"Janice!" he cried, and with new vigor hurried to the door of the room she had mentioned. Ankova smashed the lock with his war club and the portal flew open. Jan was standing there encased in space armor. She was trying hard to smile. "You're safe, darling!" Shelby cried, "And I thought that that fiend was going to hurt you!" "My luck," she said. "Koo Faya was thoughtful enough to bring this space armor, otherwise, I wouldn't have been fit to look at any more." She pointed to a shattered window. "And you--heaven's how you can yell--and swear! I am ashamed of you!" Her eyes widened when she looked at Ankova, but Shelby reassured her. "This is Ankova, and he is our friend--big shot, too," he said. "And Jan, I guess we're free now--really free." Ugly Space Men, some of them gashed and wounded, crowded about as though bent on destroying the two feeble Earthians. But with imperious gestures Ankova waved them back. He conversed by signs with these warriors of his father, and then took Janice Darell and Austin each by the arm. "Big surprise," he told them. "Come." He led them to the control room. And there, in the grip of a black colossus was Hekalu Selba--captive. The Martian nodded perfunctorily to the girl and then turned his level gaze toward the man. His face showed no hint of anger, and it seemed that a shadow of a smile twinkled about his lips. "Here we have a contrast, Mr. Shelby," he said quietly, "triumph and disaster staring at each other!" Shelby told him that he should be wreaking vengeance on the noble for the numerous wrongs he had done him, but the calm unflinching attitude of the Prince of Selba made him almost like the captive. Shelby waved the Martian's captors back and he stood free. "There is no contrast now, Akar Hekalu, for an outsider could not tell which was which!" As Hekki's jailer led him away, Shelby, assisted by Janice Darell, busied himself with the ship's controls. And so the battered _Selba_ escorted by five thousand Space Men set out for a certain minor planet where were amassed the forces of Telaba, insubordinate vassal of the Black Emperor. And on another planet was Alkebar, the Black Emperor himself, ready to hurl his shock troops, a horde five million strong, at the planets. CHAPTER IX The Revolt of Alkebar The light of a shrunken sun shone down coldly and ineffectually upon a jagged and distorted landscape. Along the horizon, which was strangely abrupt, twisted gray hills loomed up with harsh clearness against a black starlit sky. There was no atmosphere to soften their lines, nor to dull the needle-like points of deepest sable that were their shadows.