king, he touched the tab on his
arm. "Can they--"

"They're not bothered by your radiation tabs. It makes no difference
to them, Russian, American, Pole, German. It's all the same. They're
doing what they were designed to do. Carrying out the original idea.
They track down life, wherever they find it."

"They go by warmth," Klaus said. "That was the way you constructed
them from the very start. Of course, those you designed were kept back
by the radiation tabs you wear. Now they've got around that. These new
varieties are lead-lined."

"What's the other variety?" Hendricks asked. "The David type, the
Wounded Soldier--what's the other?"

"We don't know." Klaus pointed up at the wall. On the wall were two
metal plates, ragged at the edges. Hendricks got up and studied them.
They were bent and dented.

"The one on the left came off a Wounded Soldier," Rudi said. "We got
one of them. It was going along toward our old bunker. We got it from
the ridge, the same way we got the David tagging you."

The plate was stamped: I-V. Hendricks touched the other plate. "And
this came from the David type?"

"Yes." The plate was stamped: III-V.

Klaus took a look at them, leaning over Hendricks' broad shoulder.
"You can see what we're up against. There's another type. Maybe it was
abandoned. Maybe it didn't work. But there must be a Second Variety.
There's One and Three."

"You were lucky," Rudi said. "The David tagged you all the way here
and never touched you. Probably thought you'd get it into a bunker,
somewhere."

"One gets in and it's all over," Klaus said. "They move fast. One lets
all the rest inside. They're inflexible. Machines with one purpose.
They were built for only one thing." He rubbed sweat from his lip. "We
saw."

They were silent.

"Let me have another cigarette, Yank," Tasso said. "They are good. I
almost forgot how they were."

* * * * *

It was night. The sky was black. No stars were visible through the
rolling clouds of ash. Klaus lifted the lid cautiously so that
Hendricks could look out.

Rudi pointed into the darkness. "Over that way are the bunkers. Where
we used to be. Not over half a mile from us. It was just chance Klaus
and I were not there when it happened. Weakness. Saved by our lusts."

"All the rest must be dead," Klaus said in a low voice. "It came
quickly. This morning the Politburo reached their decision. They
notified us--forward command. Our runn