Charles H. Davis 18 min read

Through the outer solar system two great ships race, one wounded and fleeing, as a pale energy beam lances out and tears open the hull of the fugitive Alarian cruiser.

Charles H. Davis's 1950 story is a rousing space-opera adventure. Vivid, driven golden-age pulp. Read it for a colorful pulp yarn of pursuit and battle among the planets, brimming with force-beams, wounded warships, and cosmic combat, in the fast-moving, wonder-and-action style of the classic space-adventure magazines.

In its time

Published in 1950, during the 1950s, post-war optimism meets cold war anxiety.

Reading it

18 min read (a short story, a single idea, delivered and gone).