"Before we're out of mutual range, Rough Rock, I'm going to explore this new moon. Me and Columbus! Stand by for reports."
Dan did his walking in huge leaps that propelled him fifty feet at a step with slight effort, due to the extremely feeble gravity of the tiny body. What did he weigh here? Probably no more than an ounce or two.
"Nothing much to report, Colonel. It's a dead, airless pip-squeak planetoid, just a big mile-thick rock, probably. No life, no vegetation, no people, no nothing. Guess you might call me the Man in the Second Moon—and the joke's on me! Well, one and three-quarter hours of oxygen left, by the gauge, or 105 minutes—sounds like more that way.... What's that, sir? Your voice is getting faint. Any last requests from me? Well, one favor maybe. Pick up my body some day with another rocket.... Yeah, it'll stay preserved up here in this deep-freeze of space.... Thanks, sir.... Can't hear you much now. Going out of range. Give Betty my fondest. You know, the blonde.... Well, sir—goodbye now."
Dan was glad that Rough Rock's radio voice faded to a whispery nothingness. It wasn't easy to stay casual now. There was nothing more to say, really, and he didn't want to hear any more crying from the CO. The Old Man had sounded almost hysterical. He wanted just to be alone with his thoughts now, making his final peace with the universe....
He checked the gauge with his watch—ninety minutes of oxygen to zero. Or, he thought with a grin, eternity minus ninety minutes.
He was beginning to have trouble breathing. But it was awesomely grand, watching the sweep of Earth beneath him, the procession of dots that were islands strung across the Pacific South Seas like a necklace of green beads. He was still within radio range of ships below at sea. Yet he didn't contact them. He had nothing to say, like a ghost in the sky.
Idly, he kept pitching loose stones, watching their rifle-like speed away from him. Again a phenomenon of the weak gravity of the moonlet. Actually, he was able to pick up a boulder ten feet across and heave it away with ease. We who are about to die amuse ourselves, he thought. Then, because a thread of stubborn hope still clung in a corner of his mind, he got an idea. It had lurked just beyond his mental grasp for some time now. Something significant....
Abruptly, face alight, Dan switched on his radio and contacted a ship below, asking them to relay him to Rough Rock with their more powerful transmitter.
"Ahoy, Rough Rock! Stop adding up my insurance, Colonel! I'm coming back.... No, sir, I haven't gone out of my head, sir. It's so simple it's a laugh, sir.... See you in a few hours, sir!"
And he did.