The Amethyst City. John Russell Fearn
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gravity field.
Now and again, she found herself wondering why no further hypnosis seemed to affect her; then she decided it must be because Quorne had fully believed his grim trick with the Jovian snake had succeeded. On the other hand, he had instruments capable of showing exactly where she was, so it was queer he did not renew his attack on her mental stronghold. Whatever the answer, she was left more or less free, until within 10,000,000 miles of Jupiter. Then, just as that colossal gravity field was making itself felt, she found herself in the grip of ideas and thoughts which she was profoundly convinced were not her own.
She struggled hard against them as she sat at the control-board, gazing out on to the mighty face of Jupiter, his cloud-wreaths girt about him and whirling under the stupendous force of the hurricanes lashing his surface.
“Relka,” she said at last, turning a strained face. “We are not going to Jupiter. We are going to Saturn.”
His thoughts expressed astonishment. “But why, Amazon? I thought you were thoroughly decided that—”
“I have changed my mind. You’d better reset the course.”
Relka did not argue, even though he did not understand. The Amazon passed a hand over her forehead, puzzled as to why it should ache so heavily. There was an oppression on her brain which she could not fathom, and the oppression seemed to take the form of an implacable command to go to Saturn and not Jupiter. She assumed it could only be Quorne at work with high-powered hypnotic amplifiers, against which she stood no chance.
No chance? A notion came to her. Getting up quickly, she moved to a panel and closed one of the switches. There was a brief grinding noise as radiation-proof plates rolled into position on the outside of the vessel, completely sealing it off from all known forms of radiation, including cosmic waves. Thought waves, when sent through an amplifier, had a similar wavelength to cosmic waves, so the plates ought to block the hypnosis—yet they did not. The ache and the command in her brain remained undimmed.
“It’s a mystery,” she declared, switching the plates out of commission again. “What kind of power can Quorne be using to be able to subject me even through insulation?”
“Quorne’s science is known to be brilliant,” Relka responded, for the sake of a better comment.
Completely baffled, the Amazon returned to her control chair and remained in it until she had swung the vessel clear of Jove’s huge attraction. Fortunately, Saturn was on the same side of the sun as Jupiter at this time, so after a change of course, Saturn eventually came into view—its image greatly magnified on the viewing plate—a planet of incredible beauty, rings at an angle, shining with a deep yellow whiteness. The Amazon frowned to herself as she contemplated that beauteous world. She remembered the amethyst city and the mystery land of warm sunlight, dancing flowers and green fields; and she also remembered the real Saturn, with its deadly rocky landscape and poisonous atmosphere, comprised mainly of ammoniated hydrogen, on the principle of Jupiter.
Suddenly Relka’s thoughts spoke with sudden urgency.
“Look, Amazon! A space machine!”
In surprise she turned from gazing at Saturn and looked back in the direction of distant Jupiter. A silver speck, becoming rapidly larger, was sweeping through space in fast pursuit of the Ultra.
“It looks like Quorne’s machine!” the Amazon said in amazement. “But why should his hypnosis drive me away from Jupiter when he obviously could do better if I went there? I can’t understand this situation at all—”
“He’s gaining,” Relka interrupted. “If you want to break free of him, you’d better put on speed.”
The Amazon’s mouth tightened. “All I wish to do is destroy him, Relka, not escape him—and this may be my chance. I wonder if he’ll answer a radio call? I have to be sure whom I’m attacking.”
She switched on the radio and spoke briefly into the microphone, identifying herself. She was interrupted in the middle of a sentence.
“I had hoped, Amazon, that you would come to Jupiter—but evidently you have not the courage. Which I find surprising! That being so, I intend to destroy you. Where you are heading I can only guess, but I assume it is Saturn. You are wasting your time. Saturn is a world of poison gas, hurricanes, and death. Or are you looking for that illusive amethyst city? I saw that delusion, as you must have, but I have never seen it since.”
The Amazon did not have the chance to say any more, for Quorne cut her off. But at least she knew she was dealing with him. There was no mistaking that smooth, cultured voice.
“Stand by to attack, Relka.” The Amazon glanced at the Jovian quickly. “I’ll pilot the Ultra and you do the firing. Quorne must be crazy if he thinks that small machine of his can stand up against my weapons.”
Knowing that Quorne was anything but crazy, however, the Amazon was prepared for any trick he might pull. She slowed the Ultra down, then swung it around to give Relka a better chance of using his weapons. He settled himself at the weapon control panel, fingers on the switches, his eyes fixed on the firing screen with its hair-thin demarcation lines.
Out of the gulf came Quorne, the size of his machine rapidly increasing. In the distance lay a scattering of Jupiter’s numerous moons. Then suddenly an orange ray flashed across the gulf and struck the Ultra amidships. The Amazon smiled coldly, satisfied that the insulated metal could withstand anything Quorne wished to hurl at her. She was right. The beam, in the order of a heat ray, reflected back into space harmlessly.
“Let him have it!” she ordered, and Relka closed the switches on the Ultra’s most deadly weapon—the protonic cannon.
A livid pencil of disintegrative fire blasted straight at Quorne’s machine. On the nose of it the plate buckled and began to roll up like charred paper, but by a masterful piece of space navigation he hurled the vessel to one side and dodged the frightful stream of energy. The Amazon scowled and began to manoeuvre the Ultra once again.
Quorne replied with lavender and green beams this time, one disintegrative and the other a freezing ray. Neither of them made any impression. Then came something else, stabbing up from Jupiter itself, through the cloudbanks. It was a beam that had the Amazon baffled. It was black, the most extraordinary thing she had ever seen. Too late she tried to swing the Ultra away. The segment of black whirled around, struck the Ultra, and sent it spinning madly like a top.
The effect in the control room was chaotic. Relka was hurled backward from the weapon range, and the Amazon was pitched out of her chair and flung against the farther wall. Completely out of control, the Ultra began to fall back into the gravity of Jupiter.
The Amazon forced herself up from the floor and kept a hold of the wall struts to prevent herself from being flung over.
“That is negative force he’s using,” she panted. “That’s why it’s black. It doesn’t disintegrate matter—it batters. He can fling the Ultra where he wants. Evidently his Jovian laboratory is working at full pressure again.”
Clinging to the wall, she inched herself back to the control board. Outside, space seemed to be turning somersaults while the Ultra apparently remained still. Far below, Jupiter was gyrating and whirling crazily. Once down there in that vast gravity, surrounded by ammoniated hydrogen atmosphere, the Amazon knew she would be finished. Quorne would see to that. So she closed the switches and gave the rockets facing Jupiter all the power they possessed.
The effect slewed the Ultra away from the giant planet, but it immediately fell into an opposite attraction, this time from Ganymede, one of the larger moons. Too late, the Amazon saw her mistake and all her frantic efforts to pull free were useless. She was only 1,000 miles from the satellite and plunging at terrific speed.
Breathlessly she watched that crazy little landscape flying out of space to meet her. She gave the forward rockets full power to check her fall, but there was little they could do at such short notice. Within a few minutes, so fast was the Ultra dropping, the brief air depth of Ganymede screamed around the ship—then