Quote:The aliens are coming-riding an interstellar vehicle no one on Earth could have predicted. All aboard!
Would interstellar visitors from a civilization more advanced than our own bring solutions to our problems? And even if they did, what could we offer in return.
The trouble with going to someone Older and Wiser for help is that their ideas of what you need may be very different from your own.

✔The City of Ul Chalan • novelette by Richard K. Lyon
✔Rails Across the Galaxy (Part 1 of 3) • serial by Richard K. Lyon and Andrew J. Offutt [as by Richard Lyon and Andrew Offutt]
✔Rails Across the Galaxy (Part 2 of 3) • serial by Richard K. Lyon and Andrew J. Offutt [as by Richard Lyon and Andrew Offutt]
✔Rails Across the Galaxy (Part 3 of 3) • serial by Richard K. Lyon and Andrew J. Offutt [as by Richard Lyon and Andrew Offutt]

This story was originally serialized in four issues of Analog circa 1973 and 1982 with illustrations by Frank Kelly Freas and Jack Gaughan. Scans have been OCR'ed and very carefully proofread to recreate it as an eBook. All the original art is preserved.