. Arcot pulled one end of his cord.

Instantly a terrific roar nearly deafened the men, a solid sheet of
blinding flame reached in a flaming cone into the air for nearly fifty
feet. The screeching roar continued for a moment, then the heat was so
intense that Arcot could stand no more, and pulled the cord. The flame
died instantly, though a slight ionization clung briefly. In a moment it
had cooled to white, and was cooling slowly through orange--red
deep--red--

The grass for thirty feet about was gone, the soil for ten feet about
was molten, boiling. The machine itself was in a little crater, half
sunk in boiling rock. The Talsonians stared in amazement. Then a sort of
sigh escaped them and they started forward. Arcot raised his molecular
pistol, a blue green ray reached out, and the rock suddenly was black.
It settled swiftly down, and a slight depression was the only evidence
of the terrific action.

Arcot walked over the now cool rock, cooled by the action of the
molecular ray. In driving the molecules downward, the work was done by
the heat of these molecules. The machine was frozen in the solid lava.

"Brilliant idea, Morey," said Arcot disgustedly. "It'll be a nice job
breaking it loose."

Morey stuck the lux metal bar in the top clamp, walked off some
distance, and snapped on the power. The rock immediately about the
machine was molten again. A touch of the molecular pistol to the lux
metal bar, and the machine jumped free of the molten rock.

Morey shut off the power. The machine was perfectly clean, and extremely
hot.

"And your ship is made of that stuff!" exclaimed the Talsonian
scientist. "What will destroy it?"

"Your weapon will, apparently."

"But do you believe that we have power enough?" asked Morey with a
smile.

"No--it's entirely too much. Can you tone that condensed lightning bolt
down to a workable level?"

Chapter IX

THE IRRESISTIBLE AND THE IMMOVABLE

The generator Arcot had brought was one of the two spare generators used
for laboratory work. He took it now into the sub-station, and directed
the Talsonian students and the scientist in the task of connecting it
into the lines; though they knew where it belonged, he knew _how_ it
belonged.

Then the terrestrian turned on the power, and gradually increased it
until the power authorities were afraid of breakdowns. The accumulators
were charged in the city, and the power was being shipped to other
cities whose accumulat