1 9 7 7 =Johnny Wendt=: the world’s first Space hero--until he became an alcoholic drifter =Lisa Trovi=: she gave up a career to salvage Johnny, then she went to the Moon to help him --but found something there more important than love =Phil Kutler=: his job was to find out what Space had done to Johnny--and see that it didn’t happen to the next Spacemen =Congressman he was out to grab the Space program McLafferty=: for himself--and his dreadfully effective weapons were headlines These are THE TOMORROW PEOPLE THE TOMORROW PEOPLE a science-fiction novel by JUDITH MERRIL PYRAMID BOOKS [Illustration] NEW YORK For Milt and the unturned back THE TOMORROW PEOPLE A PYRAMID BOOK First printing, May 1960 Second printing, December 1962 This book is fiction. No resemblance is intended between any character herein and any person, living or dead; any such resemblance is purely coincidental. Copyright, © 1960 by Judith Merril All Rights Reserved _Printed in the United States of America_ PYRAMID BOOKS _are published by Pyramid Publications, Inc., 444 Madison Avenue, New York 22, New York, U.S.A._ PROLOGUE _June, 1973--January, 1976_ They sent two men out through unknown space to a far cold place, a place whose very name was fear, the name of the cruel god, the god of war. They shot two men off the Moon--out from the sun and away from the earth--in a new great ship with a shiny hull and a miracle fuel. The ship went out with a blast and a prayer. After three years it came back with a sigh, unpowered, fuel-less, floating in slow-spiralled orbit through empty sky around the Moon. It came back with its hull scratched and dented and darkened from the dust and debris of space, the wind and sands of Mars. It came back with one man in it instead of two. Johnny Wendt was the one who came back. PART ONE _January 1976--June 23, 1977_ _Rockland, N. Y.--Thursday, June 23, 1:30_ A.M. (_E.D.S.T._) He woke up screaming again. Or else he dreamed the scream? But when his eyes started to open, they closed reactively against the light. So Lee was up. And so it was no dream. Sweat tickled his neck, but he lay still, breathing evenly, eyes shut. He would talk to her in the morning. Not now. In the morning it would be better, but not _now_.... He opened his eyes a slit to make sure. It was her light, all right. She was sitting up, watching him.