It was daylight, with the Sun mounting toward the zenith so quickly in
less than an hour it would be there, and my day would be half over.
I saw myself now to be standing on a slight rise of black, sandy ground.
There were metallic rocks lying about, a low, scanty vegetation in
patches on the ground—vegetation of a bluish color; and flimsy, stunted
trees. These had broad, angular blue-white trunks with spreading tops
ten feet up, and foliage that was bluish-white. Behind me was a jagged,
metallic peak perhaps a hundred feet in height.
There was no water in sight, no sign of life of any kind. Quite suddenly
I discovered that I was both hungry and thirsty.
What was I to do? This world was so small I could have started walking
in any direction and come back to my starting point in a very short
time. Walking! It was impossible to walk! I weighed almost nothing. I
stood teetering on tip-toe, straining every muscle to maintain my
balance, feeling like a balloon poised ready to sail away.
I took a step forward. Under the impulse of my gentle leg-thrust, my
body rose into the air in a broad arc. I suppose I went up a hundred
feet, sailing forward toward the line of trees at the horizon. I lost my
balance; my arms and legs were flying. I floated gently down and landed
on my face near the base of a tree!
You smile! I assure you it was not humorous to me. I stood up again,
trembling with surprise and alarm. A new vista of land beyond the former
horizon had opened. I saw other little jagged peaks a few hundred feet
away and behind them, over that dizzying curve downward of the world,
was the azure of cloudless Space.
I was frightened, and now I know it was with good reason. Had I leaped
recklessly into the air I might have left my tiny world
entirely—escaped from its slight gravitation sufficiently to become its
satellite, or perhaps even completely to depart its vicinity and become
a satellite of Saturn!
This tiny world upon which I found myself was inhospitable to the
extreme; and yet if I had been conscious of the choice, I would not have
wanted to abandon it for empty Space. Out there, worse than suffering
hunger and thirst, I would not be able to breathe.
Whatever my life before this day may have been, walking evidently was
part of it. I know that because my instinct was to walk. I decided to
weigh myself down with rocks and thus be able to maintain a footing.
Futile conception! I seized a huge rock of black metallic quartz in each
hand—only to find that the rocks themselves were mere feathers in my
grasp! Angered, I flung them into the air. They sailed away, out over
the horizon. Undoubtedly they left my world never to return.
The Sun was now past the zenith. It was mid-afternoon. Shortly it would
be night again.
I was clinging to the tree-trunk for support, when quite near me I saw
what seemed to be the mouth of a cave. I was staring at it when a figure
appeared from below. I did not move, and this thing evidently did not
see me.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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