“As you probably know, that bright blue star is Ragnarok’s other sun. Its position in the advance of the yellow sun shows the season to be early spring. When summer comes Ragnarok will swing between the two suns and the heat will be something no human has ever endured. Nor the cold, when winter comes.

“I know of no edible plants, although there might be some. There are a few species of rodent-like animals⁠—they’re scavengers⁠—and a herbivore we called the woods goat. The prowlers are the dominant form of life on Ragnarok and I suspect their intelligence is a good deal higher than we would like it to be. There will be a constant battle for survival with them.

“There’s another animal, not as intelligent as the prowlers but just as dangerous⁠—the unicorn. The unicorns are big and fast and they travel in herds. I haven’t seen any here so far⁠—I hope we don’t. At the lower elevations are the swamp crawlers. They’re unadulterated nightmares. I hope they don’t go to these higher elevations in the summer. The prowlers and the Hell Fever, the gravity and heat and cold and starvation, will be enough for us to have to fight.”