Gary looked and nodded. Sharp against the dazzling brilliance of the true universe was a strange blot, a circular well, a cone-shaped funnel of blackness carven through the bright surroundings. And deep and far, where the end of this funnel faded into unfathomable distances, was a single, tiny, pin-prick of light glimmering faintly.
"Yes," he said, "that is—must be—it. That tiny star is Sol. The one diminishing unit in all the constant universe. And that funnel is the path of the cosmic rays, the cone through which Magog's ultrawave cannon is beaming its lethal radiation upon our little system."
"Gad!" gritted Lark O'Day. "What a vengeance! What a punishment to mete on an innocent people! We must stop those scoundrels, Gary! If we only knew where to find them—"
"We do," Gary pointed out. "As Earth is the far end of the funnel, the planet from which the rays emanate must be Magog."
"Right as rain," declared Hugh Warren. "And, Gary, I've got it spotted now. It's that second planet over there, the blue one. Hello, below there! Bud!" he shouted into the audio. "Accelerate the hypos to max. And tell the men to stand by for any emergency. We're approaching our destination."
"A.X. to max it is, sir!" came back the reply.
And the whining sound of the hypatomic motors heightened as the Liberty, its goal in sight, leaped through unworldly space like a bow-sped silver arrow.
It was as they neared Magog that Gary Lane experienced a final qualm of misgiving. Dim memory stirred him. He recalled a remark the man they had known as Dr. Anjers had made on Jupiter.
"It is ridiculous to think of us, tiny mites that we are, daring to attack the people of a universe so infinitely greater than ours that we will be as dust motes beneath their crushing heels," Borisu had said.