HAS WRITTEN The Secret of Saturn's Rings The Secret of the Martian Moons HAS EDITED Terror in the Modern Vein Every Boy's Book of Science-Fiction The Portable Novels of Science Flight into Space Adventures on Other Planets The Pocket Book of Science-Fiction Contents...

That morning began like all the preceding mornings of the past two years with the tinny jangling of the little alarm clock on Robin Carew's bureau. Opening his black eyes, he struggled into a sitting position on the narrow bed, reached out his hand and turned off the alarm. He yawned, swung his feet to the floor, rubbed his eyes. It was half past seven again of another workday morning. There was no inkling that this day would be any different from others. It was Monday again, which meant the sta

From Missouri where the bus ride had ended, the time had passed with difficulty. There had been two hot days through Kansas, standing by lonely roadsides while cars whizzed by without stopping, the strong sun beating down over the flat green plains, the insects alive with the fever of the endless wheat. Robin had to keep heading south, south and west always, driving down when cars were going that way. Down through Oklahoma, thumbing his way, sometimes with an Eastern tourist on his way to Califo

The bus roared on through the night, its cargo of men now mainly silent, dozing as their vehicle jolted along. The moon, which was full, shed a pale glow over the desolate landscape through which the road ran straight as an arrow. The vehicle had departed from the main highway fairly soon after leaving town, and had gone along another leading out into the wastes which was the government reserve. Robin had caught a momentary glimpse of floodlighted signs warning casual motorists against the use o

Suddenly it felt as if a giant had placed his huge palm squarely on Robin's chest and was pushing him down. As he tried to exert pressure against the door, the counter pressure of the invisible hand increased. For an instant Robin was thunderstruck. Had he suddenly become weak? What was this? His first emotion, that of amazement, changed in a split second to one of terror at his newly discovered weakness, and again from that to a feeling of stunned shock. There was no invisible hand! It was the

For a moment Robin felt dizzy again, and the falling sensation wracked him. It was the weightlessness, he knew. The sensation of being without weight was the same as that of being in free fall. And he was operating beyond the effects of gravity. Somehow the atomic rocket fuels had been far greater or far more effective than the inventors had calculated. He knew that they had never intended this rocket to be shot beyond Earth's grip—for if they had, they would not have loaded it with the test ani

Now that Robin recognized the certainty that he would never return, that he was a doomed man, a curious sort of change came over him. Up to this time, he had been carefully suppressing his inner thoughts, comforting himself with the hope that the trip would somehow end up safely. Yet while his mind was dwelling on that thought to the exclusion of others, his nerves had been under tension. He had felt himself continually on the edge of breakdown, in proximity to screaming. But Robin had been trai

Robin had no time to wonder why he had not been instantly killed by the crash, because the explosion on hitting the surface of the dome was followed instantly by a tremendous roaring sound that surrounded the entire rocket nose. This was in turn accompanied by a powerful pressure on the rocket, which threw Robin against the nose-end cushioning and held him there. The pressure was not steady, changing as the roaring itself changed, with sudden bursts of sound, convulsive shoves, and changes in pi

When Robin Carew opened his eyes, he knew he was a very sick man. He felt warm, sticky, and he hurt all over. He tried to sit up, but everything spun dizzily around him. His arms, legs, and body were burning intolerably and there was an itch throughout him that he could do nothing about. He lay back, trying to gain strength. A little later he managed to crawl to the water's edge, fill the container he had used in the trip from Earth, drag himself back. For a period whose length he could not dete

When he woke up one morning Robin was vaguely aware of something different. He opened his eyes to the dark interior of his cave-home and lay there on his bed of padding from the cargo chamber. For a while he rested quietly in that pleasant half-sleep of awakening after a good rest. Unconsciously his hand moved down searching for a blanket, but of course there was none. He'd never needed one before. He unconsciously groped again for the blanket, then opened his eyes wide and sat up. There was a s

Using the gas jet proved to be considerably more difficult than might have been supposed. It was hard to approach too closely to the thing without running the danger of getting scorched. Also, to hold metal in it long enough to allow it to melt or become pliable it was necessary to find a way of holding the object without getting burned. Robin did get several blisters before he finally worked out a system. Making himself a pair of thick rabbit-skin gloves lined with a thin coating of the ash fro

The situation was so astonishing that for a while Robin did not do anything but sit down inside his cave and catch his breath. Somehow he had assumed all along that he would not find anything on a human scale on the Moon. His life had been mainly confined to the first cavern-bubble he'd arrived at and this, as he now realized, had been a rather isolated one. Unconsciously, he had assumed that life in other protected airtight sublunar areas would be on a similarly low and limited level. Now he re

As they progressed, Robin queried Korree as best he could as to the exact location of this fabled place from which the sun could be seen. "I not know from here," the Glassie replied. "Go from home place, yes. We go Korree home place first." Robin thought about that as they trudged along. He went easily and lightly in spite of his huge load—a collection of sacks and equipment tied together to make a bundle more than his own height. But bundle and all, Robin was lighter and stronger by far than he

There had been a distinct chill in the strange surface canyon, but from the moment that the white sunlight began to stream in, there was a definite warming effect. The rays were diffused by the substance above which sealed the cleft, yet the sun was strong while it lasted. Robin felt good as he bathed in its rays. He looked at himself, at Korree, in wonder. For the clear white light was the first normal lighting he had seen in all the time he had been marooned below. Now he received the first tr

"I was an orphan of World War II," said Piotr Ivanovitch Kareff in a quiet voice, speaking precise English with a fair fluency. "My family were all vanished, I know not what happened to them. I was brought back to Russia by our soldiers and sent to a state school in the Urals set up to take care of such as myself. "There I was a good scholar and I made myself good marks. When I was old enough, I qualified for study at a higher institute and was sent to a college for engineers. I was always inter

After they had recovered from their outburst of enthusiasm the two let go of each other and sat down out of breath. "Well, this is really amazing," said Robin finally. "Here I have to go to the Moon to find my brother. You know I really do not remember very much." "Of course not. You could not have been more than four years old when we parted. I was about three years older, I guess. Perhaps we can put what we do know together and find out what did happen. I know that Father and Mother were inter

The tunnel was very narrow, a mere crack in the wall, and Robin was hard put to squeeze through in a couple of spots. But it was not too long and, in a few minutes, Robin felt from the change in air and echo that it had opened out into a wider area. Peter's flash confirmed this. They were in a small air-pocket bubble several yards wide. They crossed this while Peter searched along the floor. He stopped, pointed down. "We go down again, through this hole in the floor. There's a short drop of only

The impression of a damp cloth moving gently over his face was Robin's first sensation on recovering his senses. He opened his eyes to find Peter leaning over him, carefully mopping away the soreness from his nose and face. Robin's eyes hurt and he blinked several times, each time feeling their rawness. "Easy does it," said Peter, smiling. "Your eyes are very bloodshot, but fortunately there's no real damage. You couldn't have been exposed to the outside for more than a few seconds. Nosebleed's

Robin lay flat against the ground, holding himself motionless. Peter's voice came over his helmet-radio. "Did you get hit?" "No," said Robin. "Something may have chipped my helmet but there's no leak, so I guess it wasn't a direct shot. How about you? Where are you?" From his position he couldn't see his brother, who had obviously fallen somewhere near. "I'm down just behind you," came Peter's voice. "We'll have to find better cover than this. There's a slight ridge about a foot high a couple of

They looked down from their point on the high ledge into the length of the cleft-world. A very faint light streak could be seen looking upward—this was the curious volcanic glass of the surface roof. Through it penetrated just a hint of the full Earthlight that bathed the outer moonscape. Down were shadows and darkness, in the distance little bits of moving lights, flickering sparks, that may have been the Glassies' head-stalks. The two men used their remaining flashlamp to light up the narrow l