A couple lives on a lonely asteroid where they operate a lighthouse designed to prevent shipwrecks along the space trade routes. The husband, an ardent user of a mind-altering substance, views its effects as a path to ultimate contentment. His addiction renders him calm, able to face any challenge—even death—with a detached, philosophical acceptance. His wife, however, is embittered by the drug’s hold; she longs for a cure, believing that sobriety is necessary to confront the looming dangers around them. Their daily lives are framed by the relentless maintenance of a high-frequency beam from the lighthouse—a beacon that is essential for navigational safety but increasingly unreliable. The couple’s arguments reveal a deep ideological rift: the husband sees his addiction as a benign influence that even beautifies life’s final moments, whereas the wife insists that genuine, sustained thought and action require a clear mind. The tension escalates when the wife laments that his addiction has rotted his ability to cope with reality, while he dismisses her concerns by arguing that non-addicts refuse to face the stark facts of their inevitable demise. In a decisive act that momentarily shifts their power dynamic, the husband covertly administers his own drug to his wife, ensuring that she too will be under its spell. His calculated ploy is meant to force her into accepting his view, binding them together in the same altered state where happiness becomes the sole reality. However, amid the complexities of tampering with the delicate balance of their relationship, he inadvertently ingests a dose of an antidote—administered by his wife—that begins to clear his mind while leaving her intoxicated by the drug. This reversal leaves the husband plunged into a dismal sobriety marked by withdrawal and despair, while his wife remains blissfully addicted. As their individual states invert, the external environment grows perilous. Strange, alien creatures—rock-breathing beasts adapted to the asteroid’s harsh conditions—start manifesting near the station. These beings, capable of consuming the very tablets meant for the addicts, display bizarre and joyful behaviors as they indulge in the drug. Their frolicsome antics, in stark contrast to the couple’s grim situation, reflect the grotesque intersection of natural instinct and chemical euphoria. Faced with the dual threats of a failing lighthouse beacon and the approaching aliens, the once-complacent husband grapples with the sudden clarity of his predicament. As he realizes that natural happiness and the comforting numbness of addiction are no longer available to him, despair sets in. In a final, resolute act of violence born from his inner torment, he dons a spacesuit, arms himself, and steps outside to confront the drug-addled aliens. In executing them one by one, he observes with a cold, grim satisfaction that even in death, the creatures seem to escape suffering by dying in a state of ecstatic abandon. The narrative is a study in isolation and the desperate measures people adopt to preserve both subjective happiness and a grip on reality. It explores the corrupting allure of escapism through chemical dependency and the ultimate price of forsaking rationality in favor of comfort, even when that comfort leads inexorably to self-destruction. The work lays bare the tragic irony of a man who, in seeking to cure his wife of her discontents, ends up stripping himself of the drug-induced barrier that once shielded him from the terror of absolute clarity. The lighthouse, the drug, and the alien threat serve as metaphors for the broader human struggle between the desire for uninhibited bliss and the need to confront, and sometimes overcome, the brutal facts of existence.
By William Morrison · First published 1967 · Genre: Science Fiction, Dystopian, Psychological Thriller