Defender Zik lands on the central peak of the crater again, debating internally how he should handle this trap of Morren’s. If he stays completely out of the line of fire, Morren will kill Lia, but if he stays in the open, it’s only a matter of time before Morren succeeds.

With very few options, Zik tries to goad Morren into making a mistake.  He begins to insult his foe, but just as Morren is about to hurl some invective right back, Sten and Tanaka’s efforts at the top of the crater rim succeed! A huge crack opens in the cliff face!

Defender Zik is now atop the central peak of the crater, desperately trying to reach his employees who have been taken hostage by the evil Jairian Morren. But he’s exposed, and Morren sends a full barrage of exploding shells raining on the peak.

It’s clear that the Jairian isn’t trying to preserve the hostages lives, so one of the remaining two reaches out to the other to get them both under cover. Lia gets up and follows, but Morren spots them! Try as they may, they’re not going to make it to cover, so Lia’s brave companion throws her ahead and takes the brunt of the blast!

Furious, Zik launches himself toward Morren, sending a hail of bullets at the foul villain!

The Temerity crew scrambles for cover at the floor of a crater as bullets zing through the sky. Mizhakwan hurries over to help the maimed Gordon while Zik calls again for Amelia to come back with the ship. But Zoot interrupts to inform Zik that their communications are being jammed! They can reestablish local comms with the team via a tight-beam line-of-sight backup system, but comms to the Temerity are severed!

Assessing the situation, Zik asks how many enemies they face. Sten informs him that there are three adversaries, spread out around the rim of the crater.  In that case, it’s time to reply with extreme violence! Zik and the crew open up and send a hail of bullets back at the Jairians!

Taking cover, Morren taps into a local channel to interrupt Zik’s barrage…

In his eagerness to reunite with his daughter, Gordon Mises gets ahead of the rest of the crew of the Temerity.  Defender Zik urges caution, because this scenario seems too much like an….

AMBUSH!

From hiding, Morren fires at the person who looks most like how he remembers Zik from their last encounter. But that person is the unfortunate Gordon, whose arm is blown clear off from Morren’s shot!

Gordon falls out of the sky, and while Zik scrambles to catch him, everyone scatters. Bullets are zipping in from all around the crater, and there’s a mad dash for cover while Sten, Tanaka and Trent Quickdraw give covering fire.

They reach the crater floor after some near-misses, and Zik calls out to the Temerity for support – Amelia, come back!

A mighty brawl erupts in the jungle, as the gorillaurs attack Defender Zik and his Chadee pal Tanaka! As the huge male takes a swipe at Zik, a female sneaks up on Tanaka, who is drawing his pistol.  She grabs Tanaka from behind in a half-Nelson, forcing him to drop the gun!

Zik and the huge male square off, but it goes about as badly for Zik as you might expect. With his suit integrity beginning to decline, Zik also whips out his pistol and aims at the male. However, the female has Tanaka in a death grip! One false move, and Tanaka gets a dirt nap!

Surrendering his gun, Zik pleads for his good friend’s life. They’re captives of these enormous, mysterious creatures!

In the galley, Defender Zik lands a solid blow with his club, shattering the visor of Morren’s helmet! Someone’s in trouble if he gets spaced!

Meanwhile, on the bridge, a confident Trent is running out of targets for the Kodiak’s cannons. Between the Chadee snub fighters and his efforts, they’ve eliminated almost all of the Jairian fighters! He turns his attention to the Jairian breacher ship, attached like a lamprey to the side of the Kodiak. With the right angle, maybe he can blow it right off the hull…

In the breacher, the copilot is alarmed at the fact that all the boarding parties seem to be disappearing on him. But the pilot is even more alarmed to see one of the Kodiak’s cannons swing towards them.

At the last moment, both the Jairian pilot and Gerald realize what’s about to happen, but their cries go unheeded as Trent mashes the fire button!  What’s the big deal?! Find out next page!

The gallant Defender Zik and the malodorous Morren Mallor are duking it out in the mess hall of the Kodiak! As a dazed Amelia watches from the doorway, your favorite space hero fends off Morren’s knife attacks and swings back with the club he found! Who will prevail?!

The vile Jairian invader Morren Mallor continues his sexual assault on Amelia, who fights back as well as she’s able to after regaining consciousness.  She desperately reaches around for something to use as a weapon – and finds her fork!

Scooping up the fork, she lunges at Morren’s face. Her fork finds its mark in Morren’s eye! He howls in pain!

Just then, Zik walks into the mess hall and sees that a Jairian is attacking Amelia.  The club he picked up from the last Jairians he encountered comes in handy, and he gives Morren a mighty wallop in the back of the head!

Teams of Jairian raiders are moving through the Kodiak, seeking to take it over! One pair, moving forward, stumbles into the hangar where they find a huge column containing the machinery for the forward howitzer. They decide that in order to protect their comrades outside the ship, they should disable the huge cannon by smashing it until it stops firing!

They never suspect that Seamus and Jason have fixed blades to their tonfas, and are sneaking up behind them…

Nearby, one level down, another pair of the attacking space commies have found a barracks. They decide to see who they might catch asleep and unaware, and enter. But it’s a barracks for the Chadee crewmembers, some of whom are inside, gearing up to repel the invaders! Their blood lust aroused, the Chadee dispatch the unlucky Jairians in seconds…

Defender Zik is charging into action! The gravity of the hallway rotates sideways suddenly, allowing Zik to swing and making the Jairians fall!

One tumbles back down the hallway he came from, while the other two fall onto walls.  As one struggles to regain his footing, Zik’s swing ends in a boot to the head for the other!

Now confronting the last Jairian, Zik steals the thug’s helmet and uses it like a club!