"... an exceedingly small body," he repeated wearily to his unbelieving audience, "about four inches in diameter. It travels at a mean distance of four feet above the surface of the planet, at a velocity yet to be calculated. Its unique nature results in many hitherto unobserved--I might say even unimagined--phenomena." He stared blankly in front of him for a moment, then delivered the understatement of his life. "The discovery may necessitate a re-examination of many of our basic postulates in the physical sciences." The headphones squawked. Patiently, Allenby assured Earth that he was entirely serious, and reiterated the results of his observations. I suppose that he, an astronomer, was twice as flabbergasted as the rest of us. On the other hand, perhaps he was better equipped to adjust to the evidence. "Evidently," he said, "when the body was formed, it traveled at such fantastic velocity as to enable it to--" his voice was almost a whisper--"to punch holes in things." The headphones squawked. "In rocks," Allenby said, "in mountains, in anything that got in its way. And now the holes form a large portion of its fixed orbit." _Squawk._ "Its mass must be on the order of--" _Squawk._ "--process of making the holes slowed it, so that now it travels just fast enough--" _Squawk._ "--maintain its orbit and penetrate occasional objects such as--" _Squawk._ "--and sand dunes--" _Squawk._ "My God, I _know_ it's a mathematical monstrosity," Allenby snarled. "_I_ didn't put it there!" _Squawk._ Allenby was silent for a moment. Then he said slowly, "A name?" _Squawk._ "H'm," said Allenby. "Well, well." He appeared to brighten just a little. "So it's up to me, as leader of the expedition, to name it?" _Squawk._ "Well, well," he said. That chop-licking tone was in his voice. We'd heard it all too often before. We shuddered, waiting. "Inasmuch as Mars' outermost moon is called Deimos, and the next Phobos," he said, "I think I shall name the third moon of Mars--_Bottomos_." --JEROME BIXBY