these with heartfelt
approval.

Then he stared, bewilderedly aware that something had gone wrong. The
big machines had turned and begun heading toward the ridge, clattering
along at their top speed and no longer pausing to fire.

Within moments, Dworn perceived that all the other attackers were doing
likewise; everywhere on the blazing battlefield, they had ceased their
advance and were scattering to seek cover.

Only then, as the firing slackened, did he realize that the sky had
begun to echo with a spiteful screaming of flying things. Against the
brightening daylight hurtled some two dozen dark winged shapes ...
fighter drones.

Dworn realized they must have been out on patrol, and summoned back by
the drones' mysterious means of communication to defend the threatened
hive. Now the flight was splitting into groups of two or three, diving
to attack at one point and another and flitting away again so swiftly
that human reflexes could scarcely act to train a gun.

Dworn glimpsed Qanya's horrified face beside him, and the girl threw her
weight against him and dragged him down among the sheltering rocks.
Overhead, from out of the sun, shot three of the winged drones. They
passed over before the shrieking of their flight could reach the ears,
and Dworn caught a glimpse of bombs tumbling earthward. Thunder crashed
as the scorpions hugging the ridge threw up a vicious defensive barrage,
and was drowned out as the bombs landed all around. The rocks heaved,
and dust and splinters showered down from above.

Only a dozen yards away, a scorpion came rumbling up across the crest,
its many wheels jolting over the rocks, and halted there, its tail gun
weaving angrily as it sought vainly for targets in the sky. Along one of
its gray-painted sides was a long bright gash where something had barely
glanced from its armor. And Dworn saw, too, the black outline of a
mythological arachnid on its observation turret, which signified that
the machine belonged to a scorpion chief.

* * * * *

Scarcely knowing what he intended, he shook off Qanya's panic grip and
plunged recklessly toward the big machine. As he scrambled over the
rugged hilltop, he saw fleetingly what went on in the arena of
battle--the allied peoples were being driven back, forced to concentrate
their fire power on beating off aerial onslaughts. Meantime, the
wingless drones about their beleaguered citadel worked feverishly to
clear the