f a hundred other ships from all over the
city were on the way. Sirians seemed quite humanly curious.

"We'll have to be careful here. We have to use altitude suits, as the
Negrians breathe an atmosphere of hydrogen instead of oxygen," explained
Arcot rapidly to the Ortolian and the Talsonian who were to accompany
him. "We will all want to go, and so, although this suit will be
decidedly uncomfortable for you and Zezdon Afthen and Stel Felso Theu, I
think it wise that you all wear it. It will be much more convincing to
the Sirians if we show that people of no less than three worlds are
already interested in this alliance."

A considerable number of Sirian ships had landed about them, and the
tall, slim men of the 100,000,000-year-old race were watching them with
their great brown eyes from a slight distance, for a cordon of men with
evident authority were holding them back.

"Who are you, friends?" asked a single man who stood within the cordon.
His strongly built frame, a great high brow and broad head designated
him a leader at a glance.

Despite the vast change the light of Sirius had wrought, Arcot
recognized in him the original photographs he had seen from the planet
old Sol had captured as Negra had swept past. So it was he who answered
the thought-question.

"I am of the third planet of the sun your people sought as a home a few
years back in time, Taj Lamor. Because you did not understand us, and
because we did not understand you, we fought. We found the records of
your race on the planet our sun captured, and we know now what you most
wanted. Had we been able to communicate with you then, as we can now,
our people would never have fought.

"At last you have reached that sun you so needed, thanks, no doubt, to
the genius that was with you.

"But now, in your new-found peace comes a new enemy, one who wants not
only yours, but every sun in this galaxy.

"You have tried your ray of death, the anti-catalyst? And it but
sputters harmlessly on their screens? You have been swept by their
terrible rays that fuse mountains, then hurl them into space? Our world
and the world of each of these men is similarly menaced.

"See, here is Zezdon Afthen, from Ortol, far on the other side of the
galaxy, and here is Stel Felso Theu, of Talso. Their worlds, as well as
yours and mine have been attacked by this menace from a distant galaxy,
from Thett, of the sun Ansteck, of the galaxy Venone.

"Now we must form an allian