and his Karbix as you have talked to me, of cooperation and of mutual advancement. If
they will cooperate, we will.”
During the long voyage to Urvania, the third planet of the fourteenth sun, however, their
new ardor cooled perceptibly-particularly that of the younger man-and in Urvan’s palace it
became clear that the love of peaceful culture inculcated upon those fierce minds by
contact with more humane peoples could not supplant immediately the spirit of strife bred
into bone and fiber during thousands of generations of incessant warfare.
For when the two Osnomians sat down with the two Urvanians the very air seemed
charged with animosity. Like strange dogs meeting with bared fangs and bristling manes,
Osnomian and Urvanian alike fairly radiated hostility. Therefore Taman’s suggestions as
to cooperation and understanding were decidedly unconvincing, and were received with
open scorn.
“Your race may well wish to cooperate with ours,” sneered the Emperor of Urvania,
“since but for the threats of that self-styled Overlord, you would have ceased to exist
long since. And how do we know where that one is, what he is doing, whether he is
paying any attention to us? Probably you have learned that he has left this System
entirely and have already planned an attack upon us. In self-defense we shall probably
have to wipe out your race to keep you from destroying ours. At any rate your plea is
very evidently some underhanded trick of your weak and cowardly race . . .”
“Weak! Cowardly! Us? You conceited bloated toad!” stormed Dunark, who had kept
himself in check thus far only by sheer power of will. He sprang to his feet, his stool flying
backward. “Here and now I demand a meeting of honor, if you know the meaning of the
word honor.”
The four enraged men, all drawing weapons, were suddenly swept apart, then clutched
and held immovably as a figure of force materialized among them-the form of an aged,
white-bearded Norlaminian.
“Peace, children, and silence!” the image commanded sternly. “Rest assured that there
shall be no more warfare in this System and that the decrees of the Overlord shall be
enforced to the letter. Calm yourselves and listen. I know well, mind you, that none of
you really meant what has just been said. You of Osnome were so impressed by the
benefits of mutual helpfulness that you made this journey to further its cause; you of
Urvania are at heart also strongly in favor of it, but neither of you has strength enough to
admit it.
“For know, vain and self-willed children, that it is weakness, not strength, which you have
been displaying. It may well be, however, that your physical bravery and your love of
strife can now be employed for the general good of all humanity. Would you join hands,
to fight side by side in such a cause?”
“We would,” chorused the four, as one.
Each was heartily ashamed of what had just happened, and was glad indeed of the
opportunity to drop it without losing face.
“Very well! We of Norlamin fear greatly that we have inadvertently given to one of the
greatest foes of universal civilization weapons equal in power to the Overlord’s own, and
that he is even now working to undo all that has been done. Will you of Osnome and you
of Urvania help in conducting an expedition against that foe?”
“We will!” they exclaimed.
Dunark added: “Who is that enemy, and where is he to be found?”
“He is Dr. Marc C. DuQuesne, of Earth.”
“DuQuesne!” barked Dunark. “Why, I thought the Fenachrone killed him! But we shall
attend to it at once-when I kill any one he stays killed!”
“Just a moment, son,” the image cautioned. “He has surrounded Earth with defenses
against which your every arm would be entirely impotent. Come you to Norlamin, bringing
each of you one hundred of his best men. We shall have prepared for you certain
equipment which, although it may not enable you to emerge victorious from the
engagement, will at least insure your safe return. It might be well also to stop at Dasor,
which is not now far from your course of flight, and bring along Sacner Carfon, who will
be of great assistance being a man both of action and learning.”
“But DuQuesne!” raved Dunark, who realized immediately what must have happened.
“Why didn’t you ray him on sight? Didn’t you know what a liar and a thief he is, by instinct
and training?”
“We had no suspicion then who he was, thinking, as did you, that DuQuesne had passed.
He came under another name, as Seaton’s friend. He came as one possessing
knowledge, with fair and plausible words. But of that we shall inform you later. Come at
once-we shall place upon ,your controls forces which shall pilot you accurately and with
speed.”
Upon the aqueous world of Dasor they found its amphibious humanity reveling in an
activity which, although dreamed of for centuries, had been impossible of realization until
the Skylark had brought to them a supply of Rovolon, the metal of power. Now cities of
metal were arising here and there above her waves, airplanes and helicopters sped
through and hovered in her atmosphere, barges and pleasure craft sailed the almost
unbroken expanse of ocean which was her surface, immense submarine freighters bored
their serenely stolid ways through her watery depths.
Sacner Carfon, the porpoise like, hairless, naked Dasorian councilor, heaved his six and
a half feet of height and his five hundredweight of mass into Dunark’s vessel and greeted
the Osnomian prince with a grave and friendly courtesy.
“Yes, friend, everything is wonderfully well with Dasor,” he answered Dunark’s query.
“Now that our one lack, that of power, has been supplied, our lives can at last be lived to
the full, unhampered by the limitations which we have hitherto been compelled to set
upon them. But this from Norlamin is terrible news. What know you of it?”
During the trip to Norlamin the three leaders not only discussed and planned among
themselves, but also had many conferences with the Advisory Five of the planet toward
which they were speeding, so that they arrived upon that ancient world with a complete
knowledge of what they were to attempt. There Rovol and Drasnik instructed them in the
use of fifth-order forces, each according to his personality and ability.
To Sacner Carfon was given command, and he was instructed minutely in every detail of
the power, equipment, and performance of the vessel which was to carry the hope of
civilization. To Tarnan, the best balanced of his race, was given a more limited
knowledge. Dunark and Urvan, however, were informed only as to the actual operation of
the armament, with no underlying knowledge of its nature or construction.
“I trust that you will not resent this necessary caution,” Drasnik said carefully. “Your
natures are as yet essentially savage and bloodthirsty; your reason is all too easily
clouded by passion. You are, however, striving truly, and that is a great good. With a few
mental operations, which we shall be glad to give you at a later time, you shall both be
able to take your places as leaders in the march of your peoples toward civilization.”
Fodan, majestic chief of the Five, escorted the company of warriors to their battleship of
space, and what a ship she was! Fully twice the size of Skylark Three in every dimension
she lay there, surcharged with power and might, awaiting only her commander’s touch to
hurl herself away toward distant and inimical Earth.
But the vengeful expedition was too late by far. DuQuesne had long since consolidated
his position. His chain of interlinked power stations encircled the globe. Governments
were in name only. World Steel now ruled the entire Earth and DuQuesne’s power was
absolute. Nor was that rule as yet unduly onerous. The threat of war was gone, the
tyranny of gangsterism was done, everybody was working for high wages-what was
there to kick about? Some men of vision of course perceived the truth and were telling it,
but they were being howled down by the very people they were trying to warn.
It was thus against an impregnably fortified world that Dunark and Urvan directed every
force with which their flying superdreadnought was armed. Nor was she feeble, this
monster of the skyways, but DuQuesne had known well what form the attack would take
and, having the resources of the world upon which to draw, he had prepared to withstand
the massed assault of a hundred such vessels-or a thousand.
Therefore the attack not only failed; it was repulsed crushingly. For from his massed
generators DuQuesne hurled out upon the Norlaminian space ship a solid beam of such
incredible intensity that in neutralizing its terrific ardor her store of power-uranium
dwindled visibly, second by second. So rapidly did the metal disappear that Sacner
Carfon, after waging the unequal struggle for some twenty hours, abandoned it and