George G. Pinneo

Planet Scout, Raptor's World George G. Pinneo

Gil Morrison studied geology, mineralogy, ethology and general survival techniques including obtaining potable water and rapid fire-making in his new doctoral course of 'Extraterrestrial Planetology' before he rode out to a new planet orbiting Cassini's Star, CS2, aboard Tsavo's Dream. CS2 was about 6,700 miles in diameter, a little smaller than Earth; it circles it's star at something between the orbital diameter of Venus and Earth, about 87 million miles. Tsavo Ltd. said it was 'Earthlike to three decimal places. If that was true, it should be possible for a careful and resourceful person to learn to stay alive in relative comfort. Tsavo Ltd. hired Gil to be their first 'planet scout'; he'd begin the process of finding one of a handful of metals that could be mined for profit. Tsavo had convinced Dr. Roald Panter, Professor of Planetary Studies, University of Mars at Candor Cliffs, and Gil that a skillful scout might parachute down to the surface of CS2 so they wouldn't have to buy or lease a Canth lander. They'd pick him up by lander once he'd completed a preliminary mineralogical survey and hopefully found at least one useful meta. All he had to do was land successfully, find a safe place to live, find some edible foods to supplement his small stock of freeze-dried foods and keep from being eaten long enough to find and report some useful metals.