?"

"I have to relieve Burke at the ventilating turbines."

"Let Burke wait. Lead on to the invisibility generators."

"Oh, I can't do that, mister! I got to have a pass. Say, mister, I was
just kidding about being one of Gore's men. I'm for the cap'n, yes,
sir!"

"You lying scum!" Quirl barked impatiently. "Get going!"

The white-faced and bewildered pirate led the way down the tube to the
after end. He unlatched a door and tried to enter, but as soon as he
had dropped through to the platform he was met by a guard with leveled
ionizer.

"This gem'man," he started to explain. But Quirl dropped after him and
gave him a powerful shove, so that he crashed into the guard. The
latter pulled the trigger, and the unfortunate pirate crashed over the
platform's edge to the floor. Quirl had out his own electrogun and
dispatched the guard. At the same time he felt a stunning shock. His
senses reeled, but the grating had taken part of the discharge loosed
by a pirate electrician at the foot of the ladder. Quirl threw his
riot club and followed that up with another lightning bolt.

* * * * *

He was then the only living person in the room, in which two
generators hummed softly. Connected to them was a bank of U-shaped
tubes, each as tall as a man, which were filled with silent livid
fire. Quirl picked up a wrench and started hammering at the thick
tubes until the glass cracked. Each time he was engulfed by a wave of
heat, and the tube became black. The great generators idled and
automatically came to a stop. Quirl was certain now that the pirate
ship would be visible, but the position of the captives was still
desperate. He hoped that none of the surviving pirates would think of
calling at the generator room, or find out in some other way that they
were now visible in the eternal day of space.

Quietly he climbed back to the passage and closed the hatch. He cast
about for his next move. He was looking toward the bow, but on hearing
the subdued clink of metal on metal, he turned.

A dozen of the pirates were coming toward him.

It would have been useless to draw his weapon. Theirs were out and
could have burned him to a crisp before he could move. Silently and
with deadliness apparent in every move they approached him.

"Hope they try to capture me alive!" he thought. "What a dog-fight
that'll be!"

Now they were nearly up to him.

"Come along, you fool!" barked the leader of the group