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...." * * * * *