E. E. Smith

“ Think of living this close to one of the most wonderful sights in the Solar System, and never being able to see it. Think they know what they're missing, Steve?"
"We'll have to ask Barkovis," Stevens replied. He swung the communicator beam back toward Titan, and Nadia shuddered.
"Oh, it's hideous!" she exclaimed. "I thought that it would improve as we got closer, but the plainer we can see it, the worse it gets. Just to think of human beings, even such cold-blooded ones as those over there, living upon such a horrible moon and liking it, gives me the blue shivers!" ”

“ While Westfall made another series of precise measurements of the super-dreadnought of space so earnestly pursuing them, Brandon stumbled heavily about the room, hands jammed deep into pockets, eyes unseeing emitting clouds of smoke from his villainously reeking pipe. The Venetians, lacking Brandon's physical strength and by nature quieter of disposition, sat motionless; keen minds hard at work. Stevens sat at the calculating machine, absently setting up and knocking down weird and meaningless integrals, while he also concentrated upon the problem before them. ”

“ Breckenridge spoke. "The hexans are intelligent. Why are they leaving Europa and Ganymede so unguarded that human beings can move back there and that we can land there, all undetected?"
"I will answer that question myself," replied King. "Captain Czuv did not quite do justice to his own people. It is true that they are being conquered, but for every human life that is taken, a thousand hexans die, and for every human ship that is lost, twenty hexan vessels are annihilated in return. While the hexans are masters of rays, the humans are equally masters of explosives and of mechanisms. ”

“ 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! ”

“ Then, the wicked dirk in his left hand and the long and heavy saber weaving a circular path of brilliance in the sun, he stepped forward a couple of paces to meet the attackers. For a few moments nothing could stand before that fiercely driven blade—severed heads, limbs, and fragments of torsos literally filled the air, but sheer weight of numbers bore him down. As he fell, he saw the white shaft of one of Nadia's hunting-arrows flash past his helmet and bury itself to the flock in the body of one of the horde above him. ”

“ Instantly he shot out the detectors and ultra-lights and saw not one, but six of the deadly globes—almost upon them, at point-blank range! One was already playing a beam of force upon the Forlorn Hope, and the other five went into action immediately upon feeling the detector impulses and perceiving that the weapon of their sister ship had encountered an unusual resistance in the material of that peculiarly mirrored wedge. As those terrific forces struck her, the terrestrial cruiser became a vast pyrotechnic set piece, a dazzling fountain of coruscant brilliance: for the mirror held. ”

“ 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. ”

“ I am glad, for your sake as well as our own, that your vessel was able to destroy the hexan ship holding you captive, and whose crew would have killed you all as soon as they had landed your vessel and had read your minds. I regret bitterly that we can do so little for you, for only the representatives of a human civilization being exterminated by a race of highly intelligent monsters can fully realize how desirable it is for all the various races of humanity to assist and support each other. ”

“ Let the weight-fiends plan upon detonating magazines of explosives, upon laying mines calculated to destroy the invaders, even the vessel itself and all within it. Let them plan upon any other such idle schemes, which were certain to be foreseen and guarded against by the space-hardened veterans who undoubtedly moaned that all-powerful and vengeful football of scarred gray metal. Space-fighters were they, and as space-fighters would they die; taking with them to their own inevitable death a full quota of the enemy. ”

“ At least one hidden officer must have been watching the fruitless efforts, for the next lifeboat to issue made no attempt, either to talk or to flee, but from it there flamed out into space a concentrated beam of destruction—the terrible ray of annihilation, against which no known substance could endure for a moment ”

“ The air glowed with the violet light of the twelve great ultra-light projectors, like searchlights with three-foot lenses, which lined the wall. The floor beneath their feet was not a level steel platform, but seemed to be composed of many lenticular sections of dull blue alloy.
"We are standing upon the upper lookout lenses, aren't we?" asked the girl. "Is that perfectly all right?"
"Sure. They're so hard that nothing can scratch them, and of course Roeser's Rays go right through our bodies, or any ordinary substance, like a bullet through a hole in a Swiss cheese. ”

“ 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. ”

“ 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. ”

“ 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. ”

“ In return Stevens and Nadia came gradually to know the story of the humanity of Titan.
"I am glad beyond measure to have known you," Barkovis mused, one night. "Your existence proves that there is truth in mythology, as some of us have always believed. Your visit to Titan will create a furor in scientific circles, for you are impossibility incarnate—personifications of the preposterous. In you, wildest fancy had become commonplace. According to many of our scientists, it is utterly impossible for you to exist. ”

“ 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. ”

“ 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. ”

“ 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. ”

“ I know you love me, Nadia, just as I love you—you know I never doubted it. But you'll like them, really. They're a wonderful team. Brandon's a big brute, you know—fully five centimeters taller than I am, and he weighs close to a hundred kilograms—and no lard, either. He's wild, impetuous, always jumping at conclusions and working out theories that seem absolutely ridiculous, but they're usually sound, even though impractical. Westfall's the practical member—he makes Norm pipe down, pins him down to facts, and makes it possible to put his hunches and wild flashes of genius into workable form. ”

“ His powerful left arm, driving the double-razor-edged dirk in short, resistless arcs, managed to keep the snaky tendrils from coiling about his right arm, which was wielding the heavy, trenchant sword. Every time that mighty blade descended it cleaved its length through snapping spikes and impotently grinding leaves; but more than once a flailing tendril coiled about his neck armor and held his helmet immovable as though in a vise, while those frightful, grinding saws sought to rip their way through the glass to the living creature inside the peculiar metal housing. ”

“ Switch after switch drove home, and one after another those frightful fields of force, those products of the mightiest minds of three planets, were hurled out against the tiny Jovian sphere. Driven as they were by the millions upon millions of horsepower stored in the accumulators of the Sirius they formed a coruscating spherical shell of intolerable energy all around the enemy vessel, but even their prodigious force was held at bay by the powerful defensive screens of the smaller space-ship. ”

“ The satellite was reached without event and down into the crater landing shaft the two enormous masses of metal dropped.
Callisto's foremost citizens were on hand to welcome the Terrestrial rescuers, and revelry reigned supreme in that deeply buried Europan community. All humanity celebrated. The Callistonians rejoiced because they were now freed from the age-old oppression of the hexan hordes; because they could once more extend their civilization over the Jovian satellites and live again their normal lives upon the surface of those small worlds. ”

“ Horns and arms tossed fiercely, savage noises rent the air, and arrows splintered harmlessly upon steel plate as the mystified and maddened warriors upon the plain below gave vent to their outraged feelings.
"Look, Nadia! A whole gang of them are smelling around that power plug. Pretty soon somebody's going to touch a hot spot, and when he does, we'll cut loose on the rest of them."
The huge insulating plug, housing the ends of the three great cables leading to the converters of the turbo-alternator, lay innocently upon the ground, its three yawning holes invitingly open to savage arms. ”

“ 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. ”

“ 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. ”

“ 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. ”