"As for you personally, perhaps we shall destroy you after the other Great Ones have examined you, perhaps we shall decide to use you as a messenger to transmit our orders to your fellow creatures. Before we depart, however, I shall make a demonstration which should impress upon even such feeble minds as those of your race the futility of any thought of opposition to us. Watch carefully--everything that goes on outside is shown in the view box." Although Siblin had neither heard, felt, nor seen the captain issue any orders, all was in readiness for the take-off. The mining engineers were all on board, the vessel was sealed for flight, and the navigators and control officers were at their panels. Siblin stared intently into the "view box," the three-dimensional visiplate that mirrored faithfully every occurrence in the neighborhood of the Chloran vessel. The lower edge of the hemisphere of force began to contract, passing smoothly through or around--the spectator could not decide which--the ruins of Mocelyn, hugging or actually penetrating the ground, allowing not even a whiff of its precious chlorin content to escape into the atmosphere of Valeron. The ship then darted into the air and the shrinking edge became an ever-decreasing circle upon the ground beneath her. That circle disappeared as the meeting edge fused and the wall of force, now a hollow sphere, contained within itself the atmosphere of the invaders. High over the surface of the planet sped the Chloran raider toward the nearest Valeronian city, which happened to be only a small village. Above the unfortunate settlement the callous monstrosity poised its craft, to drop its dread curtain of strangling, choking death. Down the screen dropped, rolling out to become again a hemispherical wall, sweeping before it every milliliter of the life-giving air of Valeron and drawing behind it the noxious atmosphere of Chlora. For those who have ever inhaled even a small quantity of chlorin it is unnecessary to describe in detail the manner in which those villagers of Valeron died; for those who have not, no possible description could be adequate. Suffice it to say, therefore, that they died--horribly. * * * * * Again the wall of force rolled up, coming clear up to the outer skin of the cruiser this time, in its approach liquefying the chlorin and forcing it into storage chambers. The wall then disappeared entirely, leaving the marauding vessel starkly outlined against the sky. Then, further and even more strongly to impress the raging but impotent Klynor Siblin: "Beam it down!" the amœbus captain commanded, and various officers sent out thin, whiplike tentacles toward their controls. Projectors swung downward and dense green pillars of flaming energy erupted from the white-hot refractories of their throats. And what those green pillars struck subsided instantly into a pool of hissing, molten glass. Methodically they swept the entire area of the village.