But the pod might just possibly decide to burn. He crawled out painfully, but as quickly as possible.
Outside it was mid-afternoon. A desert afternoon. The sun was high and white-hot, blinding. He closed his eyes, trying to accustom himself to the glare. He thanked both God and the engineers that the pod had apparently come down where it was supposed to come down—in the great empty area in Arizona. Radar would have followed him down, therefore rescue trucks were already on their way. They would cross the rough terrain in a couple of hours. A helicopter should be here even sooner. He breathed deeply and a bit more easily, beginning to feel much better.
It occurred to him at last that he still had on his space suit. He took off the helmet, regretted it almost instantly.
The air-scorched skin of the pod by his side was glowing a brisk cherry red, radiating slow thick waves of boiling air. Web walked quickly away in the sand. The October sun was hot, but the pod was even worse. He looked around in the desert, beginning now to feel very tired, looking for a place to shelter himself, to rest until the relief came.
He walked off over the nearest rocky hill, searched among the huge boulders. Distances were deceptive. He had walked quite a way before he found two gray slabs which leaned together and formed a dark opening beneath. He made sure that he could see enough of the desert to know when the relief trucks came. Then he crawled inside.
He had just settled himself to wait, his eyes closing, when the pod blew up.
The sound came at him like a thundering wall. He whirled to face the desert.
Where the pod had been rose an enormous, greasy, ball-topped cloud. The explosion was overwhelming. The whole land shook as the concussion rolled over him, the sky and the air were black around him. After a while the dirt and the rocks began to rain down in a heavy brown splatter and he huddled in the rocks.
Atomic. They were after him.
He started to rise, agonized and tensed, thinking about the aliens and about radioactivity. But before he reached his feet his mind took hold of him and he stopped.