P’AN-KU, iris hands clasped about his ample equatorial region, leaned back in his luxuriously cushioned throne and listlessly contemplated the humped figure of his major domo who, with palms and forehead pressed to the floor before the dais, awaited permission to speak.
“Now what low person disturbs our meditations?” demanded P’an-ku.
“O, worshipful Lord of the Universe,” replied the major domo, “Kai Lo, Khan of Scouts, begs leave to impart tidings.”
“Admit him,” said P’an-ku. Then he turned to Dr. Wu, who stood at the right of the throne, having advanced himself in the graces of the monarch he regarded almost as a god, and said: “I presume he will tell me that the white Princess is about to storm the city. I knew this five days ago when my spies in Ultu informed me of her pact with the worm of Du Gong who called himself Roger Sanders.”
Kai Lo Khan, a short individual with an oval body and thin, crafty features, entered and prostrated himself before the throne.
“Speak,” commanded P’an-ku.
“O, Paragon of Wisdom and Fountain of All Authority,” said Kai Lo Khan, “the army of the Princess Maza is surrounding the city. With her are a hundred thousand nak-kar cavalry and five hundred thousand foot.”
“Dolt!” thundered P’an-ku. “I knew all this was to be five days ago, and am prepared.”
“But Majesty, that is not all. She has sent a party to the western gate of the city under a banner of truce.”
“Ah! She would parley. Go then to the gate and take her message.”
Again prostrating himself, Kai Lo Khan hastily departed.
Not more than twenty minutes elapsed before he returned and made obeisance.
“I have brought the message of the Princess, O Vicar of the Sun,” said he, producing a scroll.
“Read it,” commanded P’an-ku.
Kai Lo Khan unrolled the scroll, cleared his throat, and read:
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Her Imperial Majesty, Maza an Ma Gong
Greeting: Maza an Ma Gong. |
“Tell her,” thundered P’an-ku, “that Ted Dustin will this day be made to suffer the death of the hot oil. Tell her further, that we are prepared for her attack, and that—”
“Pardon, O just and mighty Dictator of the Universe!” It was Dr. Wu who had interrupted. The courtiers looked at him in amazement, apparently expecting P’an-ku to have him executed for his temerity, but he continued. “May your worthless slave from Du Gong suggest a plan?”
“Speak,” replied P’an-ku.
“Would it please Your Majesty to have the white Princess as a prisoner?”
“Nothing would suit me better,” replied P’an-ku. “Tzien Khan, here, could very quickly persuade her to become my queen, could you not, my Khan of the Torture Chambers?”
“Assuredly, O King of the Age, if she should be so foolish as to need such persuasion,” replied Tzien Khan with a bow.
“After which,” continued P’an-ku, “with her armies and her wealth at my disposal, I could quickly bring both Du Gong and Lu Gong under my undisputed sway. But what is your plan, Dr. Wu?”
“It is apparent from her message,” said the wily doctor, “that the Princess loves this Ted Dustin. If the prisoner, therefore, or someone purporting to be the prisoner, were sent out, she would not overlook an opportunity for speech with him.”
“Very likely,” replied P’an-ku.
“I suggest therefore,” continued the crafty doctor, “that you dress one of your white prisoners who is about the size of Ted Dustin in a suit of insulating armor and glass helmet of the kind worn by the people of Ultu. Send a note to the Princess stating that you will constitute Ted Dustin your messenger for a peace parley at a point half way between the western gate and the front line of her army, stipulating that she be accompanied by not more than ten unmounted men, and that a like number will accompany Ted Dustin.
“Men can be posted at suitable points along the wall with green ray projectors to lay down a barrage at a prearranged signal. This will prevent her from getting back to her army, or prevent the army from reaching her. In the meantime, her guard can easily be destroyed and the Princess taken prisoner.”
“What think you of this plan, Kai Lo Khan?” asked P’an-ku.
“It sounds feasible, O Bright and Shining Cousin of the Sun,” replied the Khan of Scouts, cautiously.
“And you, Tzien Khan?”
“I believe it would work, O Lord of Worlds,” replied the Khan of Torturers.
“We will try it,” decided P’an-ku. “You, Tzien Khan, will take one of the Ultuan prisoners who resembles Ted Dustin in physical proportions and dress him in a suit of the armor we took when we captured a troop of the surface scouts of the white princess.
“You, Kai Lo Khan, will go to Chu Yan, Khan of my army, inform him of our plans, and see that he has men with ray projectors suitably posted on the walls and ten men ready to accompany the prisoner to the meeting place. I will send a messenger with a note to the Princess, at once.
“And, Tzien Khan. When you have prepared a prisoner to represent the young scientist of Du Gong, you may take Ted Dustin from the dungeons of eternal darkness to the torture chambers, and there inflict on him the death of the hot oil. I had thought to delay his death and prolong his torture indefinitely, but with the prospect of the honor of a visit from the fair Princess who foolishly believes she loves him, it will be better to put him permanently out of her reach at once.
“Now go, both of you.”
Seated on the back of her great, fighting nak-kar in one of the glades of the luminous forest which surrounded the city of Peilong, Maza waited impatiently for P’an-ku reply to her message. She wore a suit and helmet of shining white armor, and a sword and red ray projector depended from the belt which encircled her slender waist. Beside her, similarly armored and mounted, was the aged Vanible Khan.
Ranged before her were line after line of her foot soldiers, and more, steadily coming up from the rear, were being hurried into place by their officers as the army encircled the city. Her nak-kar cavalry had deployed for attack, and the huge supply wagons, drawn by great, lumbering, wingless dragons, were rumbling into position.
“P’an-ku ponders long over his reply, Your Majesty,” said Vanible Khan.
“It may be that he does not intend to make one,” replied Maza. “He seems, however, to have respected my banner of truce.”
“I would not rest too strongly on the belief that Ted Dustin is alive,” said Vanible Khan. “If he escaped the green rays of the defenders when he attacked the great projector it would be amazing, but if P’an-ku were to capture him and spare his life it would indeed be astounding.”
“Nevertheless, I shall go on believing him alive until I have proof to the contrary,” answered Maza. “I seem to feel it, here.” She pressed her hand over her heart.
Sailing gracefully over the treetops, a nak-kar alighted in the glade. Its rider dismounted, rushed to where Maza sat in her saddle, made obeisance, and presented a scroll.
“A message from P’an-ku,” he announced.
The Princess eagerly seized and unrolled the missive, hastily scanning its contents.
“He lives! Ted Dustin lives!”
“And will P’an-ku surrender him without a struggle?” asked Vanible Khan.
“I will read the message,” she replied.
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His Imperial Majesty, P’an-ku an Ma Gong If you care to meet him in person, Ted Dustin will tell you the terms I propose. He will advance half way to your front lines, accompanied by ten of my guards, who will slay him at the first sign of treachery. Meet him there, on foot, with ten of your unmounted warriors, and perhaps a satisfactory settlement can be arranged. P’an-ku an Ma Gong tu Du Gong. |
“The ruler of Peilong assumes mighty titles since he has acquired the green ray and the fighting globe,” said Vanible Khan. “Emperor of Ma Gong and Du Gong, indeed! He will soon have the other planets, their satellites, and the Lord Sun under his domination, if words can do the trick. And he insultingly addressed Your Majesty as ‘Ruler of Ulta,’ ignoring your greater title.”
“I will overlook that for the present—to save Ted Dustin,” replied Maza.
“But, Your Majesty,” remonstrated the aged scientist. “Don’t you see that this bloated monster is setting a trap for you—a trap baited with the man you love?”
“Trap or no trap,” said Maza, “I am going.”
“Majesty, I implore you not to go. For the sake of Ulta—for the sake of the millions of subjects who love you-”
“Enough!” she said. “The terms are fair enough—a trap well nigh impossible. I will be accompanied by ten of my warriors, who can, if need be, account for the ten accompanying Ted Dustin. I will be within plain sight and ray-range of the advance guard of my army. They will be instructed to protect me with a ray barrage at the slightest sign of trickery.”
‘But, Majesty—”
“Not another word. I leave my army in your care until my return. If I do not come back—if I am killed or captured—attack the city at once, and continue the fight until Peilong is utterly destroyed. Goodbye, my worthy Khan and lifelong friend.”
Grief stricken, Vanible Khan bowed his head in farewell obeisance, while tears trickled down his furrowed cheeks. When he raised his tear-dimmed eyes the nak-kar with his beloved young ruler was disappearing over the treetops.
Alighting just behind the front line of her troops Maza dismounted, tossed her reins to a soldier, and addressed a young officer who ran quickly to her side and made obeisance.
“Pick me ten of your bravest soldiers at once,” she said. “They will go with me for a parley midway between my front line and the city gate. Instruct the men in the front line to be ready to throw a ray barrage around me at the least indication of treachery.”
She watched the gate while the young officer selected the men who were to go with her. One by one they took up a position in a line behind her.
Presently the gate opened, and she saw a man the size and build of Ted Dustin emerge there-from, followed by ten of P’an-ku’s soldiers. She had last seen Ted attired in one of the insulated suits with glass helmet which her people wore for surface travel, and this man was so attired. Her heart leaped with joy, and as she went out expecting to meet the man she loved, followed by her ten soldiers, there was not the slightest doubt in her mind that this was really Ted Dustin.
As she drew nearer to the man who was coming toward her, Maza felt that there was something about him which was not just as it should be. What is it? Ah, his gait. He did not walk with long, easy strides like those of the earth man, whose muscles, accustomed to a greater gravity pull, involuntarily carried him much further at each step than the stride of the most athletic of moon men. Besides, if he felt as she did, he would hurry to meet her, in which case she knew the mighty bounds through space of which he was capable.
For a moment she paused, doubting. Then came the thought that Ted might be adapting his stride to suit that of his captors—might indeed be compelled to do so. Furthermore, the size, build and attire were correct.
When within fifty feet of the man she strained her eyes to see his face in the glass helmet. The light from the luminous forest was quite dim at this point, and the yellow lights from the city were more of a hindrance than a help as they shone in her eyes from behind him without lighting his face.
A distance of twenty feet was reached, and it seemed that if she could not recognize the man he, with the light in his favor, should be able to recognize her.
Suddenly he called out:
“Retreat Majesty, quickly! It is a trap!”
The voice and face she recognized simultaneously. The man was one of her nak-kar scout officers she had believed slain in a battle with the flying globes.
Instantly a green ray from the projector of one of the warriors behind him cut him down.
Maza whipped out her own red ray projector and the man who had flashed his green ray disappeared in a sudden burst of flame. Not a second elapsed before her men were drawing their ray projectors, but the nine remaining warriors of P’an-ku were already on guard. The battle commenced with fencing, deadly as it was beautiful—green rays against red, red against green.
Simultaneously, a barrage of green leaped out from the city walls and a barrage of red flashed out from the front rank of Maza’s army. Where the rays met they neutralized each other, but enough green rays got through to form a triangle past which Maza and her little party could not retreat, while a similar triangle of red rays made it impossible for the warriors of P’an-ku to retreat.
One of Maza’s men fell, crumpled to nothingness by a green ray, but as he fell he took with him his opponent in a brilliant flash of light. Then a ray from the wall, swinging unexpectedly into the little group, cut down three of the white warriors. This left seven red rays, counting Maza’s, against eight green rays. With the odds in their favor, the yellow men redoubled their attack. The whites fought back furiously, and in a moment both parties were wiped out with the exceptions of Maza and one of P’an-ku’s warriors.
At ray-fencing, the Princess was the equal of any trained soldier in her army, but her opponent, she found, was the most skillful she had ever encountered. His tactics, however, were purely defensive except as he tried to destroy her projector. Evidently his orders had been to bring her in alive. He would feint, swinging his ray as if he meant to strike her down, but never in a direct line with her body. Noticing this, she resolved to stake everything on one long chance. Accordingly, she held her projector away from her—a tempting bait. He swung for the lure, leaving his guard open for but an instant. But in that instant her red ray struck him full in the chest, and he was no more.
While this duel was in progress Maza’s men were rushing to her rescue from behind. And P’an-ku’s men were pouring out of the city gate to meet them. She was alone in the center of a terrific battle, unable to move more than twenty feet in any direction because of the double ray barrage which surrounded her.
Through the network of rays encompassing her, she saw a detachment of her nak-kar cavalry flying swiftly above the heads of her foot soldiers, the riders aiming their ray projectors at the men on the walls and pouring through the gate. Here and there great sections of the wall disappeared in bursts of smoke as the red rays cut through the green barrage.
Although the flying cavalry was doing terrific execution, its casualties were exceedingly heavy. Soon a number of the great beasts were riderless, but more were struck down by the green rays, nak-kars and riders falling together on the heads of the soldiers below. These and the fragments of rock and huge stalactites which fell from the roof of the cavern far overhead whenever green or red rays were accidentally directed too vertically, constituted almost as much of a menace as the rays themselves.
When the first flying detachment was wiped out, a second flew into the breach, and the fighting became doubly furious.
With the assistance of her flying warriors, the foot soldiers were gaining ground when a score of huge flying globes suddenly sailed out from over the city walls. They flew in a V shaped formation, with green rays ten times as powerful as those used by the soldiers, shining from their diamond-shaped port holes.
The nak-kar cavalry fought bravely, but unavailingly as this solid wall of deadly green light approached. In less than ten minutes the entire detachment was wiped out. The globes then suddenly descended groundward, their rays forming a solid, impenetrable wall, and cutting off the red barrage rays which had formerly shielded Maza.
Another globe then shot out from over the gate, and before she was aware of its purpose, had dropped a huge net around the Princess which knocked her red ray projector from her hand and entangled her in its meshes. She was drawn swiftly up to the bridge and dragged through one of the diamond-shaped openings while the globe sped swiftly back over the gate. Then, while two warriors held her, an officer whose face was bandaged and whose left arm hung in a sling, took her sword from her and cut the meshes of the net.
With a scarcely perceptible jar, the globe alighted on the ground before a huge building which she instantly recognized from its pictures and descriptions as the palace of P’an-ku. The bridge of the globe leaned against a jutting balcony which was almost on a level with it.
Stepping out of the door, the officer vaulted the railing, alighting on the balcony, and ordered the two soldiers to follow him with the prisoner.
Maza was lifted over the railing and hurried along a corridor which led to a great diamond-shaped door on each side of which two armed guards were posted.
A major domo announced in a loud voice: “Her Royal Highness, Maza an Ultu,” and the Princess marched into the throne room between her two guards.
The officer who had captured her advanced and made profound obeisance.
“Well done, Kwan Tsu Khan,” said P’an-ku. “Take a place of honor, here on my right hand, and we will speak of your reward later.”
The officer bowed his thanks and took a position beside Dr. Wu at the right of the throne. Then P’an-ku raised his hand and the two guards brought the prisoner before the throne, after which each prostrated himself before the monarch and stepped back twenty paces.
Standing there alone in the middle of the floor, surrounded by enemies, Maza looked up unflinchingly into the gloating eyes of the porcine monster on the throne.
P’an-ku rose ponderously and bowed—a ceremony due visiting royalty.
“Welcome to Peilong, Princess of Ultu,” he said. “We are deeply grateful for the honor of this unexpected visit.”
“What have you done with Ted Dustin, treacherous monster?” she demanded.
P’an-ku smiled evilly, while he deliberately consulted his chronometer.
“By this time,” he said, “the worm of Du Gong who calls himself a scientist is undoubtedly dead—that is unless his white skin is so tough as to be impervious to boiling oil.”
The face of the Princess turned deathly pale. She swayed, and would have fallen to the floor had not the two guards behind her bounded forward and caught her by the arms.
In a moment, however, she recovered her poise and shook herself free.
“You have ordered the death of Ted Dustin,” she said, “but in so doing you have pronounced the doom of Peilong and certified your own death warrant. When my army has finished with Peilong and with you, the dynasty of the P’an kus will have ended forever. My grandfather made the mistake of granting your father freedom, and I am paying for his error, but the warriors of Ultu will take full vengeance.”
P’an-ku rose, and laughed sneeringly.
“Your army will not long survive your lover,” he said. “As for Ultu, a hundred of my globes left their hangars long before your clumsy attack on Peilong commenced, with commands to either capture or destroy the city. With their superior weapons and armament they cannot fail.
“You are hopelessly beaten, O Princess, yet I am not the savage and relentless victor you seem to think me. True, I am a conqueror, and conquerors must be ruthless with their enemies. In the conquest of Ma Gong I have only begun to extend my domination. Next will come Du Gong, then Lu Gong, and finally all the inhabited and inhabitable planets that circle the great Lord Sun. I will be the greatest conqueror of all time—not merely a conqueror of nations, but a conqueror of worlds.
“But with all this, I have a kind and generous heart. I could take vengeance on you, order your torture and death, or make you my slave, yet so magnanimously am I disposed toward you that I offer you the honor of becoming my queen—of ruling with me, the mightiest empire that has ever come under the control of one man.”
“And thus,” replied Maza, scornfully, “heap insult upon injury. Give me death—by torture if you will, in preference to that.”
“You speak hastily,” said P’an-ku, apparently unperturbed, “and in the heat of anger. Like most women you are temperamental. But I do not demand your answer now. You shall have time to think it over. And in the meantime, I have something to show you that will make you forget the relatively insignificant conquest of your people. Come with me and I will show you, even at this moment, the beginning of my conquest of a world.”
He signed to the two guards, who closed in on each side of the Princess once more. She was then compelled to follow P’an-ku out of the throne room and down a hallway which led to a large, bullet-shaped elevator. Into this they stepped, and were shot swiftly upward.