Jupiter Jones blew out his breath. His first reaction had been to swing the Mizar around, but caution prevailed. He was too old a hand at Galactic exploration to burst unannounced on an alien culture.
The terrain below had been growing progressively rougher. Just ahead a range of mountains reared saw-edged peaks into the clouds. He nursed the Mizar along until the gorges fell away beneath him like blue-green troughs. There was no sign of habitation anywhere.
He braked and banked, spiraling lower and lower, dropping into a deep valley with a river cutting through it like a silver thread. At the last moment, he frantically buckled himself down and cut in "George".
Flame bellowed around the Mizar as the automatic landing jets burst into life. With a fierce crackling roar the star ship sliced through the tangled vegetation, came to rest a hundred meters from the river.
Jupiter Jones threw off the safety straps, stood up, feeling a tingle of excitement take hold of him.
He was down, the ship resting on the crust of a strange world. A world that might well be his home for the rest of his natural life.
It was a dismaying thought.
With gravity dragging at his feet once more, he moved to the transparent rind of the thermoplas blister and stared out.
The landing jets had charred a huge swathe in the vegetation, charred it to the finest ash and baked the ground like brick, leaving a wall of jungle hemming the ship in.
Nothing moved.