"They are, and it's your fault, Marcia. You always say let the children express themselves, we can't frustrate them or cut them short in any way—so look what happens."
"You look what happens," Marcia declared dramatically. "If we don't pull out of the dive in a couple of seconds, we'll splatter all over that planetoid."
"Let me land it, let me land it!" wailed Johnny.
Burt spun to the controls, and his fingers flicked rapidly over the buttons. He was sweating when he brought the ship down with a none-too-gentle dump. He heard Joan's whimper from inside the galley, and Marcia began to tell him what a lousy pilot he was. Johnny was playing cops and robbers with the topography through the foreport.
"This," Burt said, "is the last week-end picnic for me. Definitely the last."
Marcia opened her mouth to say something, but Burt cut her off. "I don't want to hear any more about it. You'll just have to find another way for the kids to express themselves...."
They usually found an asteroid with a weird terrain, and just looking at it through the portable bubble-sphere kept the kids pretty busy. This time, however, things were different. The asteroid was only twenty miles in diameter, yet it had an atmosphere of oxygen and inert gases, and it was comfortably warm. No bubble-sphere this time to keep the kids hemmed in—and Johnny and Joan would be roving all over the uncharted surface.
Burt shuddered. What a job he'd have today. But then, this was the last time: they could talk themselves blue in the face and plead, but this was the last time.... And maybe there'd be life, since there was air and warmth. But that was silly: a body this size would not have life, and even if Johnny took advantage of the low gravity and jumped thirty feet in the air, he wouldn't get hurt—he'd float down gently as a feather.
Marcia pouted as she spread the table-cloth out on a flat expanse of rock. Burt put his hand on her shoulder, but she pulled away from him. "Brats, eh?" she muttered.