed to the front of the crowd. 
There were the boys' parents—Allen and Elizabeth 
Foster with Zip's eight-year old sister, Kathy; Keith and 
Barbara Seaton; and Charlie and Laura Taylor. All were 
smiling hugely.
	"My gosh!" exclaimed Mark. "They're here for us!"
	Although the crowd was being kept behind a light 
barrier of stanchions and ribbons, as soon as the 
Starmen came through the airlock, Zip's sister Kathy 
ducked under the ribbon and ran toward them.
	"David, David!" she yelled. When she was five feet 
away she leaped into the air and slammed into Zip's 
arms. "David, I missed you!" she cried, snuggling her 
head into his shoulder. "I was so worried!"
	Zip smelled the little girl's hair and was suddenly 
transported to his home. His heart leaped within him and 
he unexpectedly burst into tears, kissed her forehead and 
her cheek, and whispered, "Oh Kathy, I missed you, too, 
even more than I knew."
	Zip's mother Elizabeth had the same red hair that he 
had, while his father Allen had dark hair, now turning a 
dignified salt-and-pepper. But Kathy had inherited the 
best of both hair colors. Her deep maroon hair shone 
with health. Zip picked her up and, pressing his cheek to 
hers, came to where his parents waited for him. Joe and 
Mark, neither of whom had any brothers or sisters, were 
already greeting their parents.

	On the evening of September 9, the asteroid streaked 
through the night sky, drawing the awed attention of 
people all over the planet. It was best seen from the 
island of Vanuatu from just after dusk to the hour before 
dawn when its glow was overwhelmed by the dawnlight. 
Had the asteroid not been controlled, September 9 
would have been the first of the last days of life on 
Earth.
	The day after, the President presided at a worldwide 
celebration in honor of the Starmen—a celebration to 
honor them for their critical role in freeing Mars from 
the clutches of the pirates, a celebration postponed when 
the greatest threat ever to menace the Earth was 
engineered by Lurton Zimbardo, and then turned aside.
	The Starmen were the subjects of many award 
ceremonies, dinners and receptions, interviews, and 
parades. With them were Richard Starlight, Robert 
Nolan, Jesus Madera-Cruz, and others who had been 
instrumental in freeing the Earth from destruction. The 
highlight of the celebration was a ceremony on the 
grounds of the capital in New Washington, when the 
President awarded medals to the Starmen for their valor. 
The medals had been fashioned from plates in the 
Gloria, the spaceship which had taken Lee High Eagle 
to Mars in 2014, the first spaceship to carry human 
beings to another planet.
	When it was all over, they returned to their homes in 
Amundsen City for a long and well-deserved time of 
rest. One afternoon, they were in Richard Starlight's 
office. Richard had not had an opportunity to hear the 
Starmen's entire story from beginning to end. He had 
invited them to join him, Robert Nolan, Beowulf Denn, 
and John Rwakatare for a relaxing afternoon so that the 
four of them could hear firsthand the complete tale of 
the Starmen's adventures.
	Tea and coffee were provided in a luxurious silver 
service that had been in Richard's family for genera-
tions—one of the few heirlooms that had been preserved 
through the Collapse. On the silverware was engraved 
the letter "R," the only clue that existed to Richard's 
surname before his father Thomas had changed it to 
	"Starlight" and destroyed all records that spoke of his 
past.
	After the three Starmen had finished recounting their 
adventures, Joe spoke up:
	"You know, sir, as Starmen we really didn't deserve 
all that honor on Earth. I felt extremely uncomfortable 
going through all those dinners and receiving all those 
commendations, and especially receiving the medals. 
We didn't do anything to save Earth from Zimbardo—
all we did was spend our time getting captured and then 
trying to work our way out of the mess we got ourselves 
into. In fact, it would have been better if we'd just 
stayed home in bed! If we hadn't given away George St. 
George's position, Z25 would still exist and St. George 
might have never left it—we were the ones who led 
Zimbardo to St. George. All we accomplished was 
giving St. George's men a harrowing time and getting 
their base turned into molten metal."
	Richard laughed. "It looks that way, doesn't it? But 
Joe, I don't think your time was ill spent. Remember, 
you didn't go out to find St. George on your own whim; 
we personally sent you out there on an urgent mission. 
Had things turned out differently St. George might have 
been key to rounding up Zimbardo. As things were, you 
gave him and his men the time of their lives—I bet 
they'll be telling their friends tales of their harrowing 
adventure for decades to come. Besides, you've gained 
something valuable: you, Mark, and Zip are now a team. 
You've learned how to work together, how to think like 
Starmen and act like Starmen. You're experienced, 
proven Starmen now! You managed to escape from the 
clutches of the most dangerous, crazed maniac our 
century has ever seen. And you've had contact, however 
fleeting, with the second intelligent extra-terrestrial race 
that Earth has met—certainly ahead of the Titanians and 
far ahead of us!
	"But Joe, more than that, realize that your experience 
in saving Mars was the exception, not the rule. You 
can't expect to save all of mankind every day. Your role 
there was a privilege—even though you're a Starman, 
don't expect it to become a regular occurrence. Not 
everyone—even famous Starmen—can play the deciding 
role in every crisis that erupts. I know you've got 
exciting careers ahead, all three of you—you're three 
brilliant Starmen and you're a credit to the Solar 
System—but don't let it go to your heads! Your next 
adventure could be as unglamorous as mapping 
geological samples in the canyons of Mercury."
	"What of the aliens aboard the asteroid, sir?"
	"Well, maybe they're still there and maybe they're 
not. We saw no trace of them after your first encounter. 
My guess is that there were just the two of them, maybe 
a few more, and that they departed from the asteroid 
about the time you did. We have plenty of time now to 
explore the entire asteroid, and if they're there, we'll 
find them; and if not, we'll find whatever traces there 
are to be found!"
	But Richard was wrong. Nothing and no one on Earth 
had the capability of finding and entering the inner sanc-
tum on the asteroid. The revelation of the alien inhabi-
tants would come only if and when the aliens wished it, 
and even Richard Starlight could not determine or even 
predict when that might be.
	Zip said, "But it's not over yet, is it, sir? Whatever or 
whoever the aliens were afraid of hasn't even been 
identified, much less overcome. And there are still six 
pirates who haven't been captured. Zimbardo is still free 
and we haven't any idea where he is."
	Richard suddenly looked serious. "You're right, Zip. 
And there's still the matter of how he knew our plans. 
Somewhere in our organization he has an ally—at least 
one."
	Wulf Denn set his coffee cup down carefully and re-
marked, "But for now, things are peaceful. There is no 
danger anywhere, and no sign of any threat. And the 
wonderful asteroid is ours to explore!"
	"Right you are," agreed Rock. "And there are many 
secrets it can reveal to us. Time enough for us to face 
tomorrow's dangers tomorrow."
The Starmen were comforted. If even Rock was not 
on guard, they felt free to relax.
	"What will you do now?" asked Robert Nolan.
	"Well sir," said Mark. "David's uncle and aunt have 
invited all of us to go their farm in West Virginia—our 
parents and David's sister, too—for a long rest. I love 
the stars, but frankly, spending time in the woods and 
fields, and eating home-cooked meals at a large table 
with fifteen or so people, and sitting in front of a 
fireplace appeals to me more than I can say!"
	"I don't blame you!" laughed Robert.
	"But don't get too comfortable," warned Richard, 
with a chuckle. "Something will come along before too 
long!"
	"Maybe mapping geological samples in the canyons 
of Mercury," suggested Joe.
	"Maybe," said Richard.

	Two months later, as the Seatons, Taylors, and 
Fosters prepared to celebrate Thanksgiving dinner on 
the farm, the Tartarus was speeding through the void.
	"We've just passed the orbit of Neptune, sir," an-
nounced the pilot.
	"Thank you, Mr. Gebbeth. We're making good time." 
Those who had seen Lurton Zimbardo in his last hours 
aboard the runaway asteroid would have been surprised 
to learn that he could be a patient man. As he had done 
almost obsessively since he had fled the asteroid, once 
again he sorted through his thoughts.
	"Hundreds of us reduced to dozens, and then dozens 
reduced to this handful of six. The Superiors promised 
me power once I had obtained for them the access codes 
to Earth's primary systems. Access codes! That's all 
they wanted, and Earth was to be mine for payment! I 
did my best! But now I will appeal to them directly and 
they will push these Starmen aside without mercy!"
	In the next book of the chronicles of the Starmen, 
JOURNEY TO THE TENTH PLANET, the threat to 
Earth will take new form. In the dark reaches beyond the 
orbit of Pluto, in the near-absolute zero of space, the 
Starmen will finally encounter the overwhelming power 
of the true enemies of Earth.

THE END



The next three volumes in the Starman series will
*	Show how the pirates are brought to their last stand
*	Introduce the spine-tingling new villain, Banjoman
*	Describe flilox, the new threat to Mars
*	Provide the amazing explanation of the greegles
*	Reveal the thrilling secret of the pirates' asteroid


Certain words used by George St. George are part of the 
backwoods culture of Davy Crockett, and come from the 
nineteenth century.

absquatulate 	depart, run away
exflunct 	exhaust, beat thoroughly
obflisticated 	bewildered, confused
ramsquaddle 	demolish
ripstaver	a first-rate person or thing
slantindicular 	in a slanting direction



To keep up with the latest news in the Starman series, 
including the production schedule for the next book, 
please check the Starman series web site at:

http://www.StarmanSeries.com/

So far five Starman books have been released. They are:
 
ASSAULT ON MARS
THE RUNAWAY ASTEROID
JOURNEY TO THE TENTH PLANET
DESCENT INTO EUROPA
THE LOST RACE OF MARS

You can find out ordering information for these books at
the above website. Don't miss the further adventures
of the Starmen!