THE SURVIVORS
By T. D. HAMM
Illustrated by DOUGLAS
Step by gruelling step the four of them slogged
their way toward a perilous safety. It was a
magnificent display of the will for survival.
The only question was, whose survival?
[Transcriber's Note: This etext was produced from
Amazing Stories August 1961.
Extensive research did not uncover any evidence that
the U.S. copyright on this publication was renewed.]
There were only four of them now. Soames and Rutherford had literally gone down with the ship in a roar of cascading rock and sand. Out of fifty square miles of the Martian plateau they had been unlucky enough to sit down on the egg-shell thin roof of a sector honey-combed with caves. Scant moments after the exploring party had disembarked, Soames' comments on their resemblance to a Sunday School picnic were suddenly broken off by a cacophonous medley of yells, the rolling thunder of sliding rock, and over all the agonized metallic shrieking of tortured metal as the ship fell, crushed and twisted. There came a final tremendous roar as the fuel tanks blew. The ground heaved convulsively, and shuddered into silence.
Stunned and deafened, Bradford, Canham, Palmer and Rodriguez pulled themselves to their feet, staring dazedly at the towering column of dust hanging like a malevolent genie over the half-mile wide chasm.