Reunion on Ganymede

The flame rifle flared, fusing the hideous head of one monster, but the tentacles of another whipped out, snared the pilot with uncanny ease. The pilot screamed, once — a scream chopped short by choking bands of steel.

Then the ship spun crazily, out of control, toward the surface.

'An old cruiser hull is right over that ridge,' the pilot told the senator. 'It's in pretty good condition, but the nose was driven into the ground by the impact of its fall, wedged tight into the rock, so that all hell and high water couldn't move it.'

'Earthian or Marshy?' asked Gramp.

The pilot shook his head. Tm not sure,' he said. 'Earth, I think.'

The senator was struggling into his space suit.

'You remember the deal we made?' he asked the pilot. 'You're to say your ship broke down. You'll know how to explain it. So you couldn't get me back in time to make the speech.'

The pilot grinned. 'Sure do, senator,' he said.

Gramp paused with his helmet poised above his head. 'Senator!' he shouted.

He looked at the senator.

'Just who in tarnation are you?' he asked.

'I'm Senator Sherman Brown,' the senator told him. 'Supposed to dedicate the battle monument.'

'Well, I'll be a freckled frog!' said Gramp.

Jurg Tec chuckled.

Gramp whirled on him. 'No wisecracks, Marshy,' he warned.

'Here, here,' shouted the senator. 'You fellows quiet down. No more fighting.'

Space-armored, the four of them left the ship and tramped up the hill toward the ridge top.

Faintly in his helmet-phones, Gramp heard the crunch of carbon dioxide snow beneath their feet, its hiss against the space suits.

Jupiter was setting, a huge red and orange ball with a massive scallop gnawed from its top half. Against this darkened, unseen segment of the primary rode the quarter moon of tiny To, while just above, against the black of space, hung the shining sickle of Europa. The sun had set many hours before.

'Pretty as a Christmas tree,' Gramp said.

'Them tourists go nutty over it,' the pilot declared. That taxi of mine has been worked to death ever since the season started. There's something about old Jupiter that gets them.'

'I remember,' Jurg Tec said, 'that it was just like this before the battle. My pal and I walked out of camp to look at it.'

'I didn't know you Marshies ever got to be pals,' said Gramp. 'Figured you were too danged mean.'

'My pal,' said Jurg Tec, 'was killed the next day.'

'Oh,' said Gramp.

They walked in silence for a moment.

'I'm right sorry about your pal,' Gramp told the Martian then.

They topped the ridge.

There she is,' said the pilot, pointing.

Below them lay the dark shape of a huge space ship, resting crazily on the surface, with the stern tilted at a grotesque angle, the nose buried in the rock-hard soil.

'Earth, all right,' said Gramp.

They walked down the hillside toward the ship.

In the derelict's side was a great hole, blasted by a shot of long ago, a shot that echoed in dim memory of that battle forty years before.

'Let's go in,' said the senator. 'I want to take some pictures. Brought some night equipment along. Take pictures in pitch black.'

Something moved inside the ship, something that glinted and shone redly in the light of setting Jupiter.

Astonished, the four fell back a step.

A space-armored man stood just inside the ship, half in shadow, half in light. He held two flame pistols in his hands and they were leveled at Gramp and the other three.

'All right,' said the man, and his voice was savage, vicious, with just a touch of madness in it, T got you covered. Just hoist out your guns and let them drop.'

They did not move, astounded, scarcely believing what they saw.

'Didn't you hear me!' bellowed the man. 'Drop your guns onto the ground.'

The pilot went for his flame pistol, in a swift blur of motion that almost tricked the eye.

But the gun was only half out of its holster when one of the guns in the hands of the man inside the ship blasted with a lurid jet of flame. The charge struck the pilot's space suit, split it open with the fury of its energy. The pilot crumpled and rolled, with arms flapping weirdly, down the hill, to come to rest against the old space derelict. His suit glowed cherry-red.

'Maybe now you know I ain't fooling,' said the man.

Gramp, with one finger, carefully lifted his pistol from its holster and let it drop to the ground. Jurg Tec and the senator did likewise. There was no use being foolish. Not when a killer had you covered with two guns.

The man stepped carefully out of the ship and waved them back. He bolstered one of his guns, stooped and scooped up the three weapons on the ground.

'What's the meaning of this?' demanded the senator.

The man chuckled.

'I'm Spike Cardy,' he said. 'Maybe you heard of me. Only man to escape from Ganymede prison. Said nobody could break that crib. But Spike Cardy did.'

'What are you going to do with us?' asked the senator.

'Leave you here,' said Spike. 'I'm going to take your ship and leave you here.'

'But that's murder,' shouted the senator. 'We'll die. We only have about four hours' air.'