overlords.

"For centuries my people had listened to the vibrations of your Astrographs, faint, almost undecipherable, but as time passed, we learned your languages, your customs, recorded even the ages of warfare that swept your planets like a plague. But we could not reach you—oh, we knew the principles of space flight, but always the gravitational balance of the 'Rings' stopped us; it was a sidereal barrier that seemed impossible to surmount. Strange, we achieved the mathematical formula for orbital flight simultaneously with the breaching of hyperspace. And then it was too late, for in trying to reach you by the shortest possible route, we opened the doors on a Universe that ... that...." But she couldn't go on. The tangible horror of those alien beings who had invaded Saturn overcame her.

Bill Nardon waited until the spasm was over. Then, very gently he inquired: "But with a science so magnificent that you could use hyperspace, surely you must have had weapons that would make ours seem like toys?"

Margalida shook her exquisite head. "Weapons! The very memory of such a thing has been erased from the race consciousness of my people, Terran. It would be so utterly unthinkable for us to slay anything, that I doubt if I could make you understand how utterly alien to us such an act would be. For ages and ages no Aurean has taken life ... our will—literally—could not function in that direction. We managed to close the gap, for as you doubtless know, hyperspace is not exactly an energy field, but related to it, and so long as there is matter in gaseous state at both terminals of the orifice, a gap can be repaired in a very brief time cycle. But already it was too late. Hordes of Energasts had rushed through from Cinnabar, slaying, drinking our life-energy in a horrible thirst for the divine fire. Entire cities were left deserted, drained of all life, while every living thing in our world came under their power.

"Millions fled to the uninhabited parts of the planet, crossing the immense oceans of lava in a molten state that provide the necessary heat to maintain life, thinking that perhaps the invaders could not follow. At last, my people made their last stand here, in this valley, and built Sonara, the city where you found me, and we made a pact that every Aurean would submit to cataleptic sleep at the first sign of the Energasts.

"But even in that they defeated us. They took us by surprise, bridging the lava oceans in their globes, and enslaving all that had no time to go into catalepsis. Only three million remain now—the sleeping ones. All the rest, 

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