George A. Whittington 17 min read

'Asteroid fishing' is no job for men who joined the Inter-Planetary Patrol dreaming of distant frontiers, Nord Holber tells himself bitterly, his two-man ship hanging above the mad orbits of the Belt.

George A. Whittington's 1946 story is a vivid space-opera adventure of dull duty turned deadly in the asteroid Belt. Atmospheric, driven golden-age pulp. Read it for a rousing tale where a bored young Patrol officer's tedious posting among the asteroids becomes a fight along a space-lane of no return.

In its time

Published in 1946, during the 1940s, the golden age begins.

Reading it

17 min read (a short story, a single idea, delivered and gone).

Illustrated by

Harry Leydenfrost