But now there came from all directions great streams of the Atomic Giants. They seemed to suddenly appear close at hand, apparently coming from nowhere. They traveled as fast as light, therefore they reached them as soon as the light, so that their approach was invisible. Only when they slowed down could they be seen. And now, from each ship came steady streams of these Minus Force shells. Thousands of the energy-absorbing projectiles flew in amongst the massed attackers—and many of them took effect, drawing the energy from the great creatures, destroying them utterly. The weapon was a success! They fired a second volley when others of the creatures came within sighting range—but they did not affect the Atomic Giants this time. Great dark patches appeared, but the creatures that had been there before, were there now, as powerful as ever, quite uninjured! What did it mean?
They did not know. They only knew that the enraged creatures were closing in on them, closer and closer—and now the ships were being sent back to the system as rapidly as possible—one—two—three—four—but more could not get through—the others were cornered, marooned in infinity by the destruction of the sender. The Force Creatures, utterly immune to the Minus Force shells, attacked unchecked, gripped it with strange forces, limbs, hands or gripping force, that tore through the foot-thick alloy like so much tissue paper, metal, which was fifty times as strong as our frail steel, a metal whose molecules had been designed by the scientists of the race millions of years ago, and in all those ages no stronger, more inert metal had ever been found. But now that tough envelope was torn open, for the forces of atoms were greater than the forces of molecules, and the creatures used those forces.
But those marooned ships were lost—destroyed soon by the vengeful giants. And the forces of man on the far-off planets of a far-off sun were worried anew. Their weapon was a failure after all. Some new thing must be developed. But how did it happen that the first attempts were successful? The scientists believed it was due to the fact that the first attempts were utter surprises to the creatures—they were taken before they could prevent the loss of their energy. In some way they were able to build a barrier about themselves that prevented the loss of energy, even as it prevented the penetration of the energy of the disintegration ray.
But man must develop some new, some stronger weapon. The time was getting too short for more failures. For Hal Jus had announced a discovery that made men even more anxious to abandon their age-old home. The Sun was to become a nova. These flaming stars had been known and studied for ages. Dim, old stars they were that suddenly flared up for a brief period of intense activity, then quickly faded back even lower than before. It behooved man to move quickly. A mighty people that for ten billion years had slowly built up the mighty structure of their science had to move.
Many weapons were tried, many expeditions of two or three ships made the trip, and attempted to destroy the creatures. Some succeeded moderately well, others met with ghastly failure.
Two brief years now remained to them. Expeditions to many of the younger stars within range of their great projectors were made, but always they brought back bad news. Here they found no habitable planets; there the sun had not yet developed planets, and there was no time to stop to make and cool off a planet. That would require a century, even for one as small as Mercury. They must migrate to Betelguese. But Toralk, the mighty sun without planets, was kept in mind. If necessary, they could make the planet, and while it cooled, float in space, living in their mighty ships, making air and food and all their needs from matter torn from the sun. The great battle fleet of thirty thousand ships was ready. Each ship, two thousand one hundred feet long and three hundred feet beam, was ready to start. They merely awaited the hoped-for weapon.
At last it was discovered. Another of the test trips was made. Three small ships went, and one sender, that they might return.
In the depths of space they were re-integrated, and now they slowly proceeded to the blazing star before them, then hovered near one of the circling planets. In a moment they were discovered, and literally thousands of the glowing creatures darted up from the green, brightly lighted world below. These creatures had learned that these ships were hostile and as they drew near, they were already changing to that fatal violet, streaked with red. Great flaming streamers of force reached out to the ships, but in that instant the ships suddenly seemed to shimmer, as an object seen through heated air, and around them there was a strange, pale radiance, a radiance that seemed to have substance. It seemed to flow, to move, yet always remained as a strange, half-visible, milky shroud, that surrounded the ships. And then the streamers of glowing death reached out—touched it—and disappeared! The creature leaped back, as though in pain, writhing away. The usual color of the creature was suffused by a pale, but growing green—then as the red was more and more overcome by the rising green, the glowing shape grew misty—then like a puff of vapor before a breeze it was gone—the great Atomic Giant had been mortally wounded and before their eyes, had died. Instantaneous dissolution had taken place.
The others held back in fear. There was something new to combat and they went cautiously. Now there leapt out from the nose of the ship a long beam of the milky, glowing ray—it touched one of the great creatures—there was a slight flash of light—and it was gone. Then the glowing ray swept around and erased those forms there in space, erased them as one might wipe the image from the screen with the flick of the switch. And then, precipitately they fled. They were beaten; they could not attack this new ship.