"Looks like the air is seventy-one percent nitrogen, twenty-seven percent oxygen, and a little bit of almost everything else. Pressure is 1.22 standard. Pretty rich stuff but you could breathe it," Rick said.

"We'll just stay in our suits, thank you," Bob replied.

Pops opened the door which swung easily inward. He stuck his head through the door. The room was dimly lit and his image intensifiers adjusted automatically.

This should have been the room of the twin depressions if this comet was exactly like the abandoned ones they'd visited, and Pops was fairly certain that it was. But he had trouble orienting himself to the view. Despite the image intensification, in the dim light it was still hard to discern edges and ridges, and even though after a few seconds he convinced himself that he could discern the double depressions throughout the room, the task was complicated by the fact that there was something that looked mechanical within each of the depressions. He altered his visual system to infrared imagery and had steep temperature gradients rendered as lines.

Pops suppressed a gasp-suddenly he knew exactly what he was looking at.

"This room is full of Phinons, Bob. Over a hundred. But they're not moving. I'm going to step inside. Be ready if I start firing, but I have a hunch they aren't going to even notice me." Pops moved into the room. Nothing stirred. Bob followed behind him.

Almost every depression held a Phinon, facedown, arms thrust straight out in front of the head to clasp hands with another Phinon in the neighboring depression. Each pair was immobile, though Pops was able to see with his view setting that the bodies were warm and that some kind of Phinon "heart" was beating within each.

"Well, now just what the hell do you think this is all about?"

The words startled them and Bob gave a visible start. The two had been making their observations in silence. It was Rick, who had been monitoring Pops' visuals, making a comment. Pops said, "I was going to say, 'God only knows,' but I'm not so sure even about that."

It was Bob who noticed the first movement among one pair of alien bodies. But it was not the bodies themselves that were moving, but something on them.

"Can you see that, Pops?" Bob whispered, pointing.

Pops could.

On the back of the right shoulder of both of the Phinons something was detaching itself. As his vision system improved the view, Pops' first impression was that an eight-legged starfish was lifting itself off the shoulders and trying to stand up. As he watched he substituted "mechanical spider" for "starfish" in his mind, and was fascinated as the little entity actively pulled itself up out of the Phinon's flesh, shedding bits of skin and strings of wet flesh. Once entirely free, the tiny hydraulic spider set off down the right arm of the Phinon body.

The spider on the paired body, freeing itself at almost exactly the same moment, did likewise.

"Fascinating," Pops and Bob heard through the comm. Rick sounded entranced.

"You know, I believe there's a section on these things in the Phinon material," Bob said. "They found this thing on the dried out Phinon Michaels killed, but they couldn't figure out what the hell it was."

Each spider continued down the arms, crossed over respectively to the other Phinon of the pair, and then situated itself again by the right shoulder. Once there, they seemed to be going about trying to rebury themselves.

"This is a mating chamber," Pops said. "By God, they're mating. They go into a complete stupor so those spider things can get loose and crawl to where they need to go. That's how they exchange DNA."

"I think you're right," Rick said. "Somehow I don't think Phinon porno shows are likely to be a hit, though."

Pops noticed that many of the other pairs now showed spiders making their short pilgrimages and decided it was time to get going.

"This looks a little too easy, but I think we should gather up one of those frozen pairs and haul ass," Pops said. "If they start moving we'll try the PMDP."

The Phinon pair closest to them was nearly finished mating, if that's what it was, so Bob and Pops waited until the two spiders seemed to be dug in. "I just thought of something," Bob said. "What if the spiders don't stay put, but drop sperm or something and then return to their original bodies?"

"Do you want to wait and see?" Pops retorted. "Could take days for all we know."

"I'll take the closest one," Bob said. "We might have to pull them apart, though. Looks like they're holding on to each other pretty tightly."

"Of course," Pops observed. "Haven't you ever been in love?"

"Do Phinons love?" Bob asked.

"I don't know. Their sex looks pretty mechanical to me," Rick said, laughing at his own joke.

Bob stepped next to the Phinon pair and tried to separate the hands. "Geez, it's like trying to pull apart a heavy chain," he said, and cranked up his suit power. At several tons of force the hands came apart, actually shattering and exploding at the release of energy rather than ungrasping, and sending a loud ripping noise echoing through the chamber.

The other pair of locked hands unclasped then, and the lights came on.

Armed Phinons were pouring in from the door on the far side of the room, spreading out over the floor, walls, and ceiling, moving on three limbs, holding a weapon in the remaining one, which with some of them was a foot.

"Oh holy damn!" Pops said. He turned and sent a grenade into the far door. The concussion of the explosion sent Phinons flying and even bounced Bob, who was not ready for it, off the closest wall, but he recovered quickly.

The separated Phinons were still in a stupor. "Get them in the bags, Bob. Fast! I'm going to blow out that airlock once we have 'em secured." Bob got to it and Pops watched the other Phinons in the chamber. They were picking themselves up from the explosion, and Pops nailed them one by one with his laser. Only one got off a shot of its own, and then only at the instant that Pops hit it with his own burst, and the shot hit the wall above their heads, exploding the rock and pelting them with gravel shrapnel.

Bob had the two Phinons loaded into the rescue bags. Pops saw that more Phinons were again coming through the destroyed door, and he sent another grenade in that direction. This time Bob braced himself before the concussion hit.

"Stand clear," Pops ordered, and he fired down the short airlock tube. He watched as the door on the end glowed red then bubbled outward and burst. This caused the inner door to immediately reclose as the

pressure dropped, but Pops grabbed it and tore it right off its hinge and the air whooshed through the tube.

The resulting wind pulled Phinon breeding pairs out of their depressions, and though they were tossed

about the chamber, they showed no sign of waking up, remaining as stiff as planks in a tornado. The few

living Phinons from the far door were too busy trying to breathe to fire at them.

"Through the tube!" Pops ordered, and Bob took one of the rescue bags with him. Pops followed with the other.

Once in the major tunnel, the two hit their jets and tore off back toward the main shaft that led to the surface.

Once there, Pops looked up. He could see no stars.

"They closed the outer door," he said. "Shit!"

They he noticed that dozens of doors along the tunnel were opening.

"We can blast through the outer door," Bob said. He was still looking up.

"If we get a chance," Pops said. "But they're after us."

"Oh shit," Bob said, himself now seeing the doors opening. Pops checked his suit indicator. They were still in vacuum. That was too bad. He'd hoped the Phinons would start filling up the space with air, then another good grenade would blow away the outer door and he and Bob would be all set. But this time the Phinons that began emerging were wearing suits, and carrying arms.

"You head upward with the bags, Bob," Pops said. "And blast your way out. I'll hover down here just inside the shaft and hold them off. Otherwise they'll cut us to pieces on the way up."

Bob hesitated. "No, I'll hold them off. You take the Phinons back to the ship."

"My suit is better than yours, Lieutenant. And you can't abandon the ship. She's yours. Have some faith.

I'll follow along as soon as you're clear," Pops said. Pops handed over his Phinon.

In return, Bob detached his ammunition cache and handed it to Pops. "You'll need this more than I will," he said. Then Bob clapped him on the shoulder and set off, holding both Phinons in one hand, his other hand free to shoot.

Pops hovered near the wall of the shaft. A spacesuited Phinon with a weapon appeared. It was the classic Phinon hand weapon-an X-ray laser with a beam of adjustable length. The beam was glowing a bright white, waste energy trickling out, looking like a three-meter-long, white-hot lance. Pops picked off the Phinon with his laser.

Then another came into view. And another.

Pops anchored himself to the wall. He fired a grenade that exploded against the big door directly at the bottom of the shaft, but without atmosphere down there only bits of shrapnel were left to whiz through the vacuum and strike a Phinon or two.

He settled for picking them off with the laser as they came into view. This time none of them were fleeing when one of them fell. Guess there's no flight when they're in their own hive, Pops thought. He knew he was likely to soon be overwhelmed. Of course, there was one other thing Pops had left that he could do, but he'd have to wait until Bob was clear before he tried it.

So the Phinons kept coming and dying and coming.

And coming.

Back aboard the Hyperlight, Rick had not noticed immediately when the Phinons appeared. He had been watching Bob's attempt to separate the hands, and when they came apart, he'd exclaimed: "Holy smoke. I got to see that again."

Without delay Rick had switched the screen to a slow motion replay, and watched as the intertwined fingers refused to disentangle, and finally they all simply sheared away at once.

When he switched back to real time, he saw that the lights had come on and Pops and Bob were in the middle of a fight.

Don't call them. They're pros. They don't need to be interrupted, he thought.

Rick watched through Pops' suit the Phinon onslaught and the subsequent slaughter being meted out by Pops. He had to restrain himself from calling out to the commander when he noticed an alien that he was sure Pops had missed, only to watch said alien die an instant later.

Rick watched their flight down the main tunnel. He watched as more Phinons began to emerge. He overheard the discussion Pops and Bob had about who should stay. He watched Bob fly up the shaft with the two Phinons, then switched screens and watched Pops shooting at off-screen Phinons when Bob turned back to look.

Bob called. "Get into the pilot's bubble, Rick, and cover me with the antipersonnel laser once I clear the shaft. Shoot anything that moves that isn't either me or Pops."

"Yes . . . Lieutenant," Rick replied. This was actually the first moment of the trip where Rick had felt the weight of command upon the shoulders of his friend. "And be careful, Bob. I can't pilot the ship home alone."

"If something happens to both me and Pops, you know how to set the self-destruct, right?" Bob asked.

"I rigged it, remember? The mass converter will overload. We'll take the whole comet with us and they'll even see the fireworks back home."

Bob slowed rapidly as he approached the door covering the shaft. He jetted along beneath it, inspecting the locking mechanism on one side, and the hinges on the other, and came to a decision.

He looked at the Phinons through the transparent quadrant in each rescue bag. They still looked soundly comatose.

Near each of the myriad tunnels intersecting the shaft were small projections. Bob picked out two at random about ten meters below the door on the side away from the hinges and hooked a Phinon to each. Then he jetted back up to the hinges and set a charge under each one. He forced himself to take extra time positioning the explosives to guarantee that the first blast would be the only one.

Bob looked down the shaft once more. Pops was still firing, but far more often now. "You holding your own, Pops? I'm about to blow the door. Watch out for shrapnel coming down."

"That's the . . . least of my worries . . . right now," Pops replied.

Though concerned for his friend, the best thing Bob could do for Pops right now was to get the door open. "Here goes," he said.

Bob had dropped back down to where he'd left the Phinons. He detonated the charges. The silent explosion threw chunks of ice and rock out into space. He looked up and was pleased to see the dented circle of the shaft door tumbling rapidly in the direction of Ursa Major, right in the middle of the starfilled circle.

"Success, Pops! You, too, Rick. I'm on my way."

Bob collected up the rescue bags, then thought he felt something move inside one of them. For a moment he froze, then slowly brought the bags closer to look inside. He saw only a comatose Phinon in the first bag. In the second, the Phinon stared back at him.

Startled, Bob reflexively held the bag as far away from his face as he could, but he continued to look inside and watched as the Phinon lifted its damaged left hand in front of its face and looked it over. It did not seem to be in pain and after a few seconds ignored its hand and started testing the strength of the rescue bag, as if it had simply noted the fact of its hand's demise, but didn't actually care.

It didn't seem to have noticed Bob at all.

It pushed out hard on the rescue bag. "Shit. It's trying to break out," Bob whispered to himself. Briefly he considered shooting it, then realized that if it broke out, it would simply die. The rescue bag was the only thing between it and vacuum.

What an idiot I am! He remembered the ampules of PMDP, retrieved one, and drove the stinger through the material of the bag. The bag would reseal itself from such a small hole.

The Phinon ceased moving.

You were right, Sammi. He drove another ampule into the other Phinon even though it had yet to show any signs of waking up.

Bob found it more than a little ironic that he had just saved a Phinon's life. He never thought he'd ever be inclined to do that.

The firefight below was still going on. Bob didn't want to distract Pops again by calling, but he was afraid for the old man. Pops was firing continuously now, yet there seemed to be no shortage of Phinons to refill the ranks.

He called anyway. "Pops, can you rocket up here?"

Pops was short of breath. "No. Sorry, Lieutenant. There's too many. They'll . . . cut me down from below if I give them . . . half a second to aim."

"I'm coming back down," Bob said. "The door is gone, now. I'll help and we'll both get out of this."

"No, God damn it! You're the only other pilot. I don't need the . . . freaking cavalry! Get those Phinons to the ship. That's what we came out here to do. I've been in . . . deeper shit than this." * * *

There were plenty of Phinons to shoot at.

Pops had lost track of how long he'd been shooting. His FEL UV laser had long since lost its charge. He was also out of grenades and had fewer than a score of bullets for his slug thrower. He was using the suit laser now, and with its power pack, he could keep firing forever, or at least until it overheated.

Rick called him. "I've been watching Pops, and doing a count. They're definitely thinning out. You're