She cried out. Because veined glass struck the lift ceiling and rained fragments over them.

“Prince!” She pulled away from Lorq, and stared down over the lift’s edge.

“Get AWAY FROM HER!” His silver glove snatched another of the shelves from the inductance field that caused it to float around the room, and sailed it at them. “Damn you, you … “ His voice rasped to silence on his anger, then broke: “Get away!”

The second disk hissed by their shoulders and smashed on the balcony bottom. Lorq flung up his arm to knock aside the shards.

Prince ran across the floor to the stairway that mounted at the left side of the tiered chamber. Lorq ran from the lift across the carpeted balcony till he reached the head of the same stairway—Ruby behind him—and started down.

They met on the first balcony. Prince grasped both rails, panting with fury.

“Prince, what the hell is the matter with—”

Prince lunged for him. His silver glove clanged the railing where Lorq had been standing. The brass bar caved, the metal tore. “Thief! Marauder!” Prince hissed, “Murderer!” Scum—”

“What are you talking—”

“—spawn of scum. If you touch my—” His arm lashed again.

“No, Prince!” (That was Ruby.)

Lorq vaulted the balcony and dropped twelve feet to the floor. He landed, falling to his hands and knees in a pool of red that faded to yellow, was cut by drifting green.

“Lorq—!” (Ruby again.)

He flipped, rolling on multichrome (and saw Ruby at the rail, hands at her mouth; then Prince cleared the rail, was in the air, was falling at him). Prince struck the place Lorq’s head had been with his silver fist.

Crack!

Lorq staggered back to his feet and tried to regain his breath. Prince was still down.

The multichrome had smashed under his glove. Cracks zagged a yard out from the impact. The pattern had frozen in a sunburst around the glaring point.

“You … “ Lorq began. Words floundered under panting, “You and Ruby, are you crazy—?”

Prince rocked back to his knees. Fury and pain hooked his face up in outrage. The lips quivered about small teeth, the lids about turquoise eyes. “You clown, you pig, you come to Earth and dare to put your hands, your hands on my—”

“Prince, please—!” Her voice tautened above them. Anguish. Her violent beauty shattered with a cry.

Prince reeled to his feet, grasped another floating shelf. He flung it, roaring.

Lorq cried as it cut his arm and crashed into the French doors behind him.

Cooler air swept the room as the panels swung. Laughter poured from the street.

“I’ll get you; I’ll catch you, and”—he rushed Lorq—”I’ll hurt you!”

Lorq turned, jumped the wrought iron and crashed against the crowd.

They screamed as he barreled through. Hands struck his face, pushed his chest, grabbed his shoulders. The screaming—and the laughter—increased. Prince was behind him because:

“What are they…? Hey, watch out—”

“They’re fighting! Look, that’s Prince—”

“Hold them! Hold them! What are they—”

Lorq broke from the crowd and stumbled against the balustrade. For a moment the rushing Seine and wet rock were below. He pulled back and turned to see.

“Let go of me!” Prince’s voice howled from the crowd. “Let go of my hand! My hand, let go of my hand!”

Memories struck up, shaking. What was confusion before, was fear now.

Beside him stone steps led to the river’s walkway. He fled down, and heard others behind him as he reached the bottom.

Then lights ground on his eyes. Lorq shook his head. Light across the wet pavement, the mossy stone wall beside him—someone had swung a floodlight over to watch.

“Let go of my—” He heard Prince’s voice, cutting through the others. “I’m going to get him!”

Prince raced down the steps, reflections glancing from the rocks. He balanced at the bottom, squinting by the floodlit river.

His vest had been pulled from one shoulder. In the scuffle he had lost the long glove.

Lorq backed away.

Prince raised his arm:

Copper mesh and jeweled capacitors webbed black metal bone, pullies whirred in the clear casing.

Lorq took another step.

Prince lunged.

Lorq dodged for the wall; the two boys spun around each other.

The guests crowded the rail, pushed at the banister. Foxes and lizards, eagles and insects joggled one another to see. Someone stumbled against the floodlight, and the inverted gallery in the water shook,

“Thief!” Prince’s narrow chest was in spasm. “Pirate!” A rocket flared overhead. The explosion thudded after. “You’re dirt, Lorq Von Ray! You’re less than—”

Now Lorq lunged.

Anger snapped in his chest, his eyes, his hands. One fist caught the side of Prince’s head, the other jabbed his stomach. He came with blasted pride, fury compelled by bewilderment, with dense humiliation breaking his breath against his ribs as he fought below the fantastic spectators. He struck again, not knowing where.

Prince’s prosthetic arm swung up.

It caught him under the chin, bright fingers flat. It crushed skin, scraped bone, went on up, opening lip and cheek and forehead. Fat and muscle tore.

Lorq screamed, bloody mouthed, and fell.

“Prince!” Ruby (struggling to see, it was she who had jarred the light) stood on the wall. Red dress and dark hair whipped behind her in the river wind. “Prince, no!”

Panting, Prince stepped back, back again. Lorq lay facedown, one arm in the water. Beneath his head blood slurred the stone.

Prince turned sharply, and walked to the steps. Someone swung the floodlight back up. The people watching from the quay across the Seine were momentarily illuminated. Then the light went up and over, fixing on the building.

People turned from the rail.

Someone started to come down the steps, confronted Prince. After a second he turned back. A plastic rat’s face left the rail. Someone took the transparent vinyl shoulder, led her away. Music from a dozen epochs clashed across the island.

Lorq’s head rocked by the dark water. The river sucked his arm.

Then a lion climbed the wall, dropped barefoot to the stone. A griffon ran down the steps and fell to one knee beside him.

Dan pulled off his false head and tossed it against the steps. It thumped, rolled a foot. The griffon head followed.

Brian turned Lorq over.

Breath caught in Dan’s throat, then came out whistling. “He sure messed up Captain, huh?”

“Dan, we’ve got to get the patrol or something. They can’t do something like this!”

Dan’s shaggy brows rose. “What the hell makes you think they can’t? I’ve worked for bastards with a lot less money than Red-shift who could do a lot more.”

Lorq groaned.

“A medico-unit!” Brian said. “Where do you get a medico-unit here?”

“He ain’t dead. We get him back to the ship. When he comes to, I get my pay and off this damn planet!” He looked over the river from the twin spires of Notre Dame to the opposite bank. “Earth just ain’t big enough for me and Australia both. I’m willing to leave.” He got one arm under Lorq’s knees, the other under his shoulders, and stood up.

“You’re going to carry him?”

“Can you think of another way to get him back?” Dan turned toward the steps.

“But there must be—” Brian followed him. “We have to do—”

Something hissed on the water. Brian looked back.

The wing of a skimmer-boat scraped the shore. “Where are you taking Captain Von Ray?” Ruby, in the front seat, wore a dark cloak now.

“Back to his yacht, ma’am,” Dan said. “It doesn’t look like he’s welcome here.”

“Bring him on the boat.”

“I don’t think we should leave him in anybody’s hands on this world.”

“You’re his crew?”

“That’s right,” Brian said. “Were you going to take him to a doctor?”

“I was going to take him to De Blau Field. You should get off Earth as soon as possible.”