For a while, they crouched motionless, too stunned to speak.  Then shaken nerves steadied and jarred brains cleared.  They all rose weakly.  Trickles of earth were still coming down from the sides of the gully, and the little stream, which had been clear and sparkling, was roiled with mud.  Mechanically, Kalvar Dard brushed the dust from his clothes and looked to his weapons.

“That was just the fuel-tank of a little Class-3 rocket-boat,” he said.  “I wonder what the explosion of the ship was like.”  He thought for a moment before continuing.  “Glav, I think I know why our jets burned out.  We were stern-on to the ship when she blew; the blast drove our flame right back through the jets.”

“Do you think the explosion was observed from Doorsha?” Dorita inquired, more concerned about the practical aspects of the situation.  “The ship, I mean.  After all, we have no means of communication, of our own.”

“Oh, I shouldn’t doubt it; there were observatories all around the planet watching our ship,” Kalvar Dard said.  “They probably know all about it, by now.  But if any of you are thinking about the chances of rescue, forget it.  We’re stuck here.”

“That’s right.  There isn’t another human being within fifty million miles,” Seldar Glav said.  “And that was the first and only space-ship ever built.  It took fifty years to build her, and even allowing twenty for research that wouldn’t have to be duplicated, you can figure when we can expect another one.”

“The answer to that one is, never.  The ship blew up in space; fifty years’ effort and fifteen hundred people gone, like that.”  Kalvar Dard snapped his fingers.  “So now, they’ll try to keep Doorsha habitable for a few more thousand years by irrigation, and forget about immigrating to Tareesh.”

“Well, maybe, in a hundred thousand years, our descendants will build a ship and go to Doorsha, then,” Olva considered.

“Our descendants?” Eldra looked at her in surprize.  “You mean, then...?”

* * * * *

Kyna chuckled.  “Eldra, you are an awful innocent, about anything that doesn’t have a breech-action or a recoil-mechanism,” she said.  “Why do you think the women on this expedition outnumbered the men seven to five, and why do you think there were so many obstetricians and pediatricians in the med. staff?  We were sent out to put a human population on Tareesh, weren’t we?  Well, here we are.”

“But....  Aren’t we ever going to...?” Varnis began.  “Won’t we ever see anybody else, or do anything but just live here, like animals, without machines or ground-cars or aircraft or houses or anything?” Then she began to sob bitterly.

Analea, who had been cleaning a carbine that had gotten covered with loose earth during the explosion, laid it down and went to Varnis, putting her arm around the other girl and comforting her.  Kalvar Dard picked up the carbine she had laid down.