Pudge held up the pictures; they showed close-ups of a tangled mass of plants. "All ferns," he said. "Doesn't seem to be anything else." "Why would a planet have ferns and nothing else, not even the beginning of animal life?" Tom wondered aloud. "I once read an account of finding the tiny seeds of Earth's plants millions of miles out in space," Willie said. "Seems the winds blow them right off the planet and they're so light they just keep going." He looked at the pictures, then at Tom. "Suppose some of them drifted here?" "That's as good a guess as anything else," Tom said. "Maybe the master minds at home can figure it out." "Only seven or eight Earth-type planets in all these years of star mapping and I had to find one with nothing but ferns on it," Bart said in disgust to the screen. "Oh, well, maybe it'll do as a colony. No alien life to worry about, anyway. We'll call it Bart McDonald Planet." "Hey," Tom spoke up, "Willie found the planet. He should get to name it." Bart was curt. "I'm the captain of this ship; new planets are named after the captain that discovers them." "Nuts," Tom muttered. "We all had a hand in this. It ought to be named after all of us." "How about calling it the ship's name," Willie put in quietly. Bart strode over and yanked the log's keyboard out. He banged furiously on the keys for a moment, and then read aloud. "At 1430 this date, discovered McDonald's planet, an Earth class planet, signed, Bart McDonald, Captain." He slammed the log shut. Tom snorted. Bart gave him a dirty look and went over and sat in the control board chair. Pudge had disappeared in the galley as he always did when there was an argument. There were a few minutes of strained silence as they worked over the instruments. Bart turned from the control board. "As long as this place has no life, we'd be safe in landing. Suppose we earn the bonus by bringing back a full report on whether it's fit for a colony or not?" Willie's head jerked up, his face white. Tom frowned, and said nothing. He wanted to land but he didn't want to agree with Bart on anything. "What say?" Bart said. "I'll even put it up for a vote." "Okay," Tom said, thinking of walking in the sun, feeling firm ground under his feet. "It would be a shame to come all this way and then not be able to say we had explored the country." "No," Willie said quickly. "It's dangerous. And--and besides, we'd have to go in quarantine when we got back." "So we go in quarantine," Bart said. "We'll get paid for it." He turned to the control board. "Buzz Pudge, so he can get ready." He began punching buttons. They went around to the middle of the day side of the planet, swinging in closer. The continents formed a rough belt around the equator of the planet, with no land extending to the small ice caps on the poles.