 How long were Eckert and Templin planning to stay on Tunpesh?
[Transcriber's Note: This etext was produced from Galaxy Science Fiction August 1951. ] Nothing could have seemed pleasanter than that peaceful planet. Templin tightened his safety belt and lay back on the acceleration bunk. The lights in the cabin dimmed to a dull, red glow that meant the time for takeoff was nearing. He could hear noises from deep within the ship and the tiny whir of the ventilator fan, filling the air with the sweetish smell of sleeping gas. To sleep the trip away was better than to face the dull monotony of the stars for days on end. Weltschmerz, perhaps. Eckert had fiddled with the controls and changed it to sunshine, then to a weird mixture of hail amid the brassy, golden sunlight. How long would it be before memories faded and all there was left of Pendleton was a page of statistics? Pendleton had been in his second year as attache on Tunpesh, a small planet with a G-type sun. Tunpesh had been inspected and certified and approved. And then an unscheduled freighter had put in for repairs, one of the very few ships that ever came by Tunpesh. Tunpesh had been Pendleton's second assignment. It was almost black inside the cabin now; only a thin red line around the ceiling told how close they were to takeoff. Eckert and he had been chosen to go to Tunpesh and investigate. The thin red line was practically microscopic now and Templin could feel his lashes lying gently on his cheeks. Their information on Tunpesh was limited. They knew that it had no trading concessions or armed forces and that nobody from neighboring systems seemed to know much about it or even visited it. But a staff anthropologist must have been routinely assigned to Tunpesh to furnish data and reports. Warm breezes rustled through Eckert's graying hair and tugged gently at his tunic. A few hundred yards away, a forest towered straight and slim and coolly inviting, and brilliantly colored birds whirled and fluttered in the foliage. The rocketport, where they were standing surrounded by their luggage, was a grassy valley where the all too infrequent ships could land and discharge cargo or make repairs. He looked at the slim, dwindling shape that was the rocket, and was suddenly, acutely aware that he and Templin would be stranded for six months on a foreign and very possibly dangerous planet. And there would be no way of calling for help or of leaving before the six months were up. It might be a pleasant six months at that, away from the din and the hustle and confusion, spending the time in a place where the sun was warm and inviting.
 6 months
 6 years  6 days  6 months  6 weeks