There wasn't anything left to
do.
They sat around on the hard surface of the planet, staring at the
strange stars overhead.
"You know," said Astro, "I might be able to set up something to convert
some of the U235 in the reactors to fuel the jet boat."
"Impossible, Astro," said Alfie. "You'd need a reduction gear. And not
only that, but you haven't any tools to handle the mass. If you opened
one of those boxes, you'd be fried immediately by the radiation!"
"Alfie's right," said Connel. "There's nothing to do but wait."
Major Connel turned his face up as far as he could in the huge fish-bowl
helmet to stare at the sky. His eyes wandered from star cluster to star
cluster, from glowing Regulus, to bright and powerful Sirius. He stifled
a sigh. How much he had wanted to see more--and more--and more of the
great wide, high, and deep! He remembered his early days as a youth on
his first trip to Luna City; his first sensation at touching an alien
world; his skipper, old, wise, and patient, who had given him his creed
as a spaceman: "Travel wide, deep, and high," the skipper had said to
the young Connel, "but never so far, so wide, or so deep as to forget
that you're an Earthman, or how to act like an Earthman!" Even now,
years later, the gruff voice rang in his ears.
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