Black Silence

Thundering back they came across cold space—eyes aching for remembered vistas, nostrils flaring for sweet fresh air, feet itching to tread on precious soil. They stepped down—into a wasted lifeless horror! Eying each other in despair, they wondered. Must they— could they—colonize an alien world they once called HOME?
Earth! said Matthew Magoffin happily. Good old Terra. Sounds wonderful, doesn't it? Elbows on table, he sat listening to the specially-beamed broadcast from Earth. Half a dozen other members of the first expedition to Mars were also in the messroom of the Argus .
What's first on your program when we land, Lynn?
They had been out two and a half years, and it was a subject of which they never wearied.
Lynn said, A bath—a real one. Not out of a tea cup. She was the expedition's photographer and reporter, a small blonde with a soft triangular face.
The music stopped in the middle of a bar. An announcer's voice broke in.
We interrupt this program to bring you a news flash from the Union of South America.
Everyone stopped talking in the messroom of the spaceship.
The plague area in the Andean region is spreading out of control. Disease characterized by minute black spots that appear all over the body from head to foot. The spots are accompanied by a high fever and followed in two to three hours by death.
Whew! said Matt to the company at large. What a disagreeable way to die! Wonder what causes it?
As if in answer to his question, the announcer on Earth said, To date, the germ has not been isolated. And all attempts to curb the spread of the disease have proved futile.
The Pan-American League is meeting now in Lima to consider segregating the entire Andean area where the plague is raging ....