Nobody seemed to know just why this was true; but some scientists claimed that somehow there was an invisible layer or shell all around Io; an immense blanket of strange energy or force that fused and blasted the metal hulls of all ether craft that ran into its insidious web.
Tensely and helplessly Evan Harwich watched, as the ship ahead continued on its way toward what seemed sure catastrophe. No danger in front of the recklessly piloted craft could be seen, of course. Five thousand miles of clear, cold vacuum was all that was visible between it and Io. But since this region held concealed in it all the potential violence of a hair-triggered trap, ready to unleash a flaming death that involved unknown physical laws and principles, maybe it wasn't just plain vacuum after all!
With dogged persistence Harwich kept yelling futile warnings into his radio. His shouts and curses were unheeded, and no answer was given. He knew what was going to happen in another second. There would be a burst of dazzling white fire all around the rocket of this foolhardy pilot he had tried to save from suicide. Metal would drip and sparkle in the absolute zero of space. In just another instant....
Harwich swung his patrol boat aside, not caring to end his own life. But he kept watching the X911 from the side-ports of his cabin.
And now, something quite different from what he had expected was taking place. Suddenly the apparently doomed ship was enveloped in a bluish halo which seemed to emanate from a great helix or spiral of metal that wrapped its hull!
Immediately afterward, as the X911 entered definitely into the zone of destruction around Io, great white sparks lanced dazzlingly through the blue halo. It was as though the latter was fighting back those gigantic, unknown forces that had seemed to make the Forbidden Moon forever inviolable. It was as though the halo was keeping the X911, and whoever was flying it, safe!
Evan Harwich's slitted eyes widened a little in astonishment and hope. "Dammit!" he grumbled happily. "That idiot's got some kind of new invention that's protecting him! Maybe the Forbidden Moon is going to be reached and explored after all!"
A second more that weird conflict of hidden forces continued. Watching it was like watching a race, on which you have staked everything you own. Visibly, that daredevil space ship seemed to slow, as if resisted by a tangible medium. For an agonizing instant of suspense, Harwich saw those wicked sparks brighten in the X911's bluish aura. Then the latter dimmed, flickered, went out!
As if angry demons were waiting to pounce, destruction struck—quicker than a lightning bolt.