The hovering flames paused. They reached glowing tentacles toward him while he ripped frantically at his cloying, confining space suit.
He rolled over on his back when the fastenings gave way. The flames huddled closer in the intense cold of the upper slope when Rod shorted the heating element. It glowed white while he ripped his pocket in a desperate search for red dust--red oxide from the gryxon mines.
His face was blue when he dropped the dust on the white hot heat coil. The red dust changed to gleaming droplets of mercury. Oxygen--rich pure oxygen was released in the change. He breathed the life-giving fumes through pinched nostrils.
When strength came pouring back into his air-starved system he advanced on the weakened flames. They hugged the rocks--inert in the savage cold of the mountain. Some of them had changed to glowing liquid. One, higher on the slope than the rest, had frozen to an opalescent solid. When the newly generated oxygen flowed over them they exploded harmlessly to grey powder. As the last one disappeared Rod turned to face a grinning, space-clad figure.
“Nice work, Rod,” the figure called, “I see you answer your mail.”
“Bill Williamson!” Rod grinned his relief. “Oblige me, pal, by not writing any more notes.”
Williamson was beside him. He slipped a fresh cannister of air into place on Rod’s space suit and supported him while they clambered further up the mountain-side.
“That oxygen trick!” he exulted. “That’s a nice wrinkle! They sounded like popcorn going off.”
Williamson led him to a cave entrance buried deep in a gorge. The concealed opening was covered with a heavy wind-proofed canvas. They entered through the double fold.
“Oxygen equipped!” Rod stared his surprise.
“We have our creature comforts.” Williamson unlatched his helmet. “Crude but effective. We’ve been heating mercury oxide. There’s lots of it around. Set awhile--while I call the gang. They’ll be glad to see you.”
When the handshaking was over, Rod faced the hardbitten, sand-burned Survivors. These were the men who, like himself, had come through the testing. They had found the way to live on this planet--in the teeth of the conquerors of Earth. Now they needed him--needed his genius to guide them along the path to freedom--to conquest over the hated tetrarchs.