d the city and made a short dash inward on its circling
path. As though awaiting this maneuver, a battery of hissing, flaming
swords of white light flashed upward, a few hundred feet from the ring
of molten rock. As the titanic plane rolled, side-slipped out of the
way, they passed, harmlessly, barely missing a monstrous wing.

"Which?" Arcot demanded. "I say the city. No one should destroy anything
so magnificent."

Not a dissenting voice was raised, so Arcot sent the _Solarite_ nearer.

"But what in the world can we do to that huge thing?" Fuller's voice
came eerily out of the emptiness. "It has perfect invulnerability
through size alone."

There was sudden silence among the Terrestrials as one of the tiny
planes darted forward and dove at full speed directly toward one of the
giant's propellers. There were fifty of these strung along each great
wing. If enough of them could be destroyed, the plane must crash. There
came a terrific crash--a flare of light--and splintered fragments of
flaming wreckage plummeted down. Yet the mighty blades continued
whirling as smoothly as ever!

What could the _Solarite_ do against the giant monoplane? Evidently
Arcot had a plan. Under his touch their machine darted high into the sky
above the great plane. There was a full mile between them when he
released the sustaining force of the _Solarite_ and let it drop,
straight toward the source of the battle--falling freely, ever more and
more rapidly. They were rushing at the mighty plane below at a pace that
made their hearts seem to pause--then suddenly Arcot cried out, "Hold
on--here we stop!"

They seemed a scant hundred feet from the broad metal wings of the
unsuspecting plane, when suddenly there was a tremendous jerk, and each
man felt himself pressed to the floor beneath a terrific weight that
made their backs crack with the load. Doggedly they fought to retain
their senses; the blackness receded.

Below them they saw only a mighty sea of roaring red flames--a hell of
blazing gas that roared like a score of bombs set off at once. The
_Solarite_ was sitting down on her rocket jets! All six of the rocket
tubes in the base of the ship had been opened wide, and streaming from
them in a furious blast of incandescent gas, the atomic hydrogen shot
out in a mighty column of gas at 3500 degrees centigrade. Where the gas
touched it, the great plane flared to incandescence; and in an
immeasurable interval the fall of the _Solarite_ end