Albert Teichner 43 min read

Mining a promising asteroid, the two-man crew of a little ship, captain and cocky warrant officer, banter over who'll risk going out, unaware of the strange happiness that rock will bring.

Albert Teichner's 1964 story is a wry dystopian and first-contact tale. Clever, thoughtful golden-age SF. Read it for a neat, ironic story where a routine asteroid landing yields an unexpected discovery about contentment and its price, in a well-turned golden-age piece that finds a sharp idea in a small two-man crew and a jagged rock.

In its time

Published in 1964, during the 1960s, new wave revolutionizes the genre.

Reading it

43 min read (a novelette, room for a turn or two).

Illustrated by

Robert Adragna