The jagged mountains fell away to a great sea, larger even than Mare Imbrium, and like Mare Imbrium, devoid of life. A huge crater rose from its center, towering over twenty thousand feet. Beyond lay more mountains. The land between was a wild tangle of rock, a place of unutterable desolation. Crag was fascinated and depressed at the same time. The Aztec was closing around the moon in a tight spiral. The alien landscape drew visibly nearer. He switched his attention between the braking rockets and instruments, trying to manage a quick glance at the scope. Prochaska caught his look. "Bandit's up on us," he confirmed. Crag uttered a vile epithet and Prochaska grinned. He liked to hear him growl, taking it as a good sign. Crag glanced worriedly at the radar altimeter and hit the braking rockets harder. The quick deceleration gave the impression of added weight, pushing them hard against their chest harnesses. He found it difficult to make the precise hand movements required. The Aztec was dropping with frightening rapidity. They crossed more mountains, seas, craters, great chasms. Time had become meaningless--had ceased to exist. The sheer bleakness of the face of the moon gripped his imagination. He saw it as the supreme challenge, the magnitude of which took his breath. He was Cortez scanning the land of the Aztecs. More, for this stark lonely terrain had never felt the stir of life. No benevolent Maker had created this chaos. It was an inferno without fire--a hell of a kind never known on earth. It was the handiwork of a nature on a rampage--a maddened nature whose molding clay had been molten lava. He stirred the controls, moved them further, holding hard. The braking rockets shook the ship, coming through the bulkheads as a faint roar. The ground came up fast. Still the landscape fled by--fled past for seeming days. Prochaska announced wonderingly. "We've cleared the back side. You're on the landing run, Skipper." Crag nodded grimly, thinking it was going to be rough. Each second, each split second had to be considered. There was no margin for error. No second chance. He checked and re-checked his instruments, juggling speed against altitude. Ninety-mile wide Ptolemaeus was coming around again--fast. He caught a glimpse through the floor port. It was a huge saucer, level at the bottom, rimmed by low cliffs which looked as though they had been carved from obsidian. The floor was split by irregular chasms, punctuated by sharp high pinnacles. It receded and Alphons rushed to meet them. The Aztec was dropping fast. Too fast? Crag looked worriedly at the radar altimeter and hit the braking rockets harder. Alphons passed more slowly. They fled south, a slim needle in the lunar skies. "Arzachel...." He breathed the name almost reverently.