to separate sense from futility. Finally parts
would wear out, circuits would short, and one by one the killers would
crunch to a halt. A few birds would still fly then, but a unique animal
life, rare in the universe, would exist no more. And the bones of
children, eager girls, and their men would also lie, beside a rusty
hulk, beneath the alien sun.

"Peggy!"

As if in answer, a tree beside him breathed fire, then exploded. In the
brief flash of the blaster shot, Alan saw the steel glint of a robot
only a hundred yards away, much nearer than he had thought. "Thank
heaven for trees!" He stepped back, felt his foot catch in something,
clutched futilely at some leaves and fell heavily.

Pain danced up his leg as he grabbed his ankle. Quickly he felt the
throbbing flesh. "Damn the rotten luck, anyway!" He blinked the pain
tears from his eyes and looked up--into a robot's blaster, jutting out
of the foliage, thirty yards away.

* * * * *

Instinctively, in one motion Alan grabbed his pocket blaster and fired.
To his amazement the robot jerked back, its gun wobbled and started to
tilt away. Then, getting itself under control, it swung back again to
face Alan. He fired again, and again the robot reacted. It seemed
familiar somehow. Then he remembered the robot on the river bank,
jiggling and swaying for seconds after each shot. "Of course!" He cursed
himself for missing the obvious. "The blaster static blanks out radio
transmission from the computer for a few seconds. They even do it to
themselves!"

Firing intermittently, he pulled himself upright and hobbled ahead
through the bush. The robot shook spasmodically with each shot, its gun
tilted upward at an awkward angle.

Then, unexpectedly, Alan saw stars, real stars brilliant in the night
sky, and half dragging his swelling leg he stumbled out of the jungle
into the camp clearing. Ahead, across fifty yards of grass stood the
headquarters building, housing the robot-controlling computer. Still
firing at short intervals he started across the clearing, gritting his
teeth at every step.

Straining every muscle in spite of the agonizing pain, Alan forced
himself to a limping run across the uneven ground, carefully avoiding
the insect hills that jutted up through the grass. From the corner of
his eye he saw another of the robots standing shakily in the dark edge
of the jungle waiting, it seemed, for his small blaster to run dry.

"Be da