Forbidden Worlds #46 (1956)

Lieutenant J.G. Thomas Andrews, the last survivor of a sunken American submarine, is rescued by a mysterious underwater civilization after escaping his doomed vessel. Taken before their ruler, Ta-Zaken, and subjected to intense interrogation, he finds himself at odds with a society that harbors deep hatred for his kind—especially a young woman named Roma, whose fury masks a painful secret tied to humanity’s past.

In the wake of his bestselling novel about the long-lost Pharaoh Sesostan—written from pure imagination—scholar Edward Mercer is stunned when a newly discovered tomb and translated tablets reveal astonishing parallels to his fictional account. As archaeologists and the world marvel at the uncanny accuracy of his story, Mercer finds himself confronting a growing resemblance between the ancient king and his own face, deepening the mystery of how he could have known what was buried for millennia.

Jo and her friend, both avid duck hunters, are surprised when their retriever brings back a pigeon marked R-7762—one of the birds they’d previously banded during a study on migration. The discovery is baffling, not just because the pigeon was thought to be extinct, but because it bears a number from a study long since abandoned.

In a Nevada rocket testing site, scientist Edmund Gibson and his team push the limits of space travel, using a monkey named Jojo to test the effects of extreme speed and altitude. As Jojo survives flight after flight and grows astonishingly intelligent—eventually speaking, reading, and offering technical insights—the scientists marvel at his transformation. But when Jojo begins to question his place in the world and suggests training a second monkey, the team’s awe turns to unease, hinting at deeper questions about intelligence, identity, and what it means to be human.