"Wait a minute!” Thorn exclaimed, his lean brown face suddenly eager. He turned to the Chairman. “You said nobody had ever landed on Erebus and returned, sir. But one man did land there and come back. Martin Cain, the great space pirate of, a generation ago."
The Chairman nodded. “Yes, I remember the story now. Cain is supposed to have made for Erebus alone in a lifeboat when his ship was gunned to a wreck outside Pluto's orbit. They say he spent two weeks there and returned safely, the only man ever to do so."
"Martin Cain,” Thorn pointed out tensely, “must have discovered the secret of how to land safely on Erebus. If we knew that secret, we could land there safely and lift the radite!"
"But Cain has been dead for years,” the Chairman reminded. “And he never told anyone what was on Erebus, they say."
"He told one person the secret of Erebus, if what I've heard in the underworld is true,” John Thorn persisted. “His daughter, Lana Cain."
The Chairman stared. “Lana Cain, the girl who's leader of the space pirates out in the Zone? The girl they call the pirate princess?"
"That's right.” Thorn said tautly. “They say that Martin Cain, her father, before he died told her the secret of how to visit Erebus safely, so she could take refuge there if ever she had to. She's never told anyone the secret. But she knows it!"
Sual Av's green eyes glistened. “If we could get that secret from Lana Cain—"
"That's my idea!” Thorn exclaimed. “If we three go straight to Erebus to get the radite, the chances are a thousand to one as you say that we'll simply meet the same mysterious fate as all other explorers, and never come back. Our lives don't matter, of course, but the Alliance wouldn't get that precious radite.
"Our only real chance, as I see it, is to make first for the Zone, and get this girl Lana Cain's knowledge of Erebus, by trickery or force. With that knowledge, we can go on to Erebus and have a fighting chance of winning through and bringing back the radite."