The Last Plunge — Inside the Classic

Evolution had been kind to the air lion of Uranus. To the only animal inhabitant of a planet whose surface temperature is -180 degrees Centigrade, Evolution had granted the thickest fur coat of any animal known to man and a cold-blooded circulatory system. To the inhabitant of a planet whose atmosphere is mostly hydrogen and methane, Evolution had given a complicated respiratory apparatus that breathed in hydrogen and exhaled hydrogen sulfide. To retain the balance of Uranian chemistry, Evolution had provided a brittle, yellow, rootless plant-life that inhaled hydrogen sulfide and exhaled hydrogen. To the inhabitant of a planet where most of the atmosphere was in a liquid state, Evolution had seen to it that the air lion was perfectly capable of living entirely in a liquid environment: a thick skin and heavy bone structure enabled the air lion to withstand the heavy pressures of the Uranian depths, gills made it possible for him to breathe liquids, and his powerful flippers made him the strongest swimmer in the solar system.

One would say that a bountiful Providence had been good to the air lion. Granted the inconveniences of its environment, certainly the air lion was efficiently equipped by Nature to live on its home planet. But Providence also provided the air lion with a natural enemy which bade fair to exterminate the species. And that enemy was women--the same women (or rather, their descendants) who caused the extermination of the egret. Women on Earth had taken a fancy to air lion coats; and, despite the high cost of these coats (between forty and fifty thousand dollars), the number of air lions was decreasing more rapidly than any species could withstand.

To begin with, air lions were limited to the "northern" hemisphere of Uranus. Uranus is a topsy-turvey planet, tipped on its axis and rolling around the sun in the plane of its equator. The "northern" hemisphere, then, is that side of the planet which is always turned toward the sun--for which the sun is the pole star. This restriction on the area in which air lions may thrive imposed a natural limitation on the number of animals which there were in the first place. The demand for air lion pelts--despite the fact that the beasts were so large that an entire coat might be made from one of them--caused a dangerous depletion.

Nils's helmet broke atmosphere, and then hands were grappling him, helping him up the ladder, and pulling him aboard the "raft." The raft actually was a well constructed metal vessel; but, as it did not need a powerful engine, its motor was so weak that it hardly counted. Its gunwales rose only a few feet out of the air.

Nils, as usual, fell to the deck with a clatter. One of the space-suited men on the raft knelt down to look at him. "Hi, Borgmann," the man said. "Congratulations." His name was Kerr.

Nils smiled. Yes, it was worth congratulations. He was now only one lion--only one bonus--away from his goal, and then he could quit. And he'd be glad to quit. Dangling by a cable in liquid atmosphere is not safe work, and Borgmann was getting old for that kind of thing.

Another man squatted down and said, "Yeah, Nils. Happy birthday."

Birthday! Nils had forgotten all about it. That was right--he was thirty-five today. Realizing that he must have looked puzzled, he laughed. "It slipped my mind completely," he explained. "When you're on another planet, Earth dates get all mixed up."

Kerr said, "The captain's ordered you aloft for a physical check-up. It came over the radio while you were down."

Nils Borgmann stopped laughing. That could mean he'd never get a chance to make another plunge, never have another crack at an air lion, never collect that seventh bonus. They'd rotate him, put him on the mother ship and fill in on the raft with a substitute.

Nils clambered to his feet, helped by Kerr and the other man, and walked over to take a look at the air lion he had just killed. It was a good, big beast, its fur still that faint yellowish color that was bleached out on Earth. It looked something like a walrus, but without any tusks.

"Just one more," Nils said, "and I'm going to quit. I've got thirty thousand dollars in bonuses, on top of my pay."

Kerr said, "That's almost enough to buy your wife an air lion coat. That'd be a nice present, so that you could be reminded of your happy days on Uranus every time she wore it."