Although the ground fighting had moved away from the site, the air fighting was all around and above us. I was watching the vapor trails and trying to figure out who was what and how they could tell, when a big transport streaked into the area, put on the brakes with a burst of rato units, and spilled a platoon of sky boys. Again I wondered; it was too far away to tell whether they wore slugs or not. At least it came in from the east, but that did not necessarily prove anything.
I spotted the Old Man, talking with the commander of the landing force. I went up and interrupted. “We ought to get out of here, boss. This place is due to be atom-bombed about ten minutes ago.”
The commander answered me. “Relax,” he said blandly, “the concentration does not merit A-bombing, not even a pony bomb.”
I was just about to ask him sharply how he knew that the slugs would figure it that way, when the Old Man interrupted. “He’s right, son.” He took me by the arm and walked me back toward the car. “He’s perfectly right, but for the wrong reasons.”
“Huh?”
“Why haven’t we bombed the cities they hold? They won’t bomb this area, not while that ship is intact. They don’t want to damage it; they want it back. Now go on back to Mary. Dogs and strange men—remember?”
I shut up, unconvinced. I expected us all to be clicks in a Geiger counter any second. Slugs, fighting as individuals, fought with gamecock recklessness—perhaps because they were really not individuals. Why should they be any more cautious about one of their own ships? They might be more anxious to keep it out of our hands than to save it.
We had just reached the car and spoken to Mary when the still-damp little snottie came trotting up. He halted, caught his breath, and saluted the Old Man. “The commander says that you are to have anything you want, sir—anything at all!”
From his manner I gathered that the answering dispatch had probably been spelled out in asterisks, accompanied by ruffles and flourishes. “Thank you, sir,” the Old Man said mildly. “We merely want to inspect the captured ship.”
“Yes, sir. Come with me, sir.” He came with us instead, having difficulty making up his mind whether to escort the Old Man or Mary. Mary won. I came along behind, keeping my mind on watching out and ignoring the presence of the youngster. The country on that coast, unless gardened constantly, is practically jungle; the saucer lapped over into a brake of that sort and the Old Man took a shortcut through it. The kid said to him. “Watch out, sir. Mind where you step.”
I said, “Slugs?”
He shook his head. “Coral snakes.”
At that point a poisonous snake would have seemed as pleasant as a honey bee, but I must have been paying some attention to his warning for I was looking down when the next thing happened.
I first heard a shout. Then so help me, a Bengal tiger was charging us.
Probably Mary got in the first shot. I know that mine was not behind that of the young officer; it might even have been ahead. I’m sure it was—fairly sure, anyhow. It was the Old Man who shot last.
Among the four of us we cut that beast so many ways that it would never be worth anything as a rug. And yet the slug on it was untouched; I fried it with my second bolt. The young fellow looked at it without surprise. “Well,” he said, “I thought we had cleaned up that load.”
“Huh? What do you mean?”
“One of the first transport tanks they sent out. Regular Noah’s Ark. We were shooting everything from gorillas to polar bears. Say, did you ever have a water buffalo come at you?”
“No and I don’t want to.”
“Not near as bad as the dogs, really. If you ask me, those things don’t have much sense.” He looked at the slug, quite unmoved, while I was ready as usual to throw up.
We got up out of there fast and onto the titan ship—which did not make me less nervous, but more. Not that there was anything frightening in the ship itself, not in its appearance.