"Yes, it seems as though the time for emergency measures has arrived."

"Put everything on the center of the band?"

"That is probably the best frequency to use in a case of this kind."

"He can't control, so we'll push him down close to the ground before we go to work on him—so we don't have so far to fall if anything goes screwy with the works. Here's hoping nothing gives away!"

The Sirius, almost against the flaming screens of the Jovian, and both vessels very close to the surface of the satellite, Brandon tested the power leads briefly, adjusted dials and coils, then touched the button which actuated the relays—relays which in turn drove home the gigantic switches that launched a fearsome and as yet untried weapon. Instantly released, the full seven hundred thousand kilofranks of their stupendous batteries of accumulators drove into the middle frequency of the attacking band, and Brandon's heart was in his mouth as he stared into the plate to see what would happen. He saw! Everything in the Sirius held fast, and under the impact of the inconceivable plane of force, the screens of the enemy vessel flared instantly into an even more intense incandescence and in that same fleeting instant went down, and all defenses vanished as the metal sphere fell apart into two halves, as would an apple under the full blow of a broad-axe.

Brandon quickly shut off his power and stared in relief into the central compartment of the globular ship of space, now laid open, and saw there figures, one or two of which were moving weakly. As he looked, one of these feebly attempted to raise a peculiar, tubular something toward a helplessly fettered body. Even as Brandon snatched away the threatening weapon with a beam of force, he recognized the captive.

"Great Cat, there's Breckenridge!" he gasped, and directed a lifting beam upon the bound and unconscious prisoner. Rapidly, but carefully, he was brought through the double airlock and into the control room, where his shackles were cut away and where he soon revived under vigorous and skilful treatment.

"Any more of you in there? Did I hit any of you with that beam?" demanded Brandon, intensely, as soon as Breckenridge showed signs of understanding.

"King's in there somewhere, and there's a Callistonian human being that you mustn't kill," the chief pilot replied, weakly and with great effort in every word. "Don't believe that you hit anybody direct, but the shock was pretty bad." Having delivered his message, he lay back, exhausted.

"All x. Crown, give me a squad...."

"Not on your life!" barked the general. "This is my job and I'll do it myself. Your job is fighting the Sirius—stay with it!"

"Not in seven thousand years—I'm in on this, too," Brandon protested, but was decisively overruled by Newton.

"You belong right here at this board, since no one else can handle it the way you can. Stay here!" he commanded.

"All right," grudgingly assented the physicist, and held the Sirius upright, with her needle-sharp stern buried a few feet deep in the ground.

He watched the wreckage jealously while Crowninshield and forty helmeted men issued from the service door in the lower ultra-light compartment and advanced upon the two halves of the enemy vessel. As no hostile demonstrations ensued, scaling ladders were quickly placed and with weapons at the alert the police boarded the hemispheres, manacled the still helpless beings visible, and, after laying down a fog of stupefying gas, vanished into compartments beyond the metal partitions. After a short time they reappeared and climbed down the scaling ladders, carrying several inert forms, and Brandon spoke into his transmitter.

"King all x, Crowninshield?"

"I think so. Not being in the control room he was not as badly shocked by the passage of the beam as were Breckenridge and those you saw. The things in the other rooms were about ready to fight, so we gave them a little whiff of tritylamin, but Captain King will be as good as ever in a few minutes."

"Fine business!" The police entered the Sirius, the service doors clanged shut, and Brandon turned to Westfall.

"While they're coming up, I guess I'll pick up Perce and Miss Newton. We'd better get them aboard and beat it, while we're all in one piece!"

But even before he could send out the exploring beam of his communicator, the voice of Stevens came from the receiver.

"Hi, Brandon and Westfall! We've watched the whole show. Congratulations, fellows! Welcome to Ganymede! You are in our valley—we're upstream from you about three hundred meters; just below the falls, on the meadow side."

"All x," Brandon acknowledged. "We saw you. Come on out where we can pick you up. We've got to get away from here, and get away fast!"

"We'll carry off the pieces of that ship, too, Quince—we may be able to get a lot of pointers from it," and Brandon swung mighty tractor beams upon the severed halves of the Jovian vessel, then extended a couple of smaller rays to meet the two little figures racing across the smooth green meadow toward the Sirius.



CHAPTER X

Among Friends at Last

The time for the landing of the Sirius was drawing near, and the castaways upon Ganymede had donned their only suits of earthly clothing, instead of the makeshifts of mole-skin, canvas, and leather they had been wearing so long. Thorns and underbrush had pierced and torn their once natty outing costumes, and sparks and flying drops of molten metal from Stevens' first crude forges had burned in them many gaping holes.

"I did the best I could with them, Steve, but they look pretty crumby," Nadia wrinkled her nose as she studied the anything but invisible seams, darns, and staring patches everywhere so evident, both in her own apparel of gray silk and in the heavy whipcord clothing of her companion.

"You did a great job, considering what you had to work with," he reassured her. "Besides, who cares about a few patches? I feel a lot more civilized in my own clothes, don't you?"

"Well ... yes," she admitted. "They're silk, anyway, even if they don't look like much, and I'm just reveling in the feel of them next to me after the horrible, rough, scratchy things I've been wearing. See anything yet?"

"Not yet." Stevens had been scanning the heavens with a pair of binoculars. "That doesn't mean much, though, as they'll be just about in the sun and they'll be coming like a scared dog. Might as well put away these glasses—we probably won't be able to see them until they're right on top of us."

"What shall we take with us?"

"Don't know—nothing, probably, since they must have a campaign already mapped out. I'd like to salvage a lot of this junk, but I'm afraid we won't be able to. I'm going to take my bow and arrows, though, aren't you?"

"Absolutely! That's one thing that's better than anything I ever had on Earth. This bow of mine is perfect."

"There they are! Three rousing cheers! Say, but that old hulk looks good to me!"

"Doesn't she, though!" cried Nadia, vibrant with excitement. "You know, Steve. I've hardly dared really to believe it until this very minute. Oh look! What's that?"

The Sirius had stopped in midair and they could see, far in the distance, the tiny sphere of the Jovians, rushing to the attack.

"Oh, how horrible!" cried the girl, her voice breaking. "I'm afraid, Steve...."

"You needn't be, ace. I've told you they won't go off half-cocked as long as Westfall is on the job. They're ready for anything, or they wouldn't be here—but just the same I wish that they had that Titanian mirror and a couple of those bombs!"

In a moment more the Jovian plane of force was launched, the powerful ray-screens flared into white-hot, sparkling defense, and the battle was on. Held spell-bound as the castaways were by that spectacular duel, yet Stevens' trained mind warned him of the perils of their position.

"Grab your bow and we'll beat it!" and he rapidly led her away from the steel structures to an open hillside, well away from any projection, tree, or sharp point of rock. "If that keeps up very long, we're going to see some real fireworks, and I don't know whether there will be enough left of our plant here to salvage or not. Everything is grounded, of course, but I don't believe that ordinary grounds will amount to much against what's coming."

"What are you talking about?" demanded Nadia.

"Look!" he replied, pointing, and as he spoke, a terrific bolt of lightning launched itself from the incandescent screen of the Jovian vessel upon their slender ultra-radio tower, which subsided instantly into a confused mass of molten and twisted metal.

* * * * *

As the power of the beams was increased and as the combatants drew nearer and nearer the ground, the lightning display grew ever more violent. Well below the canyon as the warring vessels were, the power-plant and penstock did not suffer at all and only a few discharges struck the Forlorn Hope—discharges which were carried easily to ground by the enormous thickness of her armor—but every prominent object for hundreds of yards below the Hope was literally blasted out of existence. Radio tower, directors and fittings; trees, shrubs, sharp points of rock—all were struck again and again; fused, destroyed, utterly obliterated by the inconceivable energy being dissipated by those impregnable screens of force. Even almost flat upon the ground as the spectators were, each individual hair upon their heads strove fiercely to stand erect, so heavily charged was the very air. Stevens' arm was blue for days, such was Nadia's grip upon it, and she herself could scarcely breathe in that mighty arm's constriction—but each was conscious only of that incredibly violent struggle, of that duel to the death being waged there before their eyes with those frightful weapons, hitherto unknown to man. They saw the Sirius triumphant, and Stevens led the dancing girl back into their dwelling of steel.

"Danger's all over now. Radio's gone, but we should fret a lot about that. It has done its stuff—we can use the communicators. And now, sweetheart, I'm going to kiss you—for the first time in seven lifetimes."

Locked in each other's arms, they watched the scene until Stevens thought it time to send his message. Then, running hand in hand toward the huge space-cruiser, they were snatched apart and drawn up toward the double airlocks of the main entrance. Pressure gradually brought up to normal, they were ushered into the control room, where Nadia glanced around quickly and almost took her father off his feet by her tempestuous rush into his arms.

"Oh, Daddy darling. I just knew you'd come along! I haven't seen you for a million years!" she exclaimed, rapturously. "And Bill, too—wonderful!" as she fervently embraced a young man wearing the uniform of a lieutenant of Interplanetary Police. "Ouch, Bill—you're breaking all my ribs!"

"Well, you cracked three of mine. Maybe you don't know how husky you are, but you've got a squeeze like a full grown boa constrictor!" He held her off at arms' length and studied her with admiration. "Gee, it's fine to see you again, Sis. You're looking great, too—I think I'll bring my girl out here to live. You always were a knockout, but now you're the loveliest thing I ever saw!"

He made his way through the group surrounding Stevens, while Nadia and her father talked earnestly.

"I'm Bill Newton. Thanks," he said, simply, holding out his hand, which was taken in a bone-crushing grip.

"Bring him over here, Bill!" Nadia called before Stevens could find a reply.

"I don't know how to say anything, Stevens," the officer continued, in embarrassment, as the two men turned to obey the summons. "She's a good kid, and we think a lot of her. We'd about given her up. We.... She.... Oh, rats, what's the use? You know what I mean. You're there, Stevens, like a...."

"Clam it, ace!" Stevens interrupted. "I get you, to nineteen decimals. And you don't half know just what a good kid she really is. She's the reason we're here—we were down pretty close to bed-rock for a while, she stood up when I wilted. She's got everything. She...."

"Clam it yourself, Steve! Don't believe a word of it, Dad and Bill. Wilt!" Nadia's voice dripped scorn. "Why, he di...."

"Please!" Newton's voice was somewhat husky as he silenced the clamor of the three young people, all talking at once. "I will not embarrass you further by trying to say something that no words can express. You told me that you would take care of her, and I learn that you have done so."

"I did what I could, but most of the credit belongs to her, no matter what she says," Stevens insisted. "Anyway, sir, here she is; alive, well and ... unharmed," and his eyes bore unflinchingly the piercing gaze of the older man, who was reassured and pleased by what he read therein. "One thing I want to say right now, though, that may make you feel like canceling the welcome. I loved Nadia even before the Arcturus was attacked, and since then, coming to know her as I have, the feeling hasn't lessened any."

"Nadia has already told me all about you two," said her father, "and the welcome stands. If you could take care of her as well as you have done since you left the Arcturus, I have no doubt of your ability to take care of her for life. We have been examining the work you have done here, son, and the more I saw of it the more amazed I became that you could have succeeded as you did. We are deeply indebted.... Just a minute! There's my call—I'm wanted in Fifteen. I'll see you again directly."

"Hi, Norm!" Stevens further relieved the surcharged atmosphere. "As soon as you and Quince can leave those controls come over and see us, will you?"

"All x—coming up!" sounded Brandon's deep and pleasant bass, and the two rescuers, who had tactfully avoided the family reunion, came over and greeted the third of their triumvirate.

"Ho, Perce—you look fit." Brandon ran an expert hand over Stevens' arm and shoulder. "Looks as if he might last a round or two, doesn't he, Quince?"

"You are looking fine, Steve. Neither of you appear any the worse for your experiences. So this is Nadia? We have heard of you, Miss Newton."

"I believe that, knowing Dad," she replied. "Thanks, both of you, for digging us out. I've heard about you two, and I'm going to kiss you both."

Westfall, the silent and reserved, was taken aback, but Brandon met her more than half-way.

"All x, Nadia—payment in full received and hereby acknowledged," he laughed, as he allowed her feet to return to the floor. "Even if it was some stout lads from Mars and Venus that did all the work we'll take the reward—especially since Alcantro and Fedanzo couldn't feel even such a high-voltage salute as that one was, and I can't picture you kissing a Venerian even if you could get to him. Whenever you get lost again, be sure to let us know, now that you've got our address. If I know Perce at all, you've heard of us 'til you're sick of it and us—it's a weakness of his—talking too much."

"Why, it's no such th...." began Nadia, but broke off as an aide came up and saluted smartly.

"Pardon me, but General Crowninshield requests that Doctor Brandon, Doctor Westfall, and Doctor Stevens join the council in Lounge Fifteen as soon as convenient." He saluted again and turned away.

"Yes, that's right, folks—we've got to take a lot of steps, fast—see you later," and Brandon, taking each of the other two by an arm, marched them away toward the designated assembly room.

* * * * *

There, already seated at a long table, were Czuv, King, and Breckenridge, all fully recovered, engaged in earnest conversation with Newton and Crowninshield. Alcantro and Fedanzo, the Martian scientists, were listening intently, as were the two Venerians Dol Kenor and Pyraz Amonar. The eyes of the three newcomers, however, did not linger upon the group at the table, but were irresistibly drawn to one corner of the room, where six creatures lay in the heaviest manacles afforded by the stores of the Interplanetary Police. Not only were they manacled, but each was facing a ray-projector, held by a soldier whose expression showed plainly that he would rather press the lethal contact than not.

"Oh—those the things we're fighting?" Brandon stopped at the threshold and stared intently at the captive hexans. Goggling green eyes glaring venomously, they were lying quiet, but tense; mighty muscles ready to burst into berserk activity should the attention of a guard waver for a single instant.

But little more than half as large as the savage creatures with whom Stevens had fought in the mountain glade upon Ganymede, the hexans resembled those aborigines only as civilized men might resemble gigantic primordial savages of our own Earth. Brandon's gaze went from short, powerful legs up a round, red body to the enormous, freakish double pair of shoulders, with its peculiar universal jointing. From the double shoulders sprang four limbs, the front pair of which were undoubtedly arms, terminating in large, but fairly normal, hands. The intermediate limbs were longer than the legs and were much more powerful than the arms, and ended in members that were very evidently feet and hands combined. What in a human being would be the back of the hand was the sole of the foot—when walking upon that foot the long and dexterous thumb and fingers were curled up, out of the way and protected from injury, in the palm of the hand. From the monstrous shoulders there rose a rather long and very flexible, yet massive and columnar neck, supporting a head neither human nor bestial—a head utterly unknown to Terrestrial history or experience. The massive cranium bespoke a highly developed and intelligent brain, as did the three large and expressive, peculiar, triangular eyes. The three sensitive ears were very long, erect, and sharply pointed. Each was set immediately above an eye, one upon each side of the head and one in front. Each ear was independently and instantly movable in any direction, to catch the faintest sound. The head, like the body and limbs, was entirely devoid of hair. The horns, so prominent in the savages Stevens had seen, were in this highly intelligent race but vestigial—three small, sharp, black protuberances only an inch in length, one surmounting each ear, outlining the lofty forehead. The nose occupied almost the whole middle of the face and was not really a nose—it developed into a small and active proboscis. The chin was receding almost to the point of disappearance, so that the mouth, with its multiple rows of small, sharp, gleaming-white teeth, was almost hidden under the face instead of being a part of it. Such were the hexans, at whom the Big Three stared in undisguised amazement.

"Attention, please!" Newton called the meeting to order. "We have learned that all the passengers of the Arcturus, and all the crew save three, are alive and safe for the time being. Most of them are upon the satellite Europa. However, I understand that we are not yet sufficiently well armed to withstand such an attack in force as will certainly develop when we move to rescue them. This seems to be a war of applied physics—Doctor Brandon, as spokesman for the Scientific forces of the expedition, what are your suggestions?"

"Anticipating an attack in response to signals probably sent out by the enemy," replied Brandon. "I headed directly south immediately. We are now well south the ecliptic, and are traveling at considerably more than full Martian acceleration. Before making any suggestions, I should like to hear from Captain Czuv, who is more familiar than we are with the common enemy. Are they apt to follow us: can they detect us if we should drift at constant velocity; and can we search the brains of the prisoners with his Callistonian thought-exchanger, if he should build one with our help?"

"If they are close enough to us to overtake us without too much lost time, they will certainly attack us," Czuv answered at a nod from Newton. "Ordinarily they would pursue us to the limits of the Solar System if necessary, but since they have suffered reverses of late and cannot spare any vessels, they will probably not pursue us far. Yes, they can detect us, even without the driving rays, since this vessel uses much low-tension, low-frequency electricity in its automatic machinery, lights, and so on. No; our thought-transformer cannot take thoughts by force, and the hexans will exchange no ideas with us. They are implacable and deadly foes of all humanity, irrespective of planet or race. Mercy is to them unknown—they neither give nor take quarter."

"I can bear him out in that," Crowninshield interposed grimly. "The first one to recover snapped our ordinary handcuffs like so much thread and literally tore four men to pieces before the rest of us could ray him. Will you need me longer, Director Newton?"

"I think not. General. Captain Czuv, you have made no headway with them?" asked the Director.

"None whatever, as I foretold. They understand me thoroughly, since two of them speak my own tongue, but nothing that they have said can ever be repeated here. I knew from the first that all such attempts would be fruitless, but I have tried—and failed. I suggest what I suggested at first—put them to death, here and now, as they lie there, for most assuredly they will in some way contrive to take toll of lives of your own humanity if you allow them to live."

"You may be right," said Newton, "but neither the General nor myself can give the order for their death, since Interplanetary law does not countenance such summary action. However, the guards are fully warned of the peril, and will ray every prisoner at the first sign of unruliness. General Crowninshield, you may remove the prisoners and deal with them in accordance with...."

* * * * *

Pandemonium reigned. At Crowninshield's signal for the guards to leave the room with their captives, all six had strained furiously at their bonds and three of them had broken free in a flash, throwing themselves upon the guards with unthinkable ferocity. Stevens, seeing a ray-projector in a hand of one of the prisoners, hurled his heavy chair instantly and with terrific force. The projector flew into the air, shattered and useless, while the hexan was knocked into a corner by the momentum of the massive projectile and lay there, stunned and broken. Brandon, likewise reacting instantaneously, had bent over and seized a leg of the table, bracing his knee against the corner. With a mighty lunge of his powerful body he wrenched out the support and with a continuation of the same motion, he brought the jagged oak head of his terrible club down full upon the crown of the second hexan, who had already torn one guard apart and was leaping toward Czuv, his hereditary foe. In midflight he was dashed to the floor, his head a shapeless, pulpy mass, and Brandon, bludgeon again aloft, strode deeper into the fray. For a brief moment searing lethal beams probed here and there, chains clanked and snapped, once more that ponderous and irresistible oaken mace fell like the hammer of Thor, again spattering brains and blood abroad as it descended—then again came silence. The six erstwhile prisoners lay dead, but they had taken five of the guards with them—literally dismembered, hideously torn limb from limb by the superhuman, incredible physical strength and utter ferocity of the hexans.

By common consent the meeting was adjourned to another room, for the business in hand could not be postponed.

"Captain Czuv was right—we Tellurians could not believe in the existence of such a race without the evidence of our own senses." Newton reopened the meeting. "From this time on we take no prisoners. Doctor Brandon, you may resume."

"The detectors and lookouts will give ample warning of any attack, and Doctor Westfall has suggested that we should have all possible facts at hand before we try to decide upon a course of action. We should like to hear the full reports of Captain King, Captain Czuv, Chief Pilot Breckenridge, and Doctor Stevens."

The four men told their stories tersely and rapidly, while the others listened in deep attention. As the last speaker sat down, Newton again turned to Brandon, who silently jerked his head at Westfall, knowing his own inadequacy in such a situation—realizing that here was needed Westfall's cold and methodical thinking.

"Director Newton and gentlemen," Westfall spoke calmly and precisely. "We have much to do before we can meet the hexans upon equal terms. We have many new fields of force and rays to develop, of whose nature and necessity Doctor Brandon is already aware. Then, too, we must recalculate our visirays so that we can operate at greater range and efficiency. We must also examine the hexan space-ship which is towing, to do which it will be desirable to drift at constant velocity for a time. In it we may find instruments or devices as yet unknown to us. It also occurs to me that since this is an Interplanetary Police problem of the first magnitude, we should at once get in touch with Police Headquarters, so that the Peace Fleet can be armed as we ourselves are, or shall be, armed; for a large and highly efficient fleet will be necessary to do that which must be done. It is, of course, a foregone conclusion that Interplanetary humanity will support the humanity of Callisto against the hexans.

"It is also self-evident that we must stay here and rescue the Tellurians now upon Europa and Callisto, but we are not yet in position to decide just how that rescue is to be accomplished. Four courses are apparently open to us. First, to attempt it as soon as we shall have strengthened our armament as much as is now possible. That would invite a massed attack, and in my opinion would be foolish—probably suicidal. Second, to stand by at a distance until the rocket-ship is launched, then to escort it back to the Earth. Third, to aid the Callistonians as much as possible while awaiting the completion of the rocket-vessel. Fourth, and perhaps the most feasible and quickest, it may be possible for the Callistonian rocket-ships to bring out fellow-Tellurians, a few at a time, to us here out in space, since they are apparently able to come and go at will. However, I would recommend that we make no plans for the rescue as yet—there is little use in attempting to deal with an ever-changing situation until we are ready to act forthwith. I suggest that we strengthen our offensive and defensive armament first, then secure information as to the exact status of affairs, both upon Callisto and upon Europa. Then, ready to act, we will do at once whatever seems called for by the situation then obtaining."

"The program as outlined seems eminently sensible. Are there any comments or suggestions?" None having been offered, Director Newton adjourned the meeting and each man attacked his particular problem.

True to Czuv's prediction the hexans did not deem it worthwhile to pursue the Terrestrial vessel, so obviously and so earnestly fleeing from them, and shortly, the acceleration was cut off, to render possible a thorough study of the two halves of the spherical warship of the enemy. Scientists donned space-suits and studied every feature of the strange vessel, while mechanics dismantled and transferred to the Sirius every device and instrument of interest. One or two novel and useful applications of rays and forces were found, their visirays and communicators in particular being of a high degree of efficiency; but upon the whole the science of the hexans was found to be inferior to that now known to the scientists of Interplanetary's flying laboratory. Brandon studied the hexan power-system most carefully, and, everything in readiness and after a long talk with Westfall, he called a general conference in the control-room.

"Gentlemen, we have done about everything we can do for the time being. By combining the best features of the visirays and communicators of the hexans with our own newly-perfected devices, we now have a really excellent system of communication. Our friends from Mars and Venus have so altered and enlarged our force-controls that our offensive and defensive fields, rays, and screens leave little to be desired. In power we are far ahead of the enemy. They apparently know nothing of the possibilities of cosmic radiation, but depend upon tight-beam transmission from their own power-plants—which transmission they have perfected to a point far beyond anything reached by us of the three planets. They do not use accumulators, and therefore their dissipation is limited to their maximum reception, which is about seventy thousand kilofranks. Since we can dissipate ten times that amount of energy, we could withstand, for a short time, the simultaneous attacks of ten of their vessels. Eleven or more of them, however, would be able to crush our defensive screens—and Captain Czuv has seen as many as a hundred of their space-ships in one formation. Furthermore, since they have several times our maximum acceleration, they could concentrate quickly upon any desired point. We could not escape them by flight if they really set out to overtake us, which they certainly will do if we again venture into their territory. Therefore it is clear that we cannot subject ourselves to any attack in force and it follows that we cannot do much of anything until the police fleet of some five hundred vessels can be re-armed and can join us near Callisto. This will require several months at best. As you already know, it has been decided that we should not return to any of the minor planets, as to do so might invite a hexan attack upon our police fleet which is as yet unprepared. We are now heading for Uranus, in the hope that such a course will distract the attention of the hexans from Tellus, even though they probably already know that we are Tellurians. Our new communicator ray will reach any member of the Jovian system from this point. It has been decided that it is safe to use it, since it employs an almost absolutely tight beam of very small diameter, and since we know that that one hexan vessel, at least, had no apparatus sufficiently sensitive to detect a beam of that nature. We will therefore now get in touch with the Callistonians and with our own people."

* * * * *

Brandon seated himself before the communicator screen, and while the others packed themselves closely around his stool, he snapped on the visiray and turned the dials which directed that invisible, immensely complex beam through space. The screen was apparently in itself a coign of vantage, flying through space with the velocity of light, and the watchers gasped involuntarily and drew themselves together, as with that unthinkable speed they flashed down toward the surface of Callisto. So realistic was the impression that they themselves were hurtling through the void, that they could scarcely reason themselves into believing their positive knowledge that the impending collision was not an actual happening! Reducing the velocity of the projection abruptly as it approached the satellite, Brandon flashed it down into a crater indicated by Czuv, and along a tunnel to the city of Zbardk, where the Callistonian captain held a long conversation with the Council of the nation. Frowning in thought, he turned to Newton and spoke seriously and slowly.

"Immediately after the loss of our super-plane, with the supposed death of King, Breckenridge, and myself, the other Tellurian officers were returned to Europa, since even they could be of no assistance to us Callistonians in our struggle against the new, high-acceleration vessels of the hexans. The present situation is much more serious than I would have believed possible. The last vessel going to visit Wruszk, our city upon Europa, was caught and destroyed by the hexans, and for many weeks no ship or message has come from there to Callisto. In spite of the fact that the hexan fleet is smaller than ever before, they are guarding Europa very closely. It is feared that they may have found and destroyed our city there—an expedition is even now about to set out in a desperate attempt to learn the fate of our fellows."

"Suppose the rays of the lifeboats were detected in landing?" asked Brandon. "That might have given them a clue."

"Possibly; but it is equally possible that our own men became careless in the operation of one of our own vessels. Having been unmolested so long, they might have relaxed their vigilance. We may never know."

"Tell 'em to cancel the expedition—we'll shoot the visiray over there right now and find out all about it. We'll let them know pretty quickly. Also, you might tell them that you've got complete plans and specifications for all the weapons that the hexans have, and a couple besides, and that the quicker they shoot a ship out here after you, the sooner they can get to building some stuff to blow those hexans clear out of space!"

It was the work of only a few moments to drive the visiray projection to Europa, where Czuv, to the great relief of all, found that the hexans had not yet discovered either Wruszk or the Terrestrial workings. All Europan humanity, fully aware of the hexan investment, was exerting every possible precaution against discovery by the enemy. This information was duly flashed to the Council of Callisto, and the projection was then hurled across the intervening reaches of space and into the cavern in which was being built the enormous rocket-ship in which the Terrestrial refugees were to attempt the long voyage back to their own distant planet.

It took some little time to convince Doctor Penfield that there had been projected into the empty air of his little sanctum an absolutely invisible and impalpable structure of pure force capable of receiving and transmitting voice and vision. Once convinced of the reality of the phenomenon, however, the speaker beside Brandon's communicator screen fairly rattled under the fervor of his greeting, so great was his pleasure at the arrival of the expedition of relief and in knowing that King and Breckenridge, whom they had, of course, given up for dead, were aboard the Interplanetary vessel.

Penfield reported that the work upon the great rocket-ship was progressing satisfactorily, although slowly, since it was so much larger than any vessel theretofore constructed by the Callistonians. Newton, in turn, informed the autocrat of the stranded Terrestrials as to the status quo of the rescuing party.

"Of course, because of the hexan blockade, you cannot take us off until they have been wiped out, which will be several months at best," the surgeon said, slowly, and a shadow came over his face as he spoke. "Well, what can't be cured...."

"Trouble with the personnel?" King broke in sharply.

"Personnel, yes; but not trouble in the sense you mean—we have had none of that. It is only that there are four more of us now than there were...."

"Huh? How come?" demanded Brandon, in astonishment.

"Four babies have been born to us here so far, and several more are coming. They are the ones I'm worried about. Most normal adults can stand it here without any serious effects, but this thin atmosphere and weak gravity are certain to result in abnormal development of children. However, there may be another way out of it. Are you using normal acceleration, or have you Martians aboard?"

"Both," replied Brandon. "We are carrying two inhabitants of Mars, but Alcantro and Fedanzo are not ordinary Martians. They have been in constant training ever since we left Tellus, and now they can stand as high an acceleration as a weak Tellurian. We're riding at normal."

"Good! As you already know, there has been no communication of late between here and Callisto. It had already been decided, however, that one more voyage must be risked, in order to bring back material which is most urgently needed. Since the vessel will leave here light and is large enough to carry about thirty passengers on a short trip with some crowding, the Council will probably approve of having it carry some of our passengers out to the Sirius—especially now, since a vessel must visit you, anyway, to get Captain Czuv and the specifications of the new armament. All these things can be done with one vessel in one trip."

"That sounds fine!" boomed King. "It will give me a chance to get back there where I belong, too. Whom are you sending out?"

"The seven couples who either have babies already or who will have them in the next few months; and some of our young who aren't standing the gaff any too well. You won't be in the red very deeply on the deal, either—while two or three of the passengers I am sending you will certainly be a nuisance; anybody could use, anywhere, such men as Commander Sanderson and Lieut..."

"Sanderson!" interrupted King. "Why, he wasn't—when did he get married?"

"The day after we arrived here," replied the surgeon. "His fiancee was aboard the Arcturus, and when they found out how long we would have to be here, they very sensibly decided not to wait."

"Were there any others?" demanded Nadia, who, standing between Stevens and her father, had been an interested listener.

"Plenty of them! Fourteen of our young women passengers have married here upon Europa. A few married fellow-passengers, but most of them picked out officers of the Arcturus. You'll find your staff made up pretty largely of benedicts now, King! We've been here a year, you know, and time will tell! Young Commander Sanderson's a fine baby—he'll be a credit to the IPC some day, if we can get him aboard the Sirius, where he can get a good start. We could give our babies normal air pressure here by building special rooms, but we cannot give them the normal acceleration necessary to develop their muscles properly."

"Well, we'd better snap over to Callisto and take this up with the Council," Brandon put in. "I don't imagine that there will be any objections, so you might as well get your ship gassed up and loaded—we'll be back here with the okay in about a minute and a half."

* * * * *

With Brandon at the controls and with Czuv at the communicator plate, the projection flashed toward distant Callisto and the group melted away, each man going about his interrupted task.

"Daddy, take us somewhere—I want to talk to you," Nadia spoke to her father, and the director led her and Stevens to his own room.

"All x, daughter; out with it!" and he bent upon her a quizzical glance, under which a fiery blush burned from her throat to her forehead.

"Dad, I've been thinking a lot since you rescued us, and what we've just heard has given me the nerve to say it. Steve, of course, wouldn't dare suggest such a thing until we're safely back on Earth, so I will." Her deep brown eyes held his steadily. "All those girls got married—why, some of them have babies already—and Steve and I have waited for each other so long, daddy! And none of them love each other the way we do. Do they, Steve?"

"I don't see how they could, sir; and that goes straight across the panel," and he bore unflinchingly the piercing gaze of the older man as his right arm encircled the girl and held her close.

"Well, why not?" A sudden smile transformed Newton's stern visage. "There are three chaplains with the police—a Methodist minister, a Catholic priest, and a Jewish rabbi. Also, we have on board two full-fledged I-P captains, either of whom is authorized to tie matrimonial knots. The means are not lacking—if you're both sure of yourselves?" and all levity disappeared as he studied the two young faces.

"Yes, you are sure," he continued after a moment "just as her mother and I were—and are. It is too bad that she cannot be here with you, but it may be a long time before we can return to Tellus, and you have indeed waited long.

"Oh thanks, Daddy, you're just a perfectly wonderful old darling!" Nadia exclaimed, as she threw her arms rapturously around his neck. "And this isn't a warship at all—you know perfectly well that it's a research laboratory, and that as soon as the Navy gets here, you won't let it fight a bit more, because such scientists can't be allowed to risk themselves! And also, you're forgetting that whole flock of women and babies that are coming out here just as fast as they can get themselves ready. So get going, daddy old dear, and let's do things! Steve's a Quaker and we're Presbyterians, so none of the chaplains will do at all. Besides, I promised Captain King ages ago that he could marry me, so go get him and we'll do it now. Bill can be my bridesmaid, you'll give me away, and Steve can have the other two of his Big Three for best men. I'm off to hunt up the flimsiest, fussiest white dress I can find in my trunks. Let's go!"

"Mr. Newton." Stevens spoke thoughtfully as Nadia darted away. "You said something about her mother, I didn't want to say anything to raise false hopes while she was here, but I've got an idea. Let's meet in Brandon's room instead of here. We can send code to Tellus easily enough on our ultrawave, and we may be able to fake up something on vision."

A few minutes later the Big Three were in Brandon's private study; staring intently into a screen of ground glass upon which played flickering, flashing lights, while the black-haired physicist manipulated micrometer dials in infinitesimal arcs.

"Once more, Mac," Brandon directed. "Pretty nearly had them that time. We're stretching this projector about six hundred percent, but we've got to make this connection. Can't you give me just a little more voltage on those secondaries?"

"I can not!" the voice of the first assistant snapped from the speaker. "I'm overloading now so badly that some of my plates are getting hot—if I hold this voltage much longer, the whole secondary bank of tubes is going out. All x—you're on zero!"

"All x!" Flashing and waning, the lights upon the screen formed fleeting, shifting, nebulous images of a relay station upon distant Earth; but the utmost power of the transmitting fields could neither steady the image nor hold it.

"Back off, Mac," Brandon instructed. "I'm afraid we can't hold 'em direct—no use blowing a bank of tubes. We'll try relaying through Mars—we can hold them there, I think. It will muss up reception some, but it will probably be better than direct, at that. Point oh five three six ... all x—shoot!"

Brandon's relay station upon Mars was finally raised and held, and a corps of keenly interested engineers there made short work of the Earth-Mars linkage. Soon the screen glowed with the picture of the transmitter-room of the Terrestrial station, and while the three men were waiting for Mrs. Newton to be called to her own television set, the door behind them opened. Nadia and her escorts entered the room—but Stevens' eyes saw only the entrancing vision of loveliness that was his bride. Dressed in a clinging white gown of shimmering silk, her hair a golden blond corona, sweetly curved lips slightly parted and wide eyes eloquent, she paused momentarily as Stevens came to his feet and stared at her, his very heart in his eyes.

"You never saw me in a dress before—do you like me, Steve?"

"Like you! You're beautiful!" and gray eyes and brown, deep with wonder and with love, met and held as, unheeding the presence of their friends, they went into each other's arms in a coalescence as inevitable and as final as Fate itself.

"Hi, Nadia old dear!" and "Daughter, from what I can see of my son-in-law, I believe that he may do," came together from the speaker. Nadia tore herself from Stevens' embrace, to see upon the lambent screen the happily smiling faces of her mother and sister.

"Mother! Claire! Oh, you three wonder-workers!" She addressed simultaneously the distant Terrestrials and the scientists at her side, while broken exclamations, punctuated by ominous, crackling snaps, came from the laboring amplifier.

"Sorry to interrupt," MacDonald's voice broke in, "but you'll have to hurry it up. Alcantro and Fedanzo are doing their best, but every plate in my secondary bank's red hot, and you could fry an egg on any one of my transformers. Even my primary tubes are running hot. She won't hold together five minutes longer!"

Captain King opened his book, and in that small steel room, unadorned save for stack upon stack of bookcases, the brief but solemn ceremony joining two young lives was read—its solemnity only intensified by its unique accompaniment. For from Brandon at the primary controls, through the power-room of the Sirius and the relay-station upon Mars, to the immense Interplanetary transmitter upon Earth, the greatest radio and television engineers of two planets were fighting overdriven equipment, trying to hold an almost impossible connection, in order that Nadia Newton's mother and sister might be present at her wedding, hundreds of millions of miles distant in space!

"I pronounce you man and wife. Whom God hath joined, let no man put asunder." The sacred old ritual ended and Captain King picked up the bride in his great arms as though she were a baby, kissed her vigorously, and set her down in front of the transmitter. In the midst of the joyous confusion that ensued a tearing, rattling crash came from the speaker and the screen went blank.

"There!" lamented MacDonald from the power room. "I knew they'd blow! There goes my whole secondary bank—eight perfectly good ten-nineteens all shot to...."

"That's too bad, but it couldn't be helped; they went for a good cause," interrupted Brandon. "I'll come down and help clean up the mess."

* * * * *

Leaving the bridal party, he made his way rapidly to the power room, where he found MacDonald and the two Martians inspecting the smoking remains of what had been the secondary bank of their powerful ultra-transmitter. Spare parts in abundance were on hand, and it was not long until the damaged section was apparently as good as new.

"Now to try her out," Brandon announced. "We want to give her a good workout, but there's no use trying the I-P stations any more—they're altogether too hard to handle at this range. Czuv said something about an unknown race of monstrosities at the south pole of Jupiter—let's try it on them for a while."

He flung the field of force out into space, as responsive to his will as a well-trained horse, and guided it toward the southern limb of that gigantic world. Down and down the projection plunged, through mile after mile of reeking, steaming fog, impenetrable to earthly eyes. Finally it came to rest upon the surface, hundreds of feet deep in a lush, dank, tropical jungle, and Brandon plugged into the Venerian room.

"Kenor? We've got a lot of use for you, if you can come down here for a while. Thanks a lot." He turned to the Martians. "Luckily, we've got a couple of infra-red transformers aboard, so we won't have to build one. You fellows might break one out and shunt it onto this circuit while Dol Kenor is hunting up something for us to look at.

"Hi, old Infra-Eyes!" he went on, as the Venerian scientist waddled into the room in his bulging space-suit. "We've got something here that's right down your alley. Want to see what you can see?"

"Ah, a beautiful scene!" exclaimed Dol Kenor, after one glance into the plate. "It is indeed a relief, after all this coldness and glare, to see such a soft, warm landscape—even though I have never expected to behold quite such a violent bit of jungle," and under his guidance the projection flashed over hundreds of miles of territory. To the eyes of the Terrestrials the screen revealed only a blank, amorphous grayness, through which at times there shot lines and masses of vague and meaningless form; but the Venerian was very evidently seeing and enjoying many and diverse scenes.

"There, I think, is what you wish to see first," he announced, as he finally steadied the controls, and Brandon cut in upon the shunting screen the infra-red transformer. This device, developed long before to render possible the use of Terrestrial eyes in the opaque atmosphere of Venus, stepped up the fog-piercing long waves into the frequencies of light capable of affecting the earthly retina. Instantly the dull gray blank of the shunting screen became transformed into a clear and colorful picture of the great city of the Jovians of the South.

"Great Cat!" Brandon exclaimed. "Flying fortresses is right! They're in war formation, too, or I'm a polyp! We've got to watch this, Mac, all of it, and watch it close—it's apt to have a big bearing on what we'll have to do, before they get done. Better we rig up another set, and put a relay of observers on this job!"



CHAPTER XI

The Vorkul-Hexan War

Vorkulia, the city of the Vorkuls, was an immense seven-pointed star. At its center, directly upon the south pole of Jupiter, rose a tremendous shaft—its cross-section likewise a tapering seven-pointed star—which housed the directing intelligence of the nation. Radiating from the seven cardinal points of the building were short lanes leading to star-shaped open plots, from which in turn branched out ways to other stellate areas; ways reaching, after many such steps, to the towering inner walls of the metropolis. The outer walls, still loftier and even more massive ramparts of sullen gray-green metal, formed a seamless, jointless barrier against an utterly indescribable foe; a barrier whose outer faces radiated constantly a searing, coruscating green emanation. Metal alone could not long have barred that voracious and implacably relentless enemy, but against that lethal green emanation even that ravening Jovian jungle could not prevail, but fell back, impotent. Writhing and crawling, loathesomely palpitant with an unspeakable exuberance of foul and repellent vigor, possible only to such meteorological conditions as obtained there, it threw its most hideously prolific growths against that radiant wall in vain.

The short, zig-zag lanes, the ways, and the seven-pointed areas were paved with a greenish glass. This pavement was intended solely to prevent vegetable growth and carried no traffic whatever, since few indeed of the Vorkuls have ever been earth-bound and all traffic was in the air. The principal purpose of the openings was to separate, and thus to render accessible by air, the mighty buildings which, level upon level, towered upward, with airships hovering at or anchored to doorways and entrances at every level. Buildings, entrances, everything visible—all replicated, reiterated, repeated infinite variations in the one theme, that of the septenate stelliform.

Color ran riot; masses varied from immense blocks of awe-inspiring grandeur to delicate tracery of sheerest gossamer; lights flamed and flared in wide bands and in narrow, flashing pencils—but in all, through all, over all, and dominating all was the Seven-Pointed Star.

In and almost filling the space, at least a mile in width, between the inner and the outer walls were huge, seven-sided structures—featureless, squat, forbidding heptagons of dull green metal. No thing living was to be seen in that space. Its pavement was of solid metal and immensely thick, and that metal, as well as that of the walls, was burned and blackened and seared as though by numberless exposures to intolerable flame. In a lower compartment of one of these enormous heptagons Vortel Kromodeor, First Projector Officer, rested before a gigantic and complex instrument board. He was at ease—his huge wings folded, his sinuous length coiled comfortably in slack loops about two horizontal bars. But at least one enormous, extensible eye was always pointed toward the board, always was at least one nimble and bat-like ear cocked attentively in the direction of the signal panel.

A whistling, shrieking ululation rent the air and the officer's coils tightened as he reared a few feet of his length upright, shooting out half a dozen tentacular arms to various switches and controls upon his board, while throughout the great heptagon, hundreds of other Vorkuls sprang to attention at their assigned posts of duty. As the howling wail came to a climax in a blast of sound Kromodeor threw over a lever, as did every other projector officer in every other heptagon, and there was made plain to any observer the reason for the burns and scars in the tortured space between the lofty inner and outer walls of Vorkulia. For these heptagons were the monstrous flying fortresses which Czuv had occasionally seen from afar, as they went upon some unusual errand above the Jovian banks of mist, and which Brandon was soon to see in his visiray screen. The seared and disfigured metal of the pavement and walls was made so by the release of the furious blasts of energy necessary to raise those untold thousands of tons of mass against the attraction of Jupiter, more than two and a half times the gravity of our own world! Vast volumes of flaming energy shrieked from the ports. Wave upon wave, flooding the heptagons, it dashed back and forth upon the heavy metal between the walls. As more and more of the inconceivable power of those Titanic generators was unleashed, it boiled forth in a devastating flood which, striking the walls, rebounded and leaped vertically far above even those mighty ramparts. Even the enormous thickness of the highly conducting metal could not absorb all the energy of that intolerable blast, and immediately beneath the ports new seven-pointed areas of disfigurement appeared as those terrific flying fortresses were finally wrenched from the ground and hurled upward.

* * * * *

High in the air, another signal wailed up and down a peculiar scale of sound and the mighty host of vessels formed smoothly into symmetrical groups of seven. Each group then moved with mathematical precision into its allotted position in a complex geometrical formation—a gigantic, seven-ribbed, duplex cone in space. The flagship flew at the apex of this stupendous formation; behind, and protected by, the full power of the other floating citadels of the forty-nine groups of seven. Due north, the amazing armada sped in rigorous alignment, flying along a predetermined meridian—due north!

At the end of his watch Kromodeor relinquished his board to the officer relieving him and shot into the air, propelled by the straightening of the powerful coils of his snake-like body and tail. Wings half spread, lateral and vertical ruddering fins outthrust, he soared across the room toward a low opening. Just before they struck the wall upon either side of the doorway the great wings snapped shut, the fins retracted, and the long and heavy body struck the floor of the passage without a jar. With a wriggling, serpentine motion he sped like a vibrant arrow along the hall and into a wardroom. There, after a brief glance around the room, he coiled up beside a fellow officer who, with one eye, was negligently reading a scroll held in three or four hands; while with another eye, poised upon its slender pedicle, he watched a moving picture upon a television screen.

"Hello, Kromodeor," Wixill, Chief Power Officer[2] greeted the newcomer in the wailing, hissing language of the Vorkuls. He tossed the scroll into the air, where it instantly rolled into a tight cylinder and shot into an opening in the wall of the room. "Glad to see you. Books and shows are all right on practice cruises, but I can't seem to work up much enthusiasm about such things now."

[Footnote 2: In order to avoid all unnecessary strain upon the memory of the reader, all titles, etc., have been given in the closest possible English equivalent, instead of in an attempted transliteration of the foreign word. This particular officer has no counterpart upon Tellurian vessels. He is the second in command of a Vorkulian fortress, his function being to supervise all expenditure of power.—E. E. S.]

Kromodeor elevated an eye and studied the screen, upon which, to the accompaniment of whistling, shrieking sound, whirled and gyrated an interlacing group of serpentine forms.

"A good show, Wixill," the projector officer replied, "but nothing to hold the attention of men engaged in what we are doing. Think of it! After twenty years of preparation—two long lifetimes—and for the first time in our history, we are actually going to war!"

"I have thought of it at length. It is disgusting. Compelled to traffic with an alien form of life! Were it not to end in the extinction of those unspeakable hexans, it would be futile to the point of silliness. I cannot understand them at all. There is ample room upon this planet for all of us. Our races combined are not using one seven-thousandth of its surface. You would think that they would shun all strangers. Yet for ages have they attacked us, refusing to let us alone, until finally they forced us to prepare means for their destruction. They seem as senselessly savage as the jungle growths, and, but for their very evident intelligence, one would class them as such. You would think that, being intelligent and being alien to us, they would not have anything to do with us in any way, peacefully or otherwise. However, their intrusions and depredations are about to end."

"They certainly are. Vorkulia has endured much—too much—but I am glad that our forefathers did not decide to exterminate them sooner. If they had, we could not have been doing this now."

"There speaks the rashness of youth, Kromodeor. It is a violation of all our instincts to have any commerce with outsiders, as you will learn as soon as you see one of them. Then, too, we will lose heavily. Since we have studied their armaments so long, and have subjected every phase of the situation to statistical analysis, it is certain that we are to succeed—but you also know at what cost."

"Two-sevenths of our force, with a probable error of one in seven," replied the younger Vorkul. "And because that figure cannot be improved within the next seven years and because of the exceptional weakness of the hexans due to their unexpectedly great losses upon Callisto, we are attacking at this time. Their spherical vessels are nothing, of course. It is in the reduction of the city that we will lose men and vessels. But at that, each of us has five chances in seven of returning, which is good enough odds—much better than we had in that last expedition into the jungle. But by the Mighty Seven, I shall make myself wrap around one hexan, for my brother's sake," and his coils tightened unconsciously. "Hideous, repulsive monstrosities! Creatures so horrible should not be allowed to live—they should have been tossed over the wall to the jungle ages ago!" Kromodeor curled out an eye as he spoke, and complacently surveyed the writhing cylinder of sinuous, supple power that was his own body.

"Better avoid contact work with them if possible," cautioned Wixill. "You might not be able to unwrap, and to touch one of them is almost unthinkable. Speaking of wrapping, you know that they are putting on the finals of the contact work in the star this evening. Let's watch them."

They slid to the floor and wriggled away in perfect "step"—undulating along in such nice synchronism that their adjacent sides, only a few inches apart, formed two waving rigidly parallel lines. Deep in the lower part of the fortress they entered a large assembly room, provided with a raised platform in the center and having hundreds of short, upright posts in lieu of chairs; most of which were already taken by spectators. The two officers curled their tails comfortably around two of the vacant pillars, elevated their heads to a convenient level of sight and directed each an eye or two upon the stage. This was, of course, heptagonal. Its sides, like those of the mighty flying forts themselves, were not straight, but angled inward sufficiently to make the platform a seven-pointed star. The edge was outlined by a low rail, and bulwark and floor were padded with thick layers of a hard but smooth and yielding fabric.

* * * * *

In this star-shaped ring two young Vorkuls were contending for the championship of the fleet in a contest that seemed to combine most of the features of wrestling, boxing, and bar-room brawling, with no holds barred. Four hands of each of the creatures held heavy leather billies, and could be used only in striking with those weapons, the remaining hands being left free to employ as the owner saw fit. Since the sport was not intended to be lethal, however, the eyes and other highly vulnerable parts were protected by metal masks, and the wing ribs were similarly guarded by leathern shields. The guiding fins, being comparatively small and extremely tough, required no protection.

"We're just in time," Kromodeor whistled. "The main bout is nicely on. See anyone from the flagship? I might stake a couple of korpels that Sintris will paint the symbol upon his wing."

"Most of their men seem to be across the star," Wixill replied, and both beings fell silent, absorbed in the struggle going on in the ring.

It was a contest well worth watching. Wing crashed against mighty wing and the lithe, hard bodies snapped and curled this way and that, almost faster than the eye could follow, in quest of advantageous holds. Above the shrieking wails of the crowd could be heard the smacks and thuds of the eight flying clubs as they struck against the leather shields or against tough and scaly hides. For minutes the conflict raged, with no advantage apparent. Now the fighters were flat upon the floor of the star, now dozens of feet in the air above it, as one or the other sought to gain a height from which to plunge downward upon his opponent; but both stayed upon or over the star—to leave its boundaries was to lose disgracefully.

Then, high in air, the visiting warrior thought that he saw an opening and grappled. Wings crashed in fierce blows, hands gripped and furiously wrenched. Two powerful bodies, tapering smoothly down to equally powerful tails, corkscrewed around each other viciously, winding up into something resembling tightly twisted lamp cord; and the two Vorkuls, each helpless, fell to the mat with a crash. Fast as was Zerexi, the gladiator from the flagship, Sintris was the merest trifle faster. Like the straightening of a twisted spring of tempered steel that long body uncoiled as they struck the floor, and up under those shielding wings—an infinitesimal fraction of a second slow in interposing—that lithe tail sped. Two lightning loops flashed around the neck of the visitor and tightened inexorably. Desperately the victim fought to break that terrible strangle hold, but every maneuver was countered as soon as it was begun. Beating wings, under whose frightful blows the very air quivered, were met and parried by wings equally capable. Hands and clubs were of no avail against that corded cable of sinew, and Sintris, his head retracted between his wings and his own hands reenforcing that impregnable covering over his head and neck, threw all his power into his tail—tightening, with terrific, rippling surges, that already throttling band about the throat of his opponent. Only one result was possible. Soon Zerexi lay quiet, and a violet beam of light flared from a torch at the ringside, bathing both contenders. At the flash the winner disengaged himself from the loser, and stood by until the latter had recovered the use of his paralyzed muscles. The two combatants then touched wing tips in salute and flew away together, over the heads of the crowd; plunging into a doorway and disappearing as the two officers uncoiled from their "seats" and wriggled out into the corridor.

"Fine piece of contact work," said Wixill, thoughtfully. "I'm glad that Sintris won, but I did not expect him to win so easily. Zerexi shouldn't have gone into a knot so early against such a fast man."

"Oh, I don't know," argued Kromodeor. "His big mistake was in that second body check. If he had blocked the sixth arm with his fifth, taken out the fourth and second with his third, and then gone in with...." and so, quite like two early experts after a good boxing match, the friends argued the fine points of the contest long after they had reached their quarters.

Day after day the vast duplex cone of Vorkulian fortresses sped toward the north pole of the great planet, with a high and constant velocity. Day after day the complex geometrical figure in space remained unchanged, no unit deviating measurably from its precise place in the formation. Over rapacious jungles, over geysers spouting hot water, over sullenly steaming rivers and seas, over boiling lakes of mud, and high over gigantic volcanoes, in uninterrupted eruptions of cataclysmic violence, the Vorkulian phalanx flew—straight north. The equatorial regions, considerably hotter than the poles, were traversed with practically no change in scenery—it was a world of steaming fog, of jungle, of hot water, of boiling, spurting mud, and of volcanoes. Not of such mild and sporadic volcanic outbreaks as we of green Terra know, but of gigantic primordial volcanoes, in terrifyingly continuous performances of frightful intensity. Due north the Vorkulian spearhead was hurled, before the rigorous geometrical alignment was altered.

"All captains, attention!" Finally, in a high latitude, the flagship sent out final instructions. "The hexans have detected us and our long range observers report that they are coming to meet us in force. We will now go into the whirl, and proceed with the maneuvers exactly as they have been planned. Whirl!"

At the command, each vessel began to pursue a tortuous spiral path. Each group of seven circled slowly about its own axis, as though each structure were attached rigidly to a radius rod, and at the same time spiraled around the line of advance in such fashion that the whole gigantic cone, wide open maw to the fore, seemed to be boring its way through the air.

"Lucky again!" Kromodeor, in the wardroom, turned to Wixill as the two prepared to take their respective watches. "It looks as though the first action would come while we're on duty. I've got just one favor to ask, if you have to economize on power, let Number One alone, will you?"

"No fear of that," Wixill hissed, with the Vorkulian equivalent of a chuckle. "We have abundance of power for all of your projector officers. But don't waste any of it, or I'll cut you down five ratings!"

"You're welcome. When I shine old Number One on any hexan work, one flash is all we'll take. See you at supper," and, leaving his superior at the door of the power room, Kromodeor wriggled away to his station upon the parallel horizontal bars before his panel.

Making sure that his tail coils were so firmly clamped that no possible lurch or shock could throw him out of position, he set an eye toward each of his sighting screens, even though he knew that it would be long before those comparatively short range instruments would show anything except friendly vessels. Then, ready for any emergency, he scanned his one "live" screen—the one upon which were being flashed the pictures and reports secured by the high-powered instruments of the observers.

* * * * *

With the terrific acceleration employed by the hexan spheres, it was not long until the leading squadron of fighting globes neared the Vorkulian war-cone. This advance guard was composed of the new, high-acceleration vessels. Their crews, with the innate blood-lust and savagery of their breed, had not even entertained the thought of accommodating their swifter pace to that of the main body of the fleet. These vast, slow-moving structures were no more to be feared than those similar ones whose visits they had been repulsing for twenty long Jovian years—by the time the slower spheres could arrive upon the scene there would be nothing left for them to do. Therefore, few in number as were the vessels of the vanguard, they rushed to the attack. In one blinding salvo they launched their supposedly irresistible planes of force—dazzling, scintillating planes under whose fierce power the studying, questing, scouting fortresses previously encountered had fled back southward; cut, beaten, and crippled. These spiraling monsters, however, did not pause or waver in their stolidly ordered motion. As the hexan planes of force flashed out, the dull green metal walls broke into a sparkling green radiance, against which the Titanic bolts spent themselves in vain. Then there leaped out from the weird brilliance of the walls of the fortresses great shafts of pale green luminescence—tractor ray after gigantic tractor ray, which seized upon the hexan spheres and drew them ruthlessly into the yawning open end of that gigantic cone.

Then, in each group of seven, similar great streamers of energy reached out from fortress to fortress, until each group was welded into one mighty unit by twenty-one such bands of force. The unit formed, a ray from each of its seven component structures seized upon a designated sphere, and under the combined power of those seven tractors, the luckless globe was literally snapped into the center of mass of the Vorkulian unit There seven dully gleaming red pressor rays leaped upon it, backed by all the power of seven gigantic fortresses, held rigidly in formation by the unimaginable mass of the structures and by their twenty-one prodigious tractor beams. Under that awful impact, the screens and walls of the hexan spheres were exactly as effective as so many structures of the most tenuous vapor. The red glare of the vortex of those beams was lightened momentarily by a flash of brighter color, and through the foggy atmosphere there may have flamed briefly a drop or two of metal that was only liquefied. The red and green beams snapped out, the peculiar radiance died from the metal walls, and the gigantic duplex cone of the Vorkuls bored serenely northward—as little marked or affected by the episode as is a darting swift who, having snapped up a chance insect in full flight, darts on.

"Great Cat!" Far off in space, Brandon turned from his visiray screen and wiped his brow. "Czuv certainly chirped it, Perce, when he called those things flying fortresses. But who, what, why, and how? We didn't see any apparatus that looked capable of generating or handling those beams—and of course, when they got started, their screens cut us off at the pockets. Wish we could have made some sense out of their language—like to know a few of their ideas—find out whether we can't get on terms with them some way or other. Funny-looking wampuses, but they've got real brains—their think-tanks are very evidently full of bubbles. If they have it in mind to take us on next, old son, it'll be just ... too ... bad!"

"And then some," agreed Stevens. "They've got something—no fooling. It looks like the hexans are going to get theirs, good and plenty, pretty soon—and then what? I'd give my left lung and four front teeth for one long look at their controls in action."

"You and me both—it's funny, the way those green ray-screens stick to the walls, instead of being spherical, as you'd expect ... should think they'd have to radiate from a center, and so be spherical," Brandon cogitated. "However, we've got nothing corkscrewy enough to go through them, so we'll have to stand by. We'll stay inside whenever possible, look on from outside when we must, but all the time picking up whatever information we can. In the meantime, now that we've got our passengers, old Doctor Westfall prescribes something that he says is good for what ails us. Distance—lots of distance, straight out from the sun—and I wouldn't wonder if we'd better take his prescription."

The two Terrestrial observers relapsed into silence, staring into their visiray plates, searching throughout the enormous volume of one of those great fortresses in another attempt to solve the mystery of the generation and propagation of the incredible manifestations of energy which they had just witnessed. Scarcely had the search begun, however, when the visirays were again cut off sharply—the rapidly advancing main fleet of the hexans had arrived and the scintillant Vorkulian screens were again in place.

True to hexan nature, training and tradition, the fleet, hundreds strong, rushed savagely to the attack. Above, below, and around the far-flung cone the furious globes dashed, attacking every Vorkulian craft viciously with every resource at their command; with every weapon known to their diabolically destructive race. Planes of force stabbed and slashed, concentrated beams of annihilation flared fiercely through the reeking atmosphere, gigantic aerial bombs and torpedoes were hurled with full radio control against the unwelcome visitor—with no effect. Bound together in groups of seven by the mighty, pale-green bands of force, the Vorkulian units sailed calmly northward, spiraling along with not the slightest change in formation or velocity. The frightful planes and beams of immeasurable power simply spent themselves harmlessly against those sparklingly radiant green walls—seemingly as absorbent to energy as a sponge is to water, since the eye could not detect any change in the appearance of the screens, under even the fiercest blasts of the hexan projectors. Bombs, torpedoes, and all material projectiles were equally futile—they exploded harmlessly in the air far from their objectives, or disappeared at the touch of one of those dark, dull-red pressor rays. And swiftly, but calmly and methodically as at a Vorkulian practice drill, the heptagons were destroying the hexan fleet. Seven mighty green tractors would lash out, seize an attacking sphere, and snap it into the center of mass of the unit of seven. There would be a brief flash of dull red, a still briefer flare of incandescence, and the impalpable magnets would leap out to seize another of the doomed globes. It was only a matter of moments until not a hexan vessel remained; and the Vorkulian juggernaut spiraled onward, now at full acceleration, toward the hexan stronghold dimly visible far ahead of them—a vast city built around Jupiter's northern pole.

At the controls of his projector, Kromodeor spun a dial with a many-fingered, flexible hand and spoke.

"Wixill, I am being watched again—I can feel very plainly that strange intelligence watching everything I do. Have the tracers located him?"

"No, they haven't been able to synchronize with his wave yet. Either he is using a most minute pencil or, what is more probable, he is on a frequency which we do not ordinarily use. However, I agree with you that it is not a malignant intelligence. All of us have felt it, and none of us senses enmity. Therefore, it is not a hexan—it may be one of those strange creatures of the satellites, who are, of course, perfectly harmless."

"Harmless, but unpleasant," returned Kromodeor. "When we get back I'm going to find his beam myself and send a discharge along it that will end his spying upon me. I do not...."

* * * * *

A wailing signal interrupted the conversation and every Vorkul in the vast fleet coiled even more tightly about his bars, for the real battle was about to begin. The city of the hexans lay before them, all her gigantic forces mustered to repel the first real invasion of her long and warlike history. Mile after mile it extended, an orderly labyrinth of spherical buildings arranged in vast interlocking series of concentric circles—a city of such size that only a small part of it was visible, even to the infra-red vision of the Vorkulians. Apparently the city was unprotected, having not even a wall. Outward from the low, rounded houses of the city's edge there reached a wide and verdant plain, which was separated from the jungle by a narrow moat of shimmering liquid—a liquid of such dire potency that across it, even those frightful growths could neither leap nor creep.

But as the Vorkulian phalanx approached—now shooting forward and upward with maximum acceleration, screaming bolts of energy flaming out for miles behind each heptagon as the full power of its generators was unleashed—it was made clear that the homeland of the hexans was far from unprotected. The verdant plain disappeared in a blast of radiance, revealing a transparent surface, through which could be seen masses of machinery filling level below level, deep into the ground as far as the eye could reach; and from the bright liquid of the girdling moat there shot vertically upward a coruscantly refulgent band of intense yellow luminescence. These were the hexan defences, heretofore invulnerable and invincible. Against them any ordinary warcraft, equipped with ordinary weapons of offense, would have been as pitifully impotent as a naked baby attacking a battleship. But now those defenses were being challenged by no ordinary craft; it had taken the mightiest intellects of Vorkulia two long lifetimes to evolve the awful engine of destruction which was hurling itself forward and upward with an already terrific and constantly increasing speed.

Onward and upward flashed the gigantic duplex cone, its entire whirling mass laced and latticed together—into one mammoth unit by green tractor beams and red pressors. These tension and compression members, of unheard-of power, made of the whole fleet of three hundred forty-three fortresses a single stupendous structure—a structure with all the strength and symmetry of a cantilever truss! Straight through that wall of yellow vibrations the vast truss drove, green walls flaming blue defiance as the absorbers overloaded; its doubly braced tip rearing upward, into and beyond the vertical as it shot through that searing yellow wall. Simultaneously from each heptagon there flamed downward a green shaft of radiance, so that the whole immense circle of the cone's mouth was one solid tractor beam, fastening upon and holding in an unbreakable grip mile upon mile of the hexan earthworks.

Practically irresistible force and supposedly immovable object! Every loose article in every heptagon had long since been stored in its individual shockproof compartment, and now every Vorkul coiled his entire body in fierce clasp about mighty horizontal bars: for the entire kinetic energy of the untold millions of tons of mass comprising the cone, at the terrific measure of its highest possible velocity, was to be hurled upon those unbreakable linkages of force which bound the trussed aggregation of Vorkulian fortresses to the deeply buried intrenchments of the hexans. The gigantic composite tractor beam snapped on and held. Inconceivably powerful as that beam was, it stretched a trifle under the incomprehensible momentum of those prodigious masses of metal, almost halted in their terrific flight. But the war-cone was not quite halted; the calculations of the Vorkulian scientists had been accurate. No possible artificial structure, and but few natural ones—in practice maneuvers entire mountains had been lifted and hurled for miles through the air—could have withstood the incredible violence of that lunging, twisting, upheaving impact. Lifted bodily by that impalpable hawser of force and cruelly wrenched and twisted by its enormous couple of angular momentum, the hexan works came up out of the ground as a waterpipe comes up in the teeth of a power shovel. The ground trembled and rocked and boulders, fragments of concrete masonry, and masses of metal flew in all directions as that city-encircling conduit of diabolical machinery was torn from its bed.

* * * * *

A portion of that conduit fully thirty miles in length was in the air, a twisted, flaming inferno of wrecked generators, exploding ammunition, and broken and short-circuited high-tension leads before the hexans could themselves cut it and thus save the remainder of their fortifications. With resounding crashes, the structure parted at the weakened points, the furious upheaval stopped and, the tractor beams shut off, the shattered, smoking, erupting mass of wreckage fell in clashing, grinding ruin upon the city.

The enormous duplex cone of the Vorkuls did not attempt to repeat the maneuver, but divided into two single cones, one of which darted toward each point of rupture. There, upon the broken and unprotected ends of the hexan cordon, their points of attack lay: theirs the task to eat along that annular fortress, no matter what the opposition might bring to bear—to channel in its place a furrow of devastation until the two cones, their work complete, should meet at the opposite edge of the city. Then what was left of the cones would separate into individual heptagons, which would so systematically blast every hexan thing into nothingness as to make certain that never again would they resume their insensate attacks upon the Vorkuls. Having counted the cost and being grimly ready to pay it, the implacable attackers hurled themselves upon their objectives.

Here were no feeble spheres of space, commanding only the limited energies transmitted to their small receptors through the ether. Instead there were all the offensive and defensive weapons developed by hundreds of generations of warrior-scientists; wielding all the incalculable power capable of being produced by the massed generators of a mighty nation. But for the breach opened in the circle by the irresistible surprise attack, they would have been invulnerable, and, hampered as they were by the defenseless ends of what should have been an endless ring, the hexans took heavy toll.

The heptagons, massive and solidly braced as they were, and anchored by tractor rays as well, shuddered and trembled throughout their mighty frames under the impact of fiercely driven pressor beams. Sullenly radiant green wall-screens flared brighter and brighter as the Vorkulian absorbers and dissipators, mighty as they were, continued more and more to overload; for there were being directed against them beams from the entire remaining circumference of the stronghold. Every deadly frequency and emanation known to the fiendish hexan intellect, backed by the full power of the city, was poured out against the invaders in sizzling shrieking bars, bands, and planes of frenzied incandescence. Nor was vibratory destruction alone. Armor-piercing projectiles of enormous size and weight were hurled—diamond-hard, drill-headed projectiles which clung and bored upon impact. High-explosive shells, canisters of gas, and the frightful aerial bombs and radio-dirigible torpedoes of highly scientific war—all were thrown with lavish hand, as fast as the projectors could be served. But thrust for thrust, ray for ray, projectile for massive projectile, the Brobdingnagian creations of the Vorkuls gave back to the hexans.

The material lining of the ghastly moat was the only substance capable of resisting the action of its contents, and now, that lining destroyed by the uprooting of the fortress, that corrosive, brilliantly mobile liquid cascaded down in to the trough and added its hellish contribution to the furious scene. For whatever that devouring fluid touched flared into yellow flame, gave off clouds of lurid, strangling vapor, and disappeared. But through yellow haze, through blasting frequencies, through clouds of poisonous gas, through rain of metal and through storm of explosive the two cones ground implacably onward, their every offensive weapon centered upon the fast-receding exposed ends of the hexan fortress. Their bombs and torpedoes ripped and tore into the structure beneath the invulnerable shield and exploded, demolishing and hurling aside like straws, the walls, projectors, hexads and vast mountains of earth. Their terrible rays bored in, softening, fusing, volatilizing metal, short-circuiting connections, destroying life far ahead of the point of attack; and, drawn along by the relentlessly creeping composite tractor beam, there progressed around the circumference of the hexan city two veritable Saturnalia of destruction—uninterrupted, cataclysmic detonations of sound and sizzling, shrieking, multi-colored displays of pyrotechnic incandescence combining to form a spectacle of violence incredible.

But the heptagons could not absorb nor radiate indefinitely those torrents of energy, and soon one greenishly incandescent screen went down. Giant shells pierced the green metal walls, giant beams of force fused and consumed them. Faster and faster the huge heptagon became a shapeless, flowing mass, its metal dripping away in flaming gouts of brilliance; then it disappeared utterly in one terrific blast as some probing enemy ray reached a vital part. The cone did not pause nor waver. Many of its component units would go down, but it would go on—and on and on until every hexan trace had disappeared or until the last Vorkulian heptagon had been annihilated.

In one of the lowermost heptagons, one bearing the full brunt of the hexan armament, Kromodeor reared upright as his projector controls went dead beneath his hands. Finding his communicator screens likewise lifeless, he slipped to the floor and wriggled to the room of the Chief Power Officer, where he found Wixill idly fingering his controls.

"Are we out?" asked Kromodeor, tersely.

"All done," the Chief Power Officer calmly replied. "We have power left, but we cannot use it, as they have crushed our screens and are fusing our outer walls. Two out of seven chances, and we drew one of them. We are still working on the infra band, over across on the Second's board, but we won't last long...."

* * * * *

As he spoke, the mighty fabric lurched under them, and only their quick and powerful tails, darting in lightning loops about the bars, saved them from being battered to death against the walls as the heptagon was hurled end over end by a stupendous force. With a splintering crash it came to rest upon the ground.

"I wonder how that happened? They should have rayed us out or exploded us," Kromodeor pondered. The Vorkuls, with their inhumanly powerful, sinuous bodies, were scarcely affected by the shock of that frightful fall.

"They must have had a whole battery of pressors on us when our greens went out—they threw us half-way across the city, almost into the gate we made first," Wixill replied, studying the situation of the vessel in the one small screen still in action. "We aren't hurt very badly—only a few holes that they are starting to weld already. When the absorber and dissipator crews get them cooled down enough so that we can use power again, we'll go back."

But they were not to resume their place in the attack. Through the holes in the still-glowing walls, hexan soldiery were leaping in steady streams, fighting with the utmost savagery of their bloodthirsty natures, urged on by the desperation born of the knowledge of imminent defeat and total destruction. Hand-weapons roared, flashed, and sparkled; heavy bars crashed and thudded against crunching bones; mighty bodies and tails whipped crushingly about six-limbed forms which wrenched and tore with monstrously powerful hands and claws. Fiercely and valiantly the Vorkuls fought, but they were outnumbered by hundreds and only one outcome was possible.

Kromodeor was one of the last to go down. Weapons long since exhausted, he unwrapped his deadly coils from about a dead hexan and darted toward a storeroom, only to be cut off by a horde of enemies. Throwing himself down a vertical shaft, he flew toward a tiny projector-locker, in the lowermost part of one of the great star's points, the hexans in hot pursuit. He wrenched the door open, and even while searing planes of force were riddling his body, he trained the frightful weapon he had sought. He pressed the contact, and bursts of intolerable flame swept the entire passage clear of life. Weakly he struggled to go out into the aisle, but his muscles refused to do the bidding of his will and he lay there, twitching feebly.

In the power room of the heptagon a hexan officer turned fiercely to another, who was offering advice.

"Vorkuls? Bah!" he snarled, viciously. "Our race is finished. Die we must, but we shall take with us the one enemy, who above all others needs destruction!" and he hurled the captured Vorkulian fortress into the air.

As the heptagon lurched upward, the massive door of a lower projector locker clanged shut and Kromodeor collapsed in a corner, his consciousness blotted out.

* * * * *

"Well, that certainly tears it! That's a ... I...." Stevens' ready vocabulary failed him and he turned to Brandon, who was still staring narrow-eyed into the plate, watching the destruction of the hexan city.

"They've got something, all right—you've got to hand it to them," Brandon replied. "And we thought we knew something about forces and physical phenomena in general. Those birds have forgotten more than we ever will know. Just one of those things could take the whole I-P fleet, armed as we are now, any morning before breakfast, just for setting-up exercises. We've got to do something about it—but what?"

"It's okay—whatever you say. There may be an out somewhere, but I don't see it," and Stevens' gloomy tone matched his words.

Highly trained scientists both, they had been watching that which transcended all the science of the inner planets and knew themselves outclassed immeasurably.

"Only one thing to do, as I see it," Brandon cogitated. "That's to keep on going straight out, the way we're headed now. We'd better call a council of war, to dope out a line of action."



CHAPTER XII

The Citadel in Space

For the first time in many days Brandon and Westfall sat at dinner in the main dining room of the Sirius. They were enjoying greatly the unaccustomed pleasure of a leisurely, formal meal; but still their talk concerned the projection of pure forces instead of subjects more appropriate to the table; still their eyes paid more attention to diagrams drawn upon scraps of paper than to the diners about them.

"But I tell you, Quince, you're full of little red ants, clear to the neck!" Brandon snorted, as Westfall waved one of his arguments aside. "You must have had help to get that far off—no one man could possibly be as wrong as you are. Why, those fields absolutely will...."

"Hi, Quincy! Hi, Norman!" a merry voice interrupted. "Still fighting as usual, I see! What kind of knights are you, anyway, to rescue us poor damsels in distress, and then never even know that we're alive?" A tall, willowy brunette had seen the two physicists as she entered the saloon, and came over to their table, a hand outstretched to each in cordial greeting.

"Ho, Verna!" both men exclaimed, and came to their feet as they welcomed the smiling, graceful newcomer.

"Sit down here, Verna—we have hardly started," Westfall invited, and Brandon looked at the girl in assumed surprise as she seated herself in the proffered chair.

"Well, Verna, it's like this...." he began.

"That's enough!" she broke in. "That phrase always was your introduction to one of the world's greatest brainstorms. But I know that this is the first time you have had time even to eat like civilized beings, so I'll forgive you this once. Why all the registering of amazement, Norman?"

"I'm astonished that you aren't being monopolized by some husband or other. Surely the officers of the Arcturus weren't so dumb that they'd stand for your still being Verna Pickering, were they?"

"Not dumb, Norman, no. Far from it. But I'm still working for my M. R. S. degree, and I haven't succeeded in snaring it yet. You'd be surprised at how cagy those officers got after a few of them had been captured. But they are just like any other hunted game, I suppose—the antelopes that survive get pretty wild, you know," she concluded, plaintively.

"Well, that certainly is one tough break for a poor little girl," Brandon sympathized. "Quince, our little Nell, here, hasn't been done right by. I'm bashful and you're a woman-hater, but between us, some way, we've simply got to take steps."

"You might take longer steps than you think," Verna laughed, her regular, white teeth and vivid coloring emphasized by her olive skin and her startling hair, black as Brandon's own. "Perhaps I would like a scientist better than an I-P officer, anyway. The more I think of it, the surer I am that Nadia Newton had the right idea. I believe that I'll catch me a physicist, too—either of you would do quite nicely, I think," and she studied the two men carefully.

Westfall, the methodical and precise, had never been able to defend himself against Verna Pickering's badinage, but Brandon's ready tongue took up the challenge.

"Verna, if you really decided to get any living man he wouldn't stand a chance in the world," he declared. "If you've already made up your mind that I'm your meat, I'll come down like Davy Crockett's coon. But if either of us will do, that'll give us each a fifty-fifty chance to escape your toils. What say we play a game of freeze-out to decide it?"

"Fine, Norman! When shall we play?"

"Oh, between Wednesday and Thursday, any week you say," and the two fenced on, banteringly but skilfully, with Westfall an appreciative and unembarrassed listener.

Dinner over, Brandon and Westfall went back to the control room, where they found Stevens already seated at one of the master screens.

"All x, Perce?"

"All x. The observers report no registrations during the last two watches," and the three fell into discussion. Long they talked, studying every angle of the situation confronting them; until suddenly a speaker rattled furiously and an enormous, staring eye filled both master plates. Brandon's hand flashed to a switch, but the image disappeared even before he could establish the full-coverage ray screen.

"I'm on the upper band—take the lower!" he snapped, but Stevens' projector was already in action. Trained minds all, they knew that some intelligence had traced them, and all realized that it was of the utmost importance to know what and where that intelligence was. Stevens found the probing frequency in his range and they flashed their own beam along it, encountering finally one of the monstrous Vorkulian fortresses, far from Jupiter and almost directly between them and the planet! Its wall screens were in operation, and no frequency at their command could penetrate that neutralizing blanket of vibrations.