uman females had the same physical advantages
over men as female rats, rabbits, and cats over males of the same
species. A woman's cellular structure was different; her center of
gravity was different, the brain waves given off during acceleration
were different. It was suspected that the autonomic nervous system in
women could function more freely to protect the body during emergency
situations. The only certainty about it was that no man had ever been
able to get into space and live.

But animals could so they had worked on it and finally they decided to
change a man into an animal, at least temporarily. Geneticists and
biochemists and other specialists had been able to do a lot with
hormones and hard radiation treatment. Especially with hormones. You
could shoot a man full of some fluid or another, and do almost anything
to his organism. You could induce atavism, regression to some lower form
of animal life--a highly speeded up regression. When you did that,
naturally the analytical mind, the higher thought centers of a more
recent evolutionary development, blanked out and the primal mind took
over. The body changed too, considerably.

Bowren was changing. Then the pain came and he couldn't think. He felt
his mind cringing--giving way before the onslaught of the pain. Dimly he
could feel the agony in his limbs, the throbbing of his heart, the
fading power of reason.

He retched, languished through flaccid minutes. There were recurring
spasms of shivering as he rolled his thickened tongue in the arid cavity
of his mouth. And then, somewhere, a spark exploded, and drowned him in
a pool of streaming flame.

* * * * *

Consciousness returned slowly--much as it had gone--in waves of pain. It
took a long time. Elements of reason and unreason fusing through
distorted nightmares until he was lying there able to remember, able to
wonder, able to think.

Inside the tiny compartment were supplies. A hypo, glucose, a durolene
suit neatly folded which he put on. He gave himself a needle, swallowed
the tablets, and waited until energy and a sense of well-being gave him
some degree of confidence.

It was very still. The ship would be cradled on Mars now. He lay there,
relaxing, preparing for the real challenge. He thought of how well the
Earth Investigation Committee had planned the whole thing.

The last desperate attempt of man to get into space--to Mars--a woman's
world. At least it was s