Blish,James – And all the Stars a Stage

thing. From now on, the guards are to wear spacesuits at all times, day and

night; the rest of you will sleep in the ship. All the animals are to be

brought back in. Birn, doesn’t analysis of the apparent direction of the

shots give you anything?”

And all the Stars a Stage 119

“No, Director, not a thing, except that we’re obviously surrounded.”

“AUch is logical. Orders to capture a native if possible are hereby

rescinded; we can’t afford these losses. The new orders are: Shoot to

kill.”

It was almost as though he had been overheard. For nearly two months, the

only incident was a minor flesh wound. One of the night guards also

reported in with a bright weal across one hip of his suit, which might or

might not have been the result of a grazing shot; there were no traces of

extraneous metal in the weal, the steel had simply been polished. He hadn’t

even heard the impact, let alone felt it, and the weal wasn’t turned up

until suit inspection.

Then, in broad cloudless daylight, ten naked unarmed men came out of the

forest to the west, and walked slowly toward the distant, bristling fence

of the encampment, which was yet unaware of their action.

~j

9

It was lucky, although it was probably also inevitable, that the natives

were spotted first by the watch atop the Javelin, and the alert conveyed directly

to Ertak. A quick, fierce look at the magnified image on his screen

evidently was enough to convey to him, first of all, the absolute nakedness

of the entire deputation; and secondly to convince him that if this race