nclosing walls were visible. It was a
triangular-shaped space, fifteen feet or so down one side, with a
concave ceiling overhead. I was lying on the floor. The darkness at
first had been impenetrable. The figures which had flung me down and
seized my knife were gone; I had not seen them nor where they went.

For a moment I lay cushioned by my bloated suit. When I struggled to
my feet, I was almost weightless. The movement of getting upright
flung me upward as though I were a tossed feather. My helmet struck
the metal ceiling, so sharp a blow that I feared for an instant I had
smashed the helmet.

From the ceiling, with flailing arms and legs, I sank back to the
grid-floor; and in a moment I was able to stand upright with so slight
a feeling of weight that I could have been a bit of thistle ready to
blow away in the least wind.

There was, as I stood there balancing myself, a queer feeling of
triumph within me. A triumphant hope; for coming down in the ship's
capacious funnel--larger than it had seemed from a distance--I had
seen what appeared to be a small projectile, resting in some strange
landing gear. The disc bearing me had settled on a stage alongside it.
Was that the projectile from Earth?

A growing air pressure was around me; the tiny Erentz dials within my
helmet had been immovable, but now they were showing outside pressure. I
stood waiting. Whatever sounds were here I could not tell. Then
presently the dials stopped. They registered seventeen pounds--whatever
that might mean here. I loosed the helmet and took it off.

With the first gasping breath my senses reeled. I sank to the floor,
and though I tried to replace the helmet, it was too late. My thoughts
were fading. A strange chemical odor was in my nostrils. It was like
breathing a thin, perfumed water.

The drifting away was pleasant.

Tortured dreams came with my awakening. I found myself in the same dim
room upon the floor. I could breathe better now, and in a few more
hours the strangeness had almost gone. I found now that I was not
injured, but I was ravenously hungry.

Again, gingerly as before, I stood up and slid my space-suit from me;
and now I was aware of movement and sound. The floor-grid vibrations
were apparent. And there was a dim, distant, tiny throbbing; it was
much like the interior of the _Cometara_ while in flight.

And there were other sounds, indescribably faint, yet strangely clear.
I thought they might be distant voices.