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Mars was close to Earth, so close that, had they possessed aircars like those of the Moon-people which remained to be seen they could easily have attacked the Earth. Across the face of the Earth flashed those fiery will-o'-the-wisps from Mars, without rhyme or reason; yet Sarka knew positively that they possessed some meaning, and that the Earth had been forced thus close to Mars for a purpose.
For, in order for the Gens of Dalis to be in position to launch their attack against the Moon, he had managed, by manipulating the speed of the Beryls, to bring that area into position directly opposite the Moon. Had it been otherwise, the blue column might have struck anywhere, and wiped out millions of lives! "God, Jaska," murmured Sarka. "Look!"
Sarka shuddered, trying to picture in his mind the massing of the minions of Mars, who thus saw a new country given into their hands if they could take it. Had the Earth been taken by surprise? Had Sarka the Second been able to prepare for the approaching catastrophe? "Father," he sent his thoughts racing on ahead of him, "are those lights which are striking the Earth causing any damage?"
Balls of fire? Or beings of Mars?" "I think," said Sarka, after studying the display for a few minutes, "that they are either rockets or fireballs, perhaps both together! But the Martians cannot consolidate any position on the Earth without coming to handgrips. Since they must know this, we can expect to see the people of Mars themselves when, or soon after, those balls of fire strike the Earth!"
Then, when the Earthlings would have destroyed the first of the vast fire-balls and Sarka was noting that the flames which bathed the balls seemed to have no effect whatever on Earthlings, save to outline them in mantles of fire the fire-balls wakened to new life.
But there had not, though there had been times and times when Sarka had peered closely enough at the surface of both the Moon and of Mars to see the activities, or the results of the activities, of the peoples of the two worlds.
"Yes, Jaska," he said suddenly, "somewhere on Earth, when we reach it, we may discover the secret of Luar and know far more about Dalis than we have ever known before!" Jaska merely smiled her inscrutable smile, and did not answer. By intuition, she already knew. Let Sarka arrive at her conclusion by scientific methods if he desired, and she would simply smile anew.
For in that ghastly area, he believed, was embodied an idea greater than mere wanton destruction, just as there was an idea back of the fiery lights from Mars greater than mere display. Somehow the two were allied, and Sarka believed that, between the blue column, and the fiery lights from Mars, the fate of the world rested.
Back and back retreated the squares and the rectangles, the columns and the globes, breaking apart as they retreated. Within fifteen minutes after the destruction had ceased, millions of gleaming cubes winked upward from the bottom of the crevasse motionless, quiescent! Sarka sent forth another thought. "I am your master, O cubes of the Moon!" No sound, no movement, answered him.
This seemed to clear up many things for Sarka, though it piled higher upon his shoulders the weight of his responsibilities.
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