estroy the atoms of matter; we can rip apart the greatest of planets;
we can turn the hurtling stars and send them where we want them; we can
curve space as we please; we can put out the fires of a sun, if we wish.

"Torlos, respect the powers of this ship, and do not release its
energies unknowingly; they are too great."

Torlos looked around him in awe. He had seen the engines--small,
apparently futile things, compared with the solid might of the giant
engines in his ship--but he had seen explosive charges that he knew
would split any ship open from end to end bounce harmlessly from the
smooth walls of this ship. He had seen it destroy the fleet of magnetic
ships that had formed a supposedly impregnable guard around the
mightiest city of Sator.

Then he himself had touched a button, and the giant city had shot off
into space, leaving behind it only a screaming tornado and a vast chasm
in the crust of the blasted planet.

He could not appreciate the full significance of the velocities Arcot
had told him about--he only knew that he had made a bad mistake in
underrating the powers of this ship! "I will not touch these things
again without your permission, Earthman," Torlos promised earnestly.

The _Ancient Mariner_ drove on through space, rapidly eating up the
millions of miles that separated Nansal from Sator. Arcot sat in the
control room with Morey discussing their passenger.

"You know," Arcot mused, "I've been thinking about that man's strength;
an iron skeleton doesn't explain it all. He has to have muscles to move
that skeleton around."

"He's got muscles, all right," Morey grinned. "But I see what you mean;
muscles that big should tire easily, and his don't seem to. He seems
tireless; I watched him throw those men one after another like bullets
from a machine gun. He threw the last one as violently as the first--and
those men weighed over three hundred pounds! Apparently his muscles felt
no fatigue!"

"There's another thing," pointed out Arcot. "The way he was breathing
and the way he seemed to keep so cool. When I got through there, I was
dripping with sweat; that hot, moist air was almost too much for me. Our
friend? Cool as ever, if not more so.

"And after the fight, he wasn't even breathing heavily!"

"No," agreed Morey. "But did you notice him _during_ the fight? He was
breathing heavily, deeply, and swiftly--not the shallow, panting breath
of a runner, but deep and full, yet faster than I can br