Chapter VIII

The days that followed were eternities to the little group left stranded on Vulcan Base. Nerves were taut and tempers were short. Every man there, as well as the two women, realized that their very lives as well as the fate of the System depended on the day of Luhor's return from the asteroid.

Mark had aroused the men too well. They were impatient and restless. They didn't want their freedom handed to them on a silver platter, they wanted to fight for it. Aladdian had said Luhor would be back soon--very soon. Mark questioned her about it.

"Even with that fast Spacer," Aladdian replied, "it will take him several days to get out to that asteroid and back again. Cynthia tells me her father sent a crew of men there a month ago, to assemble the new Spacers. Luhor will undoubtedly win them all to his side, and bring half of them back to continue the work here. Cynthia says--"

"Cynthia seems to have confided a lot in you!" Mark exclaimed with a sudden, unexplainable suspicion.

Aladdian smiled wearily, and slowly shook her head. "You are demoted back to the lower order, Mark Denning," she said with a hint of the same mockery Mark had known in the Swamp. "Cynthia Marnik needs our help now. She only carried out her father's orders, but now that the dynasty is crumbling about her ears, she's bewildered and a little frightened. Something else has happened to her too, for the first time in her life."

"What's that?"

"Never mind," Aladdian said enigmatically. "Ernest Carston knows. It will turn out all right. Meanwhile you had better put the men here to work, it will help pass the time. Goodbye ... Mark." Like an azure-winged elf she hurried back to the laboratory where she spent most of her time.

That was the first instance Mark could remember when Aladdian had called him by his first name, and he liked it.

He called the men together and assigned them to posts at the furnaces, where they continued to turn out the metal that would be fashioned into the super rocket-tubes. Earth was massing its fleet and Venus was mobilizing. Mark realized that if a truce could not be called, they would need every one of the outlaw Spacers on the asteroid, and others as well. He took a few of the men with him to the arsenal, where they began to get every available weapon in readiness for the Tri-Planetary showdown that was sure to come.

* * * * *

"Tell the men to stop work," Aladdian said to Mark two days later, "then bring them to the laboratory. They have as much right as we to know what is happening. I have been working on the ethero-magnum sender, and I shall try to contact both Venus and Earth."

They gathered in the magnificent laboratory George Marnik had erected. Here, various machines were arranged in preponderant array, but all were dwarfed by the imposing ethero-magnum in the center of the room. Hidden atomomotors hummed a smooth and powerful threnody. The control panel, as tall as Aladdian herself, connected to huge coils of radical design which themselves led to the televise, a huge sensitized sheet of metal reaching clear up to the ceiling.

Carston, an Earth patriot to the end, watched these activities with misgivings. But he was silent, curiously so, and Mark wondered at it.

Mark was soon to know the reason for Carston's silence, and to realize that the Earth official did not give up so easily....

"I want you all to stand back against the walls," Aladdian said, "out of range of the televise. Luhor may pick this up, and he must not know there is anyone here but me."

She operated the dials quickly, surely, with tendril-like fingers. A faint, far away voice was heard droning monotonously. "Earth is sending to Venus now," Aladdian said, never once removing her gaze from the dancing dials before her. "If I can intercept the Earth beam, I can get my message to Venus through that channel, by drowning them out. I did it once before."

The sound of the voice increased, and words became distinguishable. They were haranguing, dictatorial--undoubtedly one of the Earth Council speaking to Venus. At the same time the huge metallic sheet above Aladdian's head took on a silvery glow, and a wavering scene began to appear. The scene was a crowded city square, with thousands of faces upturned to a televise screen atop one of the buildings.

"That is N'Vaarl, Capitol City of Venus," Aladdian murmured. "They are listening to the Earth broadcast. Now I will let them see me." Automatically her hand reached out, and grasped a lever which she threw downward. The atomomotors shrieked as they absorbed the increased power, and soon the sound rose above the audible. At the same time the Earth voice was drowned out, and the scene at N'Vaarl became very clear to the watchers in the room.

On the huge public televise screen at N'Vaarl, the image of Aladdian, Princess of Venus and daughter of Bedrim the Liberator, became visible. The crowd did not cheer, but awaited her message, knowing that at any moment the Earth would throw off the beam when it realized what was happening.

"Greetings, my people!" Aladdian spoke quickly. "As I told you before, Earth is mobilizing its fleet and I know that you are preparing for any contingency. That is well, but I entreat you not to act in any manner until you have heard further from me! There is a greater danger than that of Earth! I am safe and well, I cannot come to you now, but soon--"

* * * * *

In that moment the Earth beam ceased, and the scene on the televise blanked out. Aladdian turned with a satisfied smile to Mark and Cynthia and the others. "It is enough that they saw me. My people will not act now without word from me. I hope I shall never have to give that word."

"Aladdian," Mark spoke worriedly, "isn't it a risk for you to broadcast at all? The Earth Government doesn't know your present whereabouts, but if they were to send out tracer beams and learn you were operating from Vulcan ... well, it's true that no Patrol ship is equipped to land on Vulcan, but they could bottle us up here--"

Ernest Carston, who had been silent but eternally watchful, became suddenly tense at Mark's words.

"They _have_ sent out tracer beams," Aladdian replied, "but with this instrument I can neutralize them all." Fondly she touched the ethero-magnum by her side. "Anyway, the immediate danger is not from Earth, but from Luhor. Let us not forget that! And I must warn Earth, must make them understand."

She turned to the dialed panel again, and even as her fingers made swift connections, she continued to speak. "It may not be easy to establish a direct channel from here to Earth, but I think I have completed a new trans-telector beam on which George Marnik was working. It should do away with the magnetic disturbance caused by our close proximity to the sun. We shall see."

Again the atomomotors whined and ascended the scale. This time, there was a new exultant note. Minutes passed, then the overhead screen began to take on a hazy, shifting blur. Aladdian's fingers moved unerringly on the dials. The blur came suddenly, sharply into focus.

Carston, standing against the far wall next to Mark Denning, leaned tensely forward, his eyes aglow. The scene on the televise was the Earth Council. Carston almost leaped forward in his excitement, but Mark gripped his arm tightly.

Aladdian was speaking to the Council. In slow, matter-of-fact tones she told of George Marnik, of the new metal, of Luhor and Luhor's plans. She told of the asteroid and the fleet being assembled there, without revealing the asteroid's position. She described the properties of the new metal but was careful not to hint of its source.

"I seek to warn you," Aladdian's voice came fervent and clear. "You are plunging into disaster. It is not my people I think of now, but the Tri-Planet Federation! If you continue to mobilize your fleet I am not sure I can control the Irreconcilables among my people--I certainly cannot control Dar Vaajo of Mars, who is headstrong beyond reason. It will mean an hecatomb in space, with Luhor holding his asteroid in readiness for the final blow!"

"This Luhor and the formidable asteroid of which you speak," came the cold, sneering voice of the Earth Coordinator. "Tell us more of them. Give us the location of the asteroid."

Aladdian hesitated for an instant. "No. That I cannot do."

"You cannot, because no such asteroid and no such metal exists! You would try to frighten us with this story of a demon asteroid and a super space fleet! It would not be that you seek to gain time for your people to rally to you, now that they know you have escaped the Prison Swamp? Or perhaps you need time in which to coordinate your resources with those of Dar Vaajo of Mars! Let us advise you, Aladdian, that within a week the main body of our fleet will be at Venus, and it will not go well with your Irreconcilables. We shall know how to handle them this time, we shall not be so lenient as before! Perhaps, in order to spare them, you will wish to give yourself up to us, daughter of Bedrim!"

Aladdian's slender body grew taut as though struck by a whip lash. With a single sweep of the control lever she cut off the beam. Dazedly she crossed the room, oblivious to the murmurs of the others; her usually alabaster face was now chalk white beneath her curling blue-black hair, her lips were pressed tight but they trembled nevertheless.

At the laboratory door Mark caught her arm, walked beside her. "Aladdian," he choked. "I--"

She became aware of him then, smiled up at him through her bitterness.

"Aladdian, I am--I just wanted to say--I'm sorry I'm an Earthman!"

She stopped suddenly, faced him, took one of his hands in both of hers. "No, Mark! Do not say that, do not ever say it. For you are more than that ... much more...."