Even before he began to feel the pain inside him, Odal began trying to push the boulder off. But he couldn’t get enough leverage. Then he saw the Star Watchman’s form standing over him.
“I didn’t really think you’d fall for it,” Hector’s voice said in his earphones. “I mean . . . didn’t you realize that the boulder was too massive to escape completely after it missed me? You just threw it into orbit . . . uh, a two-minute orbit, roughly. It had to come back … all I had to do was keep you in the same spot for a few minutes.”
Odal said nothing, but strained every cell in his pain-racked body to get the boulder off him. Hector reached over his shoulder and began fumbling with the valves that were pressed against the rocks.
“Sorry to do this . . . but I’m not killing you . . . just defeating you. Let’s see, one of these is the oxygen valve, and the other, I think, is the emergency rocket pack. Now, which is which?”
Hector’s hand tightened on a valve and turned it sharply. A rocket roared to life and Odal was hurtled free of the boulder, shot completely off the planetoid. Hector was bowled over by the blast and rolled halfway around the tiny chunk of rock and metal.
Odal tried to reach the rocket throttle, but the pain was too great. He was slipping into unconsciousness. He fought against it. He knew he must return to the planetoid and somehow kill his opponent. But gradually the pain overpowered him. His eyes were closing, closing….
And quite abruptly he found himself sitting in the booth of the dueling machine. It took a moment for him to realize that he was back in the real world. Then his thoughts cleared. He had failed to kill Hector. He hadn’t even defeated him.
And at the door of the booth stood Kor, his face a grim mask of anger.
For the moment, Leoh’s office behind the dueling machine looked like a great double room. One wall had been replaced by a full-sized view screen, which now seemed to be dissolved, so that he was looking directly into the austere metallic utility of a star-ship compartment.
Spencer was saying, “So this hired assassin, after killing four men and nearly wrecking a government, has returned to his native worlds.”
Leoh nodded. “He returned under guard. I suppose he’s in disgrace, or perhaps even under arrest.”
“Servants of a dictator never know when they’ll be the ones who are served-on a platter.” Spencer chuckled. “And the Watchman who assisted you, this Junior Lieutenant Hector, where is he?”
“The Dulaq girl has him in tow, somewhere. Evidently it’s the first time he’s been a hero.”
Spencer shifted his weight in his chair. “I’ve long prided myself on the conviction that any Star Watch officer can handle almost any kind of emergency. From your description of the past few weeks’ happenings, I was beginning to have my doubts. However, Junior Lieutenant Hector seems to have scraped through.”
“He turned out to be an extremely valuable man,” Leoh said, smiling. “I think he’ll make a fine officer.”
Spencer grunted an affirmative.
“Well,” Leoh said, “that’s the story, to date. I believe that Odal is finished. But the Kerak Worlds have annexed the Szarno Confederacy and are rearming in earnest now. And the Acquatainian government is still very wobbly. There will be elections for a new Prime Minister in a few days, with half a dozen men running and no one in a clear majority. We haven’t heard the last of Kanus, either, not by a long shot.”
Spencer lifted a shaggy eyebrow. “Neither,” he rumbled, “has he heard the last from us.”
II
The Force of Pride
Odal sat alone in the waiting room. It was a bare cubicle, with rough stone walls and a single slit window set high above the floor, close to the ceiling. For furniture, there was only one wooden bench and a view screen set into the wall opposite it. The room was quiet as death.
The Kerak major sat stiff-backed and unmoving. But his mind was racing: