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Updated: June 6, 2025
And the bleak and frigid barrenness that met his gaze was so implacably hostile to any living thing as to bring a shudder of more than physical cold. No warming sun, as yet, reflected from the rocks. About him was the blackness of a fire-formed lithosphere, whose lighter veining and occasional ashy fields were made ghostly in the earthlight.
Even in the earthlight the kaleidoscopic colors were vivid in their changing reds and blues and yellow sheens. Then this surface sloped sharply away, though here it was rough with broken rock where half-hardened lava, coughed from that throat, had fallen back and adhered to the molten sides. This rock in the inner crater was gray, pale and ghostly in the earthlight.
Viewed from above there was the darkly purple crater floor, the upflung circular rim where the Earthlight tinged the spires and crags with yellow sheen; and on the shelf, like a huddled group of birds' nests, Grantline's domes hung and gazed down upon the inner valley.
I caught a last vague glimpse of the huddled group of marooned passengers, staring up at us. Left to their fate, alone on this deserted world. With the three engines going, we slid smoothly upward. The forest dropped, a purple spread of treetops edged with starlight and Earthlight. The sharply curving horizon seemed to follow us upward. I swung on all the power.
I could see, far down there on the crater floor, a little patch of Earthlight in which a mashed human figure was lying. I staggered back again. A moment or two must have passed while I stood there on the summit, with my senses clearing and my strength renewed as the blood stream cleared in my veins. I was victor. Coniston was dead.
He tried the familiar jest: "Don't let the Earthlight get you!" Wilks went out through the ports a process of no more than a minute. I wandered away again through the corridors. I suppose it was half an hour later that I chanced to be gazing through a corridor window. The lights along the rocky cliff were tiny blue spots.
He evidently saw the winner of the combat on the cliff, who now was standing in the Earthlight, gazing down. And he saw too, no doubt, the second figure mounting the stairs. He stood quite near the window through which Grantline and his men were gazing, with his back to the building, looking up to the summit. Then he ran with tremendous leaps toward the ascending staircase.
And now Earthshine fell upon the moon. It was many times brighter than moonlight ever was upon the Earth. Even at lunar sunset the Earthlight was sixteen times brighter. At midnight, when the Earth was full, it would be bright enough for any activity.
The unlighted Grantline buildings showed vaguely in the Earthlight. I said, "We'll go down. I'll leave you there. You can wait at the port. They'll repair it soon." "And what will you do, Gregg?" I did not intend to tell her. "Hurry, Anita!" "Gregg, let me go with you." She jerked away from me and bounded back up the stairs. I caught her on the summit. "Anita!" "I'm going with you."
"I won't answer them," Grantline declared. "Our game is to sit defensive. Conserve everything. Let them make the leading moves." We waited half an hour; but no other shot came. The valley floor was patched with Earthlight and shadow. We could see the vague outline of the brigand ship backed up at the foot of the opposite crater wall.
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