
A lone Earth student, Phil Rhodes, finds himself imprisoned in a cramped, coffin‑shaped cell on an alien world. The Kedaki captors subject him to relentless psychological torment—cold that gnaws at his bones, scorching blasts of air, and a constant barrage of cryptic questions that erode his sanity. As Rhodes endures the ever‑shifting extremes, he clings to the thin thread of reason, daring himself to stay alive while the alien experiment pushes his mind to the brink.
Outside the cell, the sterile corridors echo with the footsteps of indifferent guards, each interaction a further test of Rhodes’s will. He learns that the true purpose of his captivity isn’t death but something far more unsettling: a quest for knowledge that could decide the fate of an entire world. Listeners are drawn into Rhodes’s desperate struggle to retain his humanity amid an alien maze of fear and manipulation.
Language
en
Duration
~2 hours (118K 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
2021-11-26
Rights
Public domain in the USA.

1928–2008
Best known for fast-moving crime and science fiction, this versatile American writer published under several names and built a career that ranged from pulp magazines to acclaimed historical novels. His work includes the detective Chet Drum series and the prizewinning novel The Memoirs of Christopher Columbus.
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