The universe wreckers

A Tale of Neptune
By Edmond Hamilton
Author of Locked Worlds, The Other Side of the Moon, etc.
Illustrated by WESSO
It is problematical whether the enormous distance that lies between the Earth and Neptune is the only reason why so much on that planet remains a mystery to astronomers. If the great sphere were not so remote, much might be revealed to us. What might have happened to some of the other planets, perhaps so much older than the Earth, and what might be found upon them, might easily exceed the pale of human conception. But that is exactly why the subject of the possibilities of life 2000 millions of miles away from us, opens such a fertile field for writers of scientific fiction. And there is no assurance that the sun, for instance, should continue indefinitely to turn at its present speed. What might happen if it should, for some reason, begin rotating at an increasing frequency? Mr. Hamilton, who needs no introduction to readers of Amazing Stories and certainly needs no further commendatory note, concerns himself chiefly with the trip to Neptune and life on Neptune. The Universe Wreckers is certainly the best interplanetary story by this author that we have published thus far.
CHAPTER I
A Warning of Doom
It was on the third day of May, 1994, that the world received its first news of the strange behavior of the sun. That first news was contained in a brief message sent out from the North American Observatory, in upper New York, and signed by Dr. Herbert Marlin, the observatory's head. It stated that within the last twenty-four hours a slight increase had been detected in the sun's rotatory speed, or rate of spin, and that while that increase might only be an apparent one, it was being further studied. That brief first message was broadcast, a few hours later, from the Intelligence Bureau of the World Government, in New York. It was I, Walter Hunt, who supervised the broadcasting of that message at the Intelligence Bureau, and I remember that it seemed to me of so little general interest that I ordered it sent out on the scientific-news wave rather than on the general-news wave.