These pirates were a motley aggregation from every planet in the system — Martians, Saturnians and Uranians, wicked-looking Earthmen, fighters all, from the look of them.
Thorn and his comrades emerged after old Stilicho Keene into the broad, glassite-fronted control-room. A surly Jovian stood at the firingkeys, and a nervous, green-faced, hollow-eyed Saturnian at the bank of instruments on the right.
"Get going to Turkoon, Barbo,” ordered the pirate commander.
With roar of stern-tubes pouring forth proton-fire, the heavy cruiser shot forward in space.
John Thorn looked through the broad glassite windows. The Venture was moving counter-sunwise into the very heart of the Zone. Space ahead seemed thick with whirling clouds of light-specks that were meteor swarms, and steady bright sparks that were booming planetoids.
"How the devil do you navigate this damned jungle, anyway?” Gunner Welk asked the old Martian.
Stilicho Keene's wrinkled face grinned. “That's easy. We've got a little projector of vibrations planted on every big asteroid and in all swarms — each projector emitting a wave of a different frequency. We pick up the signals, and they show us just how far and in what direction each swarm and asteroid is, so we can avoid them. just like the lighthouses on the Earth seas, centuries ago."
He added with cunning satisfaction, “The signals don't help naval cruisers or other ships navigate the Zone, because they don't know the frequency-code and can't tell what's meant by the signals they hear. They've lost so many cruisers trying to get in here that they gave it up as a bad job."
The ship forged on through the wilderness of the Zone, constantly detouring to avoid the many perils to navigation that abounded here. It coasted along vast swarms, cut sharply upward to evade’ planetoids, slipped close past a small tailless comet that glimmered like a little white ghost sun.
Then John Thorn made out a small green speck in the blackness, toward which the Venture was now heading directly. It widened rapidly into a green disk. His black eyes narrowed.