Suddenly a beam of the light-ray leaped from the ground. Sherman thought it was directed at him; tried to loop the plane and cursed as he remembered autogiros wouldn't loop; then saw that the light was after all, not turned in his direction, but at some object on the ground. He banked the plane over and swung lower. Undoubtedly a Lassan fighting machine--and the beam was hitting things, things large and solid, for they collapsed under the stabbing ray. A red flame rose over the wreck; the roar of an explosion reached his ears. The battle-line! He soared again. He must reach the headquarters of whatever men were down there. The information he could bring and that Marta Lami had given him might make all the difference between the loss of the world and its salvation "... perfect mirror--reflects everything that hits it, even shells, but they don't know about the big ones.... The lead will reflect their light-rays, too ... no good against lead. Their armor is made of the same stuff...." In the darkness beneath him troops were moving. He could catch glimpses of dark masses on the roads. Somewhere down there he distinctly heard the call of one of the four-winged birds, quite near. Then with a rush, it was suddenly upon him. He set the automatic pilot, and drew his revolver, but the bird, unfamiliar with the machine it was attacking, had dashed recklessly in. There was a rending screech as it came into contact with the wings of the autogiro; Sherman got in one shot, and then bird, man and plane tumbled toward the earth. CHAPTER XVIII The End of the Light-Ray "The Lassans?" said General Grierson, in a puzzled tone, looking at the sheet-clad apparition. "You mean these--mechanical monsters?" Sherman winced. "Like myself? No, sir, those are their slaves. I thought you were familiar with them. They are elephant-men and quite different." [Illustration: This shows that Mr. Pratt's conception of the elephant-men is not so far-fetched. This photo is Ganesha, a Hindu god, patron of art and literature Ganesha symbolizes to the Hindus wisdom and knowledge.] "I meant those damned, long, shining objects that shoot that light-ray of theirs. Their guns shoot it out in packages, but we can understand that and deal with them; our artillery is just as good. But if we can't stop those shining things there will be no army left and that means no men left on this planet. This army is our last resource. If you know of anything, anything, that will stop them, for God's sake tell us! All we've found that does any good so far are the twelve-inch railroad guns and we have only four of them. One was knocked out by their shells this afternoon."