
A daring space‑venturer named Wilding finds himself alone on a rogue asteroid—a cold, glittering prison drifting far beyond Pluto. The supply ship that should have rescued him has vanished, leaving him suspended in a suit amid an endless black sea, with distant stars that feel alien and indifferent. Around him swirl countless crates of food, water, luxury goods and forbidden pleasures, each bobbing like tiny moons, tantalizingly out of reach.
Now Wilding must battle both the harsh vacuum and the crushing silence, his survival hinging on a dwindling air supply and his own resolve. He clings to the hope that other desperate souls might eventually stumble upon the floating treasure and rescue him, but every passing hour tests his sanity. In this stark, beautiful void, the line between heroism and hopelessness blurs, and patience becomes his only weapon.
Language
en
Duration
~1 hours (93K characters)
Publisher of text edition
Project Gutenberg
Credits
Greg Weeks, Mary Meehan and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net
Release date
2021-01-21
Rights
Public domain in the USA.

1911–1974
A museum curator by profession and a pulp storyteller by passion, he brought a thoughtful, literary touch to science fiction and fantasy magazines of the 1940s and 1950s. His work often mixed imagination with psychology, myth, and a quietly unsettling sense of wonder.
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