ately Sally and Joe came to the very top of the Shed into the open
air. From here the steep plating curved down and away in every
direction. The sunshine was savagely bright and shining, but there was a
breeze. And here there was a considerable expanse fenced in--almost an
acre, it seemed. There were metal-walled small buildings with
innumerable antennae of every possible shape for the reception of every
conceivable wave length. There were three radar bowl reflectors turning
restlessly to scan the horizon, and a fourth which went back and forth,
revolving, to scan the sky itself. Sally told Joe that in the very
middle--where there was a shed with a domelike roof which wasn't
metal--there was a wave-guide radar that could spot a plane within three
feet vertically, and horizontally at a distance of thirty miles, with
greater distances in proportion.

There were guns down in pits so their muzzles wouldn't interfere with
the radar. There were enough non-recoil anti-aircraft guns to defend the
Shed against anything one could imagine.

"And there are jet planes overhead too," said Sally. "Dad asked to have
them reinforced, and two new wings of jet fighters landed yesterday at a
field somewhere over yonder. There are plenty of guards!"

The Platform was guarded as no object in all history had ever been
guarded. It was ironic that it had to be protected so, because it was
actually the only hope of escape from atomic war. But that was why some
people hated the Platform, and their hatred had made it seem obviously
an item of national defense. Ironically that was the reason the money
had been provided for its construction. But the greatest irony of all
was that its most probable immediate usefulness would be the help it
would give in making nuclear experiments that weren't safe enough to
make on Earth.

That was pure irony. Because if those experiments were successful, they
should mean that everybody in the world would in time become rich beyond
envy.

But Joe couldn't react to the fact. He was drained and empty of emotion
because his job was done and he'd lost a very flimsy hope to be one of
the Platform's first crew.

He didn't really feel better until late that night, when suddenly he
realized that life was real and life was earnest, because a panting man
was trying to strangle Joe with his bare hands. Joe was hampered in his
self-defense because a large number of battling figures trampled over
him and his antagonist tog