 What is hiding underneath the gigantic mound on the alien planet?
Two hours since, the sun of this solar system had been a vast glaring disk off to port, with streamers and prominences erupting about its edges. Now it lay astern, and Moran could see the planet that had been chosen for his marooning. The ice-cap, by its existence and circular shape, proved that the planet rotated at a not unreasonable rate. A water-ice ice-cap said that there were no poisonous gases in the planet's atmosphere. Its size, too, told about temperature-distribution on the planet. A small one like this meant wide tropical and sub-tropical zones. The fact was verified by the thick, dense cloud-masses which covered most of the surface,—all the surface, in fact, outside the ice-cap. But since there were ice-caps there would be temperate regions. Two of the Nadine's four-man crew watched out the same ports as the planet seemed to approach. The process would be to find a planet and check its climate and relationship to other planets, and its flora and fauna against descriptions in the Directory. If they left a beacon, they may have left an identification of the planet. All five of its proper company watched as the planet's surface enlarged. If somebody were wrecked on an even possibly habitable planet, the especially developed seed-strains would provide food in a minimum of time. But space-travel regulations are especially designed to prevent such escapes.
 An empty spacecraft where a crew member had survived long enough to set up a marker
 A pulsing, reeking object egg casing that contains countless unhatched beetle eggs  An empty spacecraft where a crew member had survived long enough to set up a marker  A 'yard-worm,' which is an uncontrolled type of an 'inch-worm'  The remains of a crew that had landed on the alien planet a century earlier