be as decent as they were. They didn't
bother the transports leaving Jupiter when they came in, only attacked
the warships. We're bound to do the same, but we'll have to keep a watch
on them, nonetheless. So you go on ahead."

They started down the corridor, and came presently to the huge locks
where the "S Doradus" and the "Cepheid" were berthed. The super-ships
lay cold and gray now, men swarming in and out with last-minute
supplies. Air, water, spare parts, bedding and personal equipment.
Douglass, Cole, and most of the laboratory staff would go with Kendall
when he followed the Strangers home. Devin and a few of the most
advanced physicists would stay with McLaurin in case of need.

* * * * *

An hour later the "S Doradus" rose gently, soundlessly from her berth,
and floated out of the open lock-door. The "Cepheid" followed her in
five seconds. Still under the great screen of the fort, the lashing,
coruscating colors of the magnetic bombs and the magnetic screen flashed
and was iridescent. The "S Doradus" poked her great nose gently through
the screen, and an instant later her titanically powerful,
material-engine effortlessly discharged a great magnetic bomb, sent with
the combined power of five atomic-powered interstellar ships. The two
ships separated now, the "Cepheid" under McLaurin flashing ahead with
sudden, terrific acceleration toward Mars, whispering through space at a
speed that made it undetectable, faster than light. The "S Doradus"
journeyed out leisurely toward the fleet of forty-seven Miran ships.

Gresth Gkae saw the "S Doradus" and as he watched the steady progress,
felt sudden fear at his heart. The ship seemed so certain--

At a distance of thirty thousand miles, Kendall stopped. Magnetic bombs
were washing his screen continuously now, seeking to exhaust the ship as
all the great ships beyond poured their energy against it. A slow smile
spread over Kendall's mouth as he heard the gentle hum of the barely
working material-engine. Carefully he aligned the nose UV beam of the "S
Doradus" on the nearest of the Miran ships. Then he depressed a switch.

There was no ion-release before the force-mirror now. Just a jet of gas
whirling into a half-inch field of "Uncertainty of the Fourth Degree."
The matter vanished instantly in released energy so stupendous that the
greatest previous UV beams had been harmless things by comparison.
Material energy maintained the mirro