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Kai and Varian exchanged fleeting glances.

“How did he elude you?” Paskutti was surprised.

Divisti shrugged. “Confusion. Thought he’d cling to the others.”

So they considered the boy, Bonnard, no threat. Kai looked at Cleiti, hoping she didn’t know where Bonnard had gone, hoping the knowledge wasn’t clear in her naÏve face. But her mouth was closed in a firm, defiant line. Her eyes, too, showed suppressed anger; hatred every time she looked toward the heavy-worlders, and disgust for Gaber blubbering beside her.

Terilla had stopped crying but Kai could see the tremors shaking her frail body. A child who preferred plants would find this violence difficult to endure, and until Lunzie had achieved her control, she couldn’t spare the girl any assistance.

“Start dismantling the lab, Divisti, Tardma.”

The two women nodded and moved to the lab. As they crossed the threshold, Trizein came out of his confusion.

“Wait a minute. You can’t go in there. I’ve experiments and analyses in progress. Divisti, don’t touch that fractional equipment. Have you taken leave of your senses?”

“You’ll take leave of yours,” said Tardma, pausing at the doorway as the chemist strode toward her. With a cool smile of pleasure, she struck him in the face with a blow that lifted the man off his feet and sent him rolling down the hard deck to lie motionless at Lunzie’s feet.

“Too hard, Tardma,” said Paskutti. “I’d thought to take him. He’d be more useful than any of the other lightweights.”

Tardma shrugged. “Why bother with him anyway? Tanegli knows as much as he does.” She went into the lab with an insolent swing of her hips and shortly emerged with Divisti, each carrying as much equipment as they could with a total disregard for its fragility. Heavy-worlder contempt for lightweights evidently extended to their instrumentation. An acrid odor of spilled preservatives and solvents overlaid the air.

With ears now ultrasensitive, Kai heard the landing whine of a sled. From the west. Tanegli had returned. He heard voices. Bakkun was with Tanegli. Shortly the other lightweight geologists were led into the shuttle, Portegin, his head bloody, half-carrying a groggy Dimenon. Aulia and Margit were shoved forward by Bakkun. Triv all but measured his length of the deck, forcefully propelled by Berru who entered behind him, a half-smile of contempt on her face.

Triv reeled to Kai’s side, shielding himself from the heavy-worlders by his leader’s body. Berru ought not to have been so derisive, for Triv now began the breathing exercises that led to the useful Discipline that Kai, Lunzie and Varian were practicing. That made four. Kai didn’t think either Aulia or Margit had qualified in their training. He knew Portegin and Dimenon were not Disciples. Four wasn’t enough to overpower the six heavy-worlders. With luck, though, they might still swing the grim balance back toward hope for the lightweights. Kai had no illusions about their situation: the heavy-worlders had mutinied and intended to strip the camp of anything useful, leaving the ship-bred and lightweights to fend for themselves, unequipped and unprotected on a hostile, dangerous world.

“All right, Bakkun,” said Paskutti, “you and Berru go after our allies. We want to make this look right. That comunit was still warm when I got here. They must have got a message through to the Theks.” He turned bland eyes on Kai, raised his eyebrows slightly to see if his guess was accurate.

Kai returned the gaze calmly. The heavy-worlder had surprised no telltale expression from him. Paskutti shrugged.

“Tanegli, get the rest of the stores!”

Tanegli was back a second later. “There aren’t any power packs left, Paskutti. I thought you said there were.”

“So there aren’t. We’ve enough in the sleds and the lift-belts for some time. Start loading.”

Tanegli went back into the storehold and, after a noisy few moments, emerged, staggering under a plaspack full of jumbled supplies.

“That clears the storehold, Paskutti.” Tanegli