Authentic Science Fiction, December 1951 — page 7: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

THE MOON IS- HEAVEN By H. J. Campbell CHAPTER ONE Three Weeks To Go The sand is so hot you almost wish you were wearing a space suit. A noon-day sun makes the world an oven as you stand waiting just outside the danger zone in a part of South America that has the double distinction of being called Cotopaxi and being slap in latitude nought. It has another distinction, too, when you come to think of it. This mountain in Ecuador will be the first to take the blast of a rocket that ought to reach the Moon. If it doesn’t reach the Moon, you reckon they’ll put up an epitaph to those who didn’t make it. And your name will be on the list. Not at the top, of course, Up there will be the world- famous name of Atah Kark, the man who did so much to get the whole thing going, and who will combine the duties of astronaut and surveyor on the trip. Then will come the pilot and the chemist and the technologist and the man who risked his life to save his friends—someone always does that on a trip like this. And then, way down at the bottom, will be your name. Any name would do. Few know it. No one will recognise it. But they will call you Mike, the thick-headed journalist who qualified for the post of observer because he happened to be exactly the right size and have the kind of lungs that don’t mind being knocked about a bit. Through the window of the hut, in the centre of the safety zonc, she rises up. Tall, sleek, unfinished. A rocket that will be the embodiment of several million pounds, several million hearts and—the embodiment of man’s desiring. You drain your coffee cup, slip the empty vessel on to the 5 comicbooks.com