Joseph Samachson

“ But to him, seeking so desperately, this galaxy was unique. It was the right one. He coursed through it from spiral arm to spiral arm, and now there could be no doubt. The star he wanted was small and yellowish, far from the center of the lens. It had a rather elaborate planetary system, which he recognized at once.
This was it. The third planet, the one with a single subsatellite, was the one he had been sent to find. To find, and perhaps to help. But how?
The finding of the planet had solved one problem. ”

“ And some of the latter could, without too great a distortion of the truth, be called intelligent. It had raised cities, tunneled into mountains, changed the appearance of sections of the planet itself. ”

“ A cloud came into being from the explosion of a mortar shell, and two men dropped to the ground. In answer to the mortar, the flaring barrel of a tank gun spoke hoarsely, and half the crew of the mortar fell in turn. But there seemed no end to this deadly dialogue. The next moment there came the burst of a bomb from a low-flying plane, and the tank half turned over on its side, a heap of smoking steel. ”

“ The first thing was to come down to earth. Choosing the dark side of the planet, shaded from the central sun by its own bulk, he shrank his body and let himself drop in the gravitational field. From time to time he slowed his fall in order to keep from flaming through the atmosphere and attracting their attention. ”

“ He came close enough to see the thousands of stars as individuals, to pick out the satellites circling the bright discs of light, to study the pale planets themselves and their tiny subsatellites. As he turned his attention from one to another, disappointment slowly filled him. ”

“ Many of those who saw him seemed to sense his strangeness, and moved toward him with a single impulse—to take advantage of his ignorance. Men spoke to him out of the sides of their mouths, offering him bargains. Women offered themselves. ”