"Well, don't get out of sight," warned Stein. "We don't have an atmosphere here to bounce radio waves over the horizon."
Through the glassite port, Kraag could see Jonner poking around at the asteroid's surface with his steel probe. Against the incredibly curved horizon, Jonner's suited figure leaned at a slight angle under the black, star-studded sky. The distant sun gleamed from the sphere of his helmet.
"Pretty smooth terrain," remarked Jonner. "It's not much of a planet, but it seems to have enough mass to pull down any mountains. Looks like there should be some hills, though. It must have been in a molten state when the original trans-Martian planet was broken up."
"That ought to mean high albedo," said Stein. "Higher than it ought to be."
"Sounds more like Vesta," said Jonner. "Sure we're on Ceres?"
Stein looked at the notes he had made from the ship's instruments, before the crash.
"The escape velocity was 1,552.41 feet per second," he said, "and the diameter 0.06. I figure the mass at .000108."
"All those figures are off according to the latest table for Ceres," said Jonner.
"The fellows that made that table were on Mars," reminded Stein. "Vesta doesn't have a 480-mile diameter. It must be Ceres."
"You're the navigator," surrendered Jonner. "I'll take your word for it."