Excerpt: ...was too great. I abandoned the idea and withdrew softly. I would have to take a chance that there was no other member of the crew aboard. I ran back to the entrance compartment. Wilma still lay where she had slumped down. I heard the voices of the Hans approaching. It was time to act. The next few seconds would tell whether the ships in the air would try or be able to melt us into nothingness. I spoke. "Are you boys all ready?" I asked, creeping to a position opposite the door and drawing my hand-gun. Again there was a chorus of assent. "Then on the count of three, shoot up those repellor rays-all of them-and for God's sake, don't miss." And I counted. I think my "three" was a bit weak. I know it took all the courage I had to utter it. For an agonizing instant nothing happened, except that the landing party from the ship strolled into my range of vision. Then startled, they turned their eyes upward. For an instant they stood frozen with horror at whatever they saw. One hurled his knife at me. It grazed my cheek. Then a couple of them made a break for the doorway. The rest followed. But I fired pointblank with my hand-gun, pressing the button as fast as I could and aiming at their feet to make sure my explosive rockets would make contact and do their work. The detonations of my rockets were deafening. The spot on which the Hans stood flashed into a blinding glare. Then there was nothing there except their torn and mutilated corpses. They had been fairly bunched, and I got them all. I ran to the door, expecting any instant to be hurled into infinity by the sweep of a disintegrator ray. Some eighth of a mile away I saw one of the ships crash to earth. A disintegrator ray came into my line of vision, wavered uncertainly for a moment and then began to sweep directly toward the ship in which I stood. But it never reached it. Suddenly, like a light switched off, it shot to one side, and a moment later another vast hulk crashed to earth. I...