disappearing as they fell into the uppermost layer of snow clouds above Seacoast City but constantly renewed as the bombers continued to spew forth more crystals.
Now the Golden Saint moved more rapidly, circling above the rotating disk. As she did so the brilliantrays of the summer sun—for, remember, although it was false winter in Seacoast City it was midsummer above and around that metropolis—those brilliant rays were bent and focused by the Saint’s membranous wings.
Focused on the whirling disk of ice crystals, the sun’s rays were further focused, bent and directed downward. Under the impact of this concentrated solar energy the heavy gray clouds brokeapart almost as if they had been intelligent beings. A great clear shaft opened in the topmost layer of clouds. The focused energy reached the next layer of gray, which responded as had the first. And then the energy reached the bottommost layer and split it, flooding Poseidon Pond with a rush of life-giving light and warmth.
It was fortunate now that Seacoast City’s uniformed guardians of justicehad cleared the surface of the pond and the pathways of the park of all legitimate visitors, for as the rays reached the icy pond its surface cleared.
Peering down through aerial telescopes from an altitude of more than a mile, the crews of the army bombers were astonished to perceive a battlemented structure. Until now it had been hidden beneath the ice of Poseidon Pond and the snow that hadaccumulated on top of the ice. But it could now be seen with increasing clarity.
The structure resembled a fairy tale castle, nor did it remain submerged for long, as the waters of the pond rose in vaporous clouds until the castle stood in the center of a miniature dry plain.
Their mission accomplished, the air corps bombers broke their circle and once more assumed a chevron formation that turnedand droned majestically away from Seacoast City and toward North Orion Field.
The Golden Saint swooped low over the structure then dropped gently into its courtyard. Her wings furled swiftly, like living things, and all but disappeared behind her shoulder blades. A replica of a medieval portcullis stood open, two guards stationed beside it. The Saint smiled grimly at their costumes. They worethe chain mail ofmock-medieval villains; their chest cloths bore the ugly insignia of the European dictator.
The guards escorted the Golden Saint to a modern laboratory concealed within the false antiquity of the castle. Its vaulted ceiling rose fully fifty feet above its flagstone floor. Its tapestry-covered walls made a room that seemed as large as Seacoast City’s world-famed indoor botanicalgarden. Here at last she confronted the woman with whose image she had previously conversed.
“Yes,” the snake-haired woman hissed, “I am The Scorpion Queen. And you, I see, are the Golden Saint. It was inevitable that we should meet, soon or late. Very well, let it be now.”
The Scorpion Queen’s eyes were like cold emeralds, her skin was of an icy perfection, her hair arranged to create the illusionof a nest of writhing vipers.
Or was it an illusion?
The only other person in the room was a small, cowering male. Both he and the Scorpion Queen wore laboratory white, but while the woman made her costume look like the brilliant uniform of a monarch, the male’s tunic and trousers had the appearance of a shabby, defeated weakling. Each of them wore high boots of a strange looking metallic material.
Was this cowardly weakling the blustering Lord Gorgon?
The Saint shook her head scornfully. She turned from the cowering male to his female commander. “You’re right, Scorpion Queen. You have made league with the European dictator. That is unforgivable. If you had acted from greed, even from hatred, I might have managed some small degree of empathy for you. For the world mistreats us all, in oneway or another. But to sell your country to the brute of Europe, that places you beyond the pale.”
Even
Now the Golden Saint moved more rapidly, circling above the rotating disk. As she did so the brilliantrays of the summer sun—for, remember, although it was false winter in Seacoast City it was midsummer above and around that metropolis—those brilliant rays were bent and focused by the Saint’s membranous wings.
Focused on the whirling disk of ice crystals, the sun’s rays were further focused, bent and directed downward. Under the impact of this concentrated solar energy the heavy gray clouds brokeapart almost as if they had been intelligent beings. A great clear shaft opened in the topmost layer of clouds. The focused energy reached the next layer of gray, which responded as had the first. And then the energy reached the bottommost layer and split it, flooding Poseidon Pond with a rush of life-giving light and warmth.
It was fortunate now that Seacoast City’s uniformed guardians of justicehad cleared the surface of the pond and the pathways of the park of all legitimate visitors, for as the rays reached the icy pond its surface cleared.
Peering down through aerial telescopes from an altitude of more than a mile, the crews of the army bombers were astonished to perceive a battlemented structure. Until now it had been hidden beneath the ice of Poseidon Pond and the snow that hadaccumulated on top of the ice. But it could now be seen with increasing clarity.
The structure resembled a fairy tale castle, nor did it remain submerged for long, as the waters of the pond rose in vaporous clouds until the castle stood in the center of a miniature dry plain.
Their mission accomplished, the air corps bombers broke their circle and once more assumed a chevron formation that turnedand droned majestically away from Seacoast City and toward North Orion Field.
The Golden Saint swooped low over the structure then dropped gently into its courtyard. Her wings furled swiftly, like living things, and all but disappeared behind her shoulder blades. A replica of a medieval portcullis stood open, two guards stationed beside it. The Saint smiled grimly at their costumes. They worethe chain mail ofmock-medieval villains; their chest cloths bore the ugly insignia of the European dictator.
The guards escorted the Golden Saint to a modern laboratory concealed within the false antiquity of the castle. Its vaulted ceiling rose fully fifty feet above its flagstone floor. Its tapestry-covered walls made a room that seemed as large as Seacoast City’s world-famed indoor botanicalgarden. Here at last she confronted the woman with whose image she had previously conversed.
“Yes,” the snake-haired woman hissed, “I am The Scorpion Queen. And you, I see, are the Golden Saint. It was inevitable that we should meet, soon or late. Very well, let it be now.”
The Scorpion Queen’s eyes were like cold emeralds, her skin was of an icy perfection, her hair arranged to create the illusionof a nest of writhing vipers.
Or was it an illusion?
The only other person in the room was a small, cowering male. Both he and the Scorpion Queen wore laboratory white, but while the woman made her costume look like the brilliant uniform of a monarch, the male’s tunic and trousers had the appearance of a shabby, defeated weakling. Each of them wore high boots of a strange looking metallic material.
Was this cowardly weakling the blustering Lord Gorgon?
The Saint shook her head scornfully. She turned from the cowering male to his female commander. “You’re right, Scorpion Queen. You have made league with the European dictator. That is unforgivable. If you had acted from greed, even from hatred, I might have managed some small degree of empathy for you. For the world mistreats us all, in oneway or another. But to sell your country to the brute of Europe, that places you beyond the pale.”
Even
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