XIV.

Lindoo strode into the presence of Vorgan, Lord of All, and handed an

aide a scroll for the record. The Lord of All nodded and said nothing.

Nor was there anything to say that had not been said previously. Any

further discussion would be merely re-contemplation of ideas. The proof

was four months off.

It would take four long months between this day--when Lindoo handed

Vorgan's aide the scroll, giving the official date and time of

I-second, when the invasion spearhead of the Loard-vogh blasted upward

from the locus and headed for Sol--to the time when the first of the

advance flight reached the Solar Sector.

Four months of just sheer waiting. Four months which the gadget-mad

Terrans would use in preparation after the grand fleet of the

Loard-vogh was a-space, and growing flight-weary.

Four months, full of intership bickerings and man-to-man fights because

the quarters were too confined.

For the Loard-vogh were a quarrelsome race, and their fighting men

trained to viciousness. It is not strange that with four months, cooped

up in shells of steel, they should take to fighting among themselves.

It was strictly against the regulations, of course, because the Lord

of All wanted his fighting men to kill the enemy. Yet a fighting man

will fight if he has nothing else to do, and for four long months there

would be absolutely nothing to do. The Loard-vogh fighting man knew

little else but battle. Trained from youth to be hard, vicious, and

ruthless, he knew nothing of the art of killing time. Confinement made

him more vicious when released, and the officers overlooked a given

percentage of fights among the men. It was better that the ultimate

viciousness be great than to have their men soft with other arts.

A goodly supply of other arts among the Loard-vogh would cause less

casualties. Had they been mentally and physically trained to carve

ivory, play chess, tie knots, or build spacecraft in bottles, their

lives would have been less violent, including the madness with which

they drove forward their attack.

Forward went the grand fleet. In the lead were the fleet fighter ships,

and following them were the second wave craft. Third came the heavy

supercraft, the backbone of the grand fleet of the Loard-vogh. A day

behind came the mop-up transports, crammed to the space cocks with

fighting men, their nerves already on edge after a short day or two of

flight.

And bringing up the rear were the myriad upon myriad of supply ships,

replacement carriers, machine-shop craft, and even space-going

foundries. Heavy ships laden with munitions and generating equipment;

craft that could anchor to the sunward side of an inner planet and

hurl megawatt after megawatt of power to the fighting ships for their

power-coffers. Huge--frameworks--with the equipment exposed to space.

Planet docks for the repair of ships damaged in fight.

Forward drove this horde; forward into the Solar Sector. An

all-conquering mass.

Silently and invisibly they sped in a long, cylindrical space pattern.

Object, Terra.

* * * * *

Not unmindful of danger, Sol was working furiously. Factories, their

dies rusting the yard, were turning out parts for the atomic sphere.

Dymodines fairly rattled off of production lines and were installed

in the minor ships. Modines, the personal side-arm miniature of the

dymodine, came with a rush down the production-line conveyors and slid

into wrapping machines; were wrapped against all destructive, natural

forces and then were packed in boxes for shipment.

Planet-mounted snatchers came to location by skytrain in parts and were

assembled on the spot by skilled technicians.

The vast machines that generated the atomic sphere were being assembled

and shipped to the several places. Here they went together, fitted bit

by bit by machinists and technical men who worked furiously against

time to complete the job before the Loard-vogh came.

They were many years building the original Palomar telescope, but this

was war, and the techniques of fabrication had advanced since then.

Perhaps the experience gained in that monstrous job--and in other

mighty projects, some war-driven, some peace-measures--gave Sol the

technical skill she needed. There would be no matter of years, this

time. It was a matter of four very short months.

One hundred and twenty days. Just one small third of a year. And there

is a saturation point in the manpower curve; just because one man can

dig a well in sixty days, it is no sign that sixty men can dig the well

in one day. They could, mathematically, but you can't get sixty men

with shovels in a three-foot circle either mathematically or physically.

So time bore on relentlessly. Time that for the Loard-vogh seemed

endlessly droning by was racing like fury for the laboring Terrans.

For at the same instant that Vorgan was groaning about the four-month

wait, Thompson was complaining about the utter impossibility of getting

anything done in four months.

What hurt Vorgan's sleep most of all was the fact that he feared that

Terra knew of the imminent invasion.

Terra knew, and that spoiled their sleep, too.

But they did not tell Vorgan that they knew. If the Lord of All had

known for certain, he would have slept better, for the uncertainty

would have been removed.

For four long months, Vorgan's vicious crew of Loard-vogh warriors

drove through space, and then they deployed in battle array. Their

nerves tautened, and the personal fighting ceased, for the chances of

battle with a legal enemy stayed their hands against their fellows.

They knew that they were approaching enemy territory. Their first

glimpse of trouble would be a mushrooming blast in the sky--or even

several simultaneous explosions.

The first that went up would be a deadly signal that near by, or dead

ahead, their hated enemy was making his advance stand. That was the

gamble. They each pinned their hopes on being the watcher. Let another

ship go up in fire and flame. In this game, where no man could help

another, none even considered the idea of wanting death in preference

to another. For one man's life was exactly as good as any other man's

at this point--for until the initial shock wave hit, neither was doing

a thing.

They were on the offensive, the Loard-vogh. They were breaching a

system that their leaders feared enough to break the Master Plan and

send forth a full grand fleet to take this sector that lay more than a

thousand light-years from the frontier of Loard-vogh conquest.

As the Loard-vogh was on the offensive, the first move had been

taken--by them. The next move was up to Sol. And that retaliation would

take place soon was not doubted by any man.

* * * * *

Fifty light-years from Sol they slowed and alerted. They wondered,

those leaders of that invasion, when the blow would fall. Was it wiser

to wait until the enemy was alert? To wait until the enemy was waiting

for the first detector alarm seemed brash. The Loard-vogh method was to

strike like a hidden snake, and beat the enemy to the ground before he

knew what was waiting for him.

It made them nervous.

And a psychologist who had studied both the Loard-vogh and the Terran

minds from a dispassionate standpoint made the observation that the

Loard-vogh might have been better equipped to cope with a slashing

surprise attack, but were completely baffled by the obvious foolishness

of waiting.

Three days Terran went by, and the secondary waves of Loard-vogh came

up, adding to the general confusion. Orders rang through space and the

following waves of the grand fleet slowed so that utter confusion would

not hamper their action.

Then, eight days after the first arrivals, and still with no attack,

the Loard-vogh decided to move in another ten light-years. A star

twinkled there. It had been this stellar outpost that the Loard-vogh

feared. Their methods of defense would have been to arm every planet of

this star with energy enough to reach three light-years into space and

crush any oncomer. They were wise. They gave a three-times plus safety

factor just because their Lord of All was afraid of Terra.

And they admitted that they, too, feared Terra.

With slow care, the spearhead moved forward. The grand fleet moved in

waves once again. Slow, overcautious waves, and they worried all the

way. They knew. They knew that it would come any minute now.

But nothing came at five light-years from the star. And at three

light-years there was not a sign in their detector systems. A single

light-year gave them the same indication, and they swarmed about the

star--now a blazing sun, and searched the heavens about them for the

sign of enemy activity. They gave the seven planets a wide berth, and

would stay away until they were very certain--

So this was the feared and hated Solar Sector? Not even an outpost. Not

a scout. Not a sign of activity!

The Loard-vogh took a deep breath and sighed in relief. And while they

were letting their breath out, Sol struck--and hard!