40.
and made a bad landing in the dark."
"I'LL tell them," North argued. "You'd better head for home before you're missed."
"No way!" Grey Mountain stubbornly argued in return. "I'm going with you, just to make sure you get there safely. Tell me, North, what's it feel like?....To kill a man, I mean."
North looked at his friend in surprise.
"It didn't feel like anything," he explained. "I suppose it should, but it was like I was killing some dangerous animal, not a man. I didn't even think about it, I just swung! I wasn't angry--I didn't hate him--I just knew I had to do it, and did it, that's all. I never thought about it."
Grey Mountain looked at his friend and nodded.
"Yes," he said, "I think I understand. I could hear the threats he was making to the Hashons: What they'd do to the females before they'd kill them. He was laughing about it just before you hit him. Just as I shouted. He's sure not laughing now!"
After a few more minutes rest, the two again winged skyward. In a short time a doctor was treating North's hand in a hospital.
"Will you young people never learn to use lights when you land in strange areas at night? This is the third incident caused by bad night landings this week, and the one yesterday will be in a Med-Com for months! He broke every bone he could break, and still be alive!"
As North and Grey were leaving, two stretcher bearers came in with a covered stretcher.
"We've got that guy in the ventilator!" the medic said. "This is going to be a bad one to even identify! The only thing we know for sure, he was in The Lord's Guard!"
The medic held out a battered helmet, or what was left of it.
"Kids flying at night," the doctor said, "and grown men that don't know engough to stay out of flyways! I suppose you couldn't find his I.D. tags."
The medic shook his head.
"Come on," the doctor told them, "let's see if we can get some finger prints. There ARE some hands left, I hope!"
"Yes," the medic told him. They picked up the stretcher and carried it through a doorway marked "AUTOPSY". When North and Grey cleared the door, and were air-borne, they were both laughing.
"It's really not funny," said Grey, "those poor guys having to pick up the pieces, and imagine the engineers having to repair those fans!"
"Yes," North agreed, "but can you think of a better way to get rid of garbage, than dumping it down a chopper?"
"No," was the answer, and he couldn't help laughing.