 How long were Eckert and Templin planning to stay on Tunpesh?
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. Weltschmerz, perhaps. 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. 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. 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. The rocketport was in a small valley, surrounded by low, wooded hills. The village started where the port left off and crawled and wound over the wooded ridges. They finally came out on the field and clustered around him and Templin. The other part of the square was given over to the native bazaar where pots and bolts of cloth were for sale, and where numerous stalls were loaded with dried fruits and vegetables and the cleaned and plucked carcasses of the local variety of fowl. It was late afternoon when they followed Jathong into a small, white-washed house midway up a hill.
 6 months
 6 years  6 days  6 months  6 weeks