Double–Cross by Frederik Pohl Episode #284
Frederik Pohl | October 13, 2024-
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Double–Cross by Frederik Pohl Episode #284
Frederik Pohl
DOUBLE-CROSS
Episode #284 · Written by Frederik Pohl · Narrated by Scott Miller
An Earth-ship’s visit to Venus should end with routine procedures and a quiet launch window. Instead, overheard words trigger a private reckoning among the planet’s descendants—one that turns fear into a deadline and debate into action.
The plan they agree upon is clean, efficient, and terrifyingly impersonal. But when the moment arrives to name the one person who must carry it out, certainty fractures. Doubt spreads. Trust erodes. The danger is no longer outside the group—it is sitting among them, unspoken.
Double-Cross builds tension not through pursuit or spectacle, but through hesitation. Every delay sharpens the risk. Every silence forces a choice. By the time action finally comes, the question is no longer whether the plan will succeed, but who will still be alive when it does.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Frederik Pohl published Double-Cross during the early phase of a career that would span more than seven decades. His short fiction appeared in Astounding Science Fiction, Galaxy, and other major magazines, while his later work included landmark novels such as The Space Merchants and the Heechee series. This story reflects Pohl’s enduring strength: compressing social conflict, political fear, and moral collapse into a tight narrative where one private decision carries irreversible weight.
LISTEN TO THE STORY
Listen to Double–Cross by Frederik Pohl — a classic science fiction tale of sabotage, fear, and choice on Venus. Vintage sci-fi with escalating tension.
FREDERIK POHL SHORT STORIES
Frederik Pohl was one of the sharpest and most influential voices in vintage science fiction. Beginning his career in the 1940s, Pohl worked not only as a writer but also as an editor and literary agent, helping shape the direction of the genre during its most creative decades. His fiction often mixes big speculative ideas with a sly understanding of human behavior, revealing how people react when technology or society shifts in unexpected ways.
Many of Pohl’s stories begin in ordinary settings before introducing a single disruptive concept. A man wakes to discover his hometown exists for a disturbing hidden purpose. A desperate scientific experiment sends a volunteer back through time to prevent a catastrophe. A routine engineering assignment on a lonely asteroid turns into a test of nerve and ingenuity. Pohl excelled at taking one unsettling idea and following it to its logical, often surprising conclusion.
His work frequently carries an undercurrent of irony. Characters believe they understand the system they live in—only to learn that someone else has been pulling the strings all along. Corporations manipulate reality. Governments experiment with dangerous technology. Ordinary people stumble into situations far larger than they expected and must think quickly if they hope to escape them.
The stories below highlight Frederik Pohl’s range, from eerie psychological puzzles to dangerous experiments and clever technological mysteries that reveal how fragile reality can become when the rules suddenly change.
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