WHIRLING, HE WENT IN the direction of the sound, his twin guns clearing tangled vines and creepers from his path so swiftly that he went forward at a run. Cold sweat bathed his body, but his mind seemed to be a detached entity that watched the entire happening with a calm unhurried interest.
He didn’t know why he ran; he had no particular reason to race to the rescue of the Earthpeople ahead—but the instinctive reactions of years of being a patrolman would not be denied.
He stumbled as he ran, his feet slipping and sliding in the ooze that lay but a few inches beneath the surface of the ground. His breath grew ragged in his throat, and a pain knifed at his side, but he kept up his steady running for minutes.
At last, he burst from the matted jungle into a clearing that led to the water’
