A world to die for
By Sam Carson
Titans respect men who create,
and add to the betterment of
others. Surely it is brave to be
a Titan and muchly in love.
Another new name for these pages. Here's Sam Carson, veteran writer, TV and Radio editor, former roving newspaperman, and a father who is now "going through an involuntary course in nuclear physics" as he keeps up with his son, a chemical engineer and physicist at the University of Tennessee. And when Sam Carson sets foot on an alien planet the hills and valleys as well as the people seem to pulse with light and vitality. It's truly rarely that a writer seated behind his desk can summon such travel magic.
[Transcriber's Note: This etext was produced from
Fantastic Universe July 1954.
Extensive research did not uncover any evidence that
the U.S. copyright on this publication was renewed.]
They cut the Markab out of hyper space three parsecs from Deneb, on the North Galactic Polar course. Three men were aboard the space yacht. The alien ship they expected to find was a thousand times greater. By standards of the Galactic Service, the Markab was on a suicide mission.
Rik Guelf, the Markab's pilot, conned sync parallax tapes, the robot master controls and set the screen charts. In came Captain Rodolph, stout and weary from twenty years of patrol service. Behind was Pere Danold, thin and lithe, with feral eyes and tight lips.
"I'm tossing out telar screens. If they're breaking out of hyper, as the outposts charted, we won't wait long."
"You hope," Danold's sardonic voice jeered. "Your phantom ship paralyzes five ships of the line beyond Altair, so they send for us to blast it."