Eighty-eight swung some millions of miles further around the sun. The pock-marks on her face grew deeper, and were lined with durite, that strange close-packed laboratory product which (usually) would confine even atomic disintegration. Then Eighty-eight received a series of gentle pats, always on the side headed along her course. In a few weeks' time the rocket blasts had their effect and Eighty-eight was plunging in an orbit toward the sun.When she reached her station one and three-tenths the distance from the sun of Earth's orbit, she would have to be coaxed by another series of pats into a circular orbit. Thereafter she was to be known as E-M3, Earth-Mars Space Station Spot Three.Hundreds of millions of miles away two other C.C.C. companies were inducing two other planetoids to quit their age-old grooves and slide between Earth and Mars to land in the same orbit as Eighty-eight. One was due to ride this orbit one hundred and twenty degrees ahead of Eighty-eight, the other one hundred and twenty degrees behind. When E-M1, E-M2, and E-M3 were all on station no hard-pushed traveler of the spaceways on the Earth-Mars passage would ever again find himself far from land -- or rescue.During the months that Eighty-eight fell free toward the sun, Captain Doyle reduced the working hours of his crew and turned them to the comparatively light labor of building a hotel and converting the little roofed-in valley into a garden spot. The rock was broken down into soil, fertilizers applied, and cultures of anaerobic bacteria planted. Then plants, conditioned by thirty-odd generations of low gravity at Luna City, were set out and tenderly cared for. Except for the low gravity, Eighty-eight began to feel like home.But when Eighty-eight approached a tangent to the hypothetical future orbit of E-M3, the company went back to maneuvering routine, watch on and watch off, with the Captain living on black coffee and catching catnaps in the plotting room.Libby was assigned to the ballistic calculator, three tons of thinking metal that dominated the plotting room. He loved the big machine. The Chief Fire Controlman let him help adjust it and care for it. Libby subconsciously thought of it as a person -- his own kind of person.On the last day of the approach, the shocks were more frequent. Libby sat in the right-hand saddle of the calculator and droned out the predictions for the next salvo, while gloating over the accuracy with which the machine tracked. Captain Doyle fussed around nervously, occasionally stopping to peer over the Navigator's shoulder. Of course the figures were right, but what if it didn't work? No one had ever moved so large a mass before. Suppose it plunged on and on -- and on. Nonsense! It couldn't. Still he would be glad when they were past the critical speed.A marine orderly touched his elbow. "Helio from the Flagship, sir.""Read it.""Flag to Eighty-eight; private message, Captain Doyle; am lying off to watch you bring her in -- Kearney."Doyle smiled. Nice of the old geezer. Once they were on station, he would invite the Admiral to ground for dinner and show him the park.Another salvo cut loose, heavier than any before. The room trembled violently. In a moment the reports of the surface observers commenced to trickle in. "Tube nine, clear!" "Tube ten, clear!"But Libby's drone ceased.Captain Doyle turned on him. "What's the matter, Libby? Asleep? Call the polar stations. I have to have a parallax.""Captain--" The boy's voice was low and shaking."Speak up, man!""Captain -- the machine isn't tracking.""Spiers!" The grizzled head of the Chief Fire Controlman appeared from behind the calculator."I'm already on it, sir. Let you know in a moment."He ducked back again. After a couple of long minutes he reappeared. "Gyros tumbled. It's a twelve hour calibration job, at least."The Captain said nothing, but turned away, and walked to the far end of the room. The Navigator followed him with his eyes. He returned, glanced at the chronometer, and spoke to the Navigator."Well, Blackie, if I don't have that firing data in seven minutes, we're sunk. Any suggestions?"Rhodes shook his head without speaking. Libby timidly raised his voice. "Captain--" Doyle jerked around. "Yes?""The firing data is tube thirteen, seven point six three; tube twelve, six point nine oh; tube fourteen, six point eight nine."Doyle studied his face. "You sure about that, son?""It has to be that, Captain."Doyle stood perfectly still. This time he did not look at Rhodes but stared straight ahead. Then he took a long pull on his cigarette, glanced at the ash, and said in a steady voice,"Apply the data. Fire on the bell."

Four hours later, Libby was still droning out firing data, his face gray, his eyes closed. Once he had fainted but when they revived him he was still muttering figures. From time to time the Captain and the Navigator relieved each other, but there was no relief for him.The salvos grew closer together, but the shocks were lighter.Following one faint salvo, Libby looked up, stared at the ceiling, and spoke."That's all, Captain.""Call polar stations!"The reports came back promptly, "Parallax constant, sidereal-solar rate constant."The Captain relaxed into a chair. "Well, Blackie, we did it -- thanks to Libby!" Then he noticed a worried, thoughtful look spread over Libby's face. "What's the matter, man? Have we slipped up?""Captain, you know you said the other day that you wished you had Earth-normal gravity in the park?""Yes. What of it?""If that book on gravitation you lent me is straight dope. I think I know a way to accomplish it."The Captain inspected him as if seeing him for the first time. "Libby, you have ceased to amaze me. Could you stop doing that sort of thing long enough to dine with the Admiral?""Gee, Captain, that would be swell!"The audio circuit from Communications cut in. "Helio from Flagship: 'Well done, Eighty-eight.'" Doyle smiled around at them all. "That's pleasant confirmation."The audio brayed again."Helio from Flagship: 'Cancel last signal, stand by for correction.'"A look of surprise and worry sprang into Doyle's face -- then the audio continued:"Helio from Flagship: 'Well done, E-M3'"

THIS aside is addressed primarily to you who have read the first two volumes of this series rather grandly titled "Future History." Volume One, The Man Who Sold the Moon,* is laid from right now until the closing years of this century and ends with mankind's first faltering steps toward space. some of the stories are so close to the present time as already to be outdated by events-an occupational hazard I share with weather forecasters and fortune tellers. Volume Two, The Green Hills of Earth,** is concerned with the great days of exploration of the Solar System. All of the stories take place somewhere close around the year 2000 A.D. If you refer to the chart in the flyleaf of this volume, you will see that this second group of stories appears to cover about twenty-five years, but this appearance is a deceptive shortcoming of typography- printing the titles on the chart requires a certain minimum of space. Nor does the order matter materially-some of the stories overlap in time but concern different characters in differing scenes.This present Volume Three starts about seventy-five years later than the end of the last story in Volume Two-and a great amount of "Future History" has taken place between the two volumes. Green Hills ended with the United States a leading power in a system wide imperialism embracing all the habitable planets. But the very first page of the first story in this book finds the United States plunged in a new Dark Ages no longer space minded, isolationist even with respect to this planet, and under a theocracy as absolute as that of Communism.The effect on the reader could be a little like that which sometimes results from unskillful editing of magazine serials- the sort of thing in which one installment ends with the hero hanging by his heels over the snake pit while the sinister villain leers at him from above, only to have the next installment start with our hero walking up Fifth Avenue, debonair and undamaged.I could plead the excuse that these stories were never meant to be a definitive history of the future (concerning which I know no more than you do), nor are they installments of a long serial (since each is intended to be entirely independent of all the others). They are just stories, meant to amuse and written to buy groceries.