THE MERCURIAN By FRANK BELKNAP LONG For ages Mankind labelled Mercury a dead world--a red-hot, seething outpost of hell. Too late Rawley learned of the hideous life that molten, steaming planet spawned! [Transcriber's Note: This etext was produced from Planet Stories Winter 1941. Extensive research did not uncover any evidence that the U.S. copyright on this publication was renewed.] We stood before the airlock, the old man and I, and watched them go out. Ellison was a granite man and I was just the lad who threw the switches. I was new at it. They had sent me out with a pat on the back and a commission, but I didn't feel like a Mercury run officer. Mining uranium on the Sun's firstling was no job for a green kid of twenty-two. Outside were lakes of molten zinc and a temperature of 790 degrees Fahr. No part of that temperature seeped into us, but just knowing it was out there was spine-chilling. I am not being facetious. To keep from thinking of the hot face we thought of the cold face, and you can't imagine extremes of cold without feeling shivery. Out on the cold face were other miners, working under conditions I wouldn't wish on my worst enemy. They had the cold of open space to contend with, and a little of _that_ seeped in. The Commander was passing out advice to each of the miners as they stepped into the lock. "Murphy, it's uranium we want. We're not zoologists. The next time you go specimen chasing--" "But it looked like a frog, Chief. I swear it did." "You know damn well no froglike animal could hop around on red-hot rocks." "I won't let him out of my sight this time, sir," said the miner at Murphy's heels. "Thank you, Haines. He needs a nurse, but do what you can." Five miners stepped out, each with a glance from Ellison which said as plain as words that he would walk beside them until they came back in again. The old man had so much quiet strength that he could split off simulacra of himself, and send them out through the airlock by just passing out advice. He moved like a living presence over the semi-molten Mercurian crust beside each of his men, fretting when a coupling slipped or mysterious stirrings caused the lads to look at one another with a wild surmise. He knew that the merciless heat beating down did something to the scarred and cracked surface rocks which made them seem to buckle and split up into little leaping ghosts, and half his warnings were directed against "heat-devils" and other optical illusions. When the last man had passed out he turned to me with a wry smile. "Dave, speaking as a psychiatrist, and without knowing for sure, I've a hunch there is too much tension inside of you."