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What can one man possibly do against a fleet loaded with H-bombs?" As if in answer to the question, Ulv's voice drowned him out, the harsh Disan words slashing the silence of the room. "Kill you, the enemy!" he said. "Kill you umedvirk!" He shouted the last word and his hand flashed to his belt. In a single swift motion he lifted his blowgun and placed it to his lips.
The man had backed in, firing behind him as he came. Ulv had no compunctions about killing, only his darts couldn't penetrate the magter's thick clothing. As the magter turned, Ulv's breath pulsed once and death stung the back of the other man's hand. He collapsed into a crumpled heap.
Brion had heard the bombs fall. Yet the Nyjord soldier was here. The two facts couldn't be accepted together. "Would you keep a hold on his arm, sir, just in case," the soldier said, glancing warily at Ulv's blowpipe. "I know what those darts can do." He pulled a microphone from one of his pockets and spoke into it.
When he posed the question to himself in this way he found that it stated clearly its inherent answer. He pulled his gun out, and as he did he wondered what Ulv's answer might be. "Nyjord is medvirk," Ulv said, raising his blowgun and sending a dart across the cavern. It struck one of the technicians, who gasped and fell to the floor.
"Don't shoot," a voice called from outside the cave, and a man stepped through the swirling dust and smoke to stand in the beam from the light. Brion clutched wildly at Ulv's arm, dragging the blowgun from the Disan's mouth. The man in the light wore a protective helmet, thick boots and a pouch-hung uniform. He was a Nyjorder. The realization was almost impossible to accept.
His toe pushed against a body on the ground and from the darkness Ulv whispered, "There were only two. We can go on now." Finding their way through the cave was a maddening torture. They had no light, nor would they dare use one if they had. There were no wheel marks to follow on the stone floor. Without Ulv's sensitive nose they would have been completely lost.
"Many variations are possible, and all the better ones continue. You might say that Ulv's people survive, but the magter survive better. If offworld contact hadn't been re-established, I imagine that the magter would slowly have become the dominant race. Only they won't have the chance now. It looks as though they have succeeded in destroying both races with their suicidal urge."
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