"Connect three-dimensional telecast," Mark ordered the robot, and instantly the tele-panel showed a scene as if it were an open window on the heavens. In the distance racing at unimaginable speed, the Terran Fleet flashed on majestically.
Breathlessly, the watchers on two worlds eyed its inexorable approach. Suddenly, from the vanguard of the Terran Fleet a pencil of livid light speared an Europan Spacer, and the great transport seemed to disintegrate in space. Mark's knuckles were white as they tightened.
"Maneuver and blast!" He roared into the radio, and in unison, but with vertiginous speed the Europa fleet became a single perpendicular line that spewed atom-blast in an awesome holocaust. But the Terran Fleet came on unscathed. Simultaneously converging beams of livid light shot out from its foremost cruisers and a score of Europan Spacers crumbled into dust. In desperation a flight of them hurled themselves suicidally against the driving Terran Fleet, and whorls of incandescence illumined the ghastly scene, and it was then that Mark saw several shattered Terran Spacers spinning down.
"We have no chance!" Mark gritted as he saw the Europan Spacers disintegrated in the awful struggle. "Murderers!... We'll hurl all our remaining spacers against the Terran Fleet; if that's the only way to shatter them, that's the way it'll be!" As he was about to give the fateful command, the Panadur super-robot, who had accompanied them, lay a restraining metal hand on Mark Lynn's arm:
"Wait!" He exclaimed laconically, and pointed to the three-dimensional Tele-cast. He flicked a tiny lever and made delicate adjustments. As if seen through an ultra-powerful telescope, a vast swarm of silver specks were rising from Europa itself. With dazzling speed many times greater than that of the Spacers, the darting miniatures grew in size. Presently they reached the battle scene, and like metal hornets were darting among the intermingled fleets, as if seeking their prey.
From thousands of projectors of the Terran Fleet, a myriad scintillating beams crossed and criss-crossed the void like cosmic fingers, but the tiny ships in an unexpected maneuver, executed with dazzling speed, had scattered, skimming, darting, swooping like silver hawks, spreading like an immense net over and beneath the Terran ships. Now, they aimed themselves with unerring accuracy at the battle-giants of the Council.
Dozens disappeared into puffs of brilliant light as the Terran beams found their mark, but as the flagship of the Terran Fleet maneuvered into position to annihilate the on-coming swarm, a single silver miniature crashed squarely against its nose. As if a meteor had exploded in space, there was a burst of intolerable light blinding the watchers, and just as they were able to see again, a salvo of crashes became a flaming incandescence that human eyes could never record.
Space was a raving hell of raw energy.