"Dog Star" is a 1962Short Stories
''Arthurcclarke.net'', 2007-2011, retrieved June 22, 2011

science fiction Science fiction (sometimes shortened to Sci-Fi or SF) is a genre of speculative fiction which typically deals with imaginative and futuristic concepts such as advanced science and technology, space exploration, time travel, parallel unive ...

short story A short story is a piece of prose fiction that typically can be read in one sitting and focuses on a self-contained incident or series of linked incidents, with the intent of evoking a single effect or mood. The short story is one of the oldest ...

by British writer Arthur C. Clarke about an astronomer and his dog,

Laika Laika (russian: link=no, Лайка; – 3 November 1957) was a Soviet space dog who was one of the first animals in space and the first to orbit the Earth. A stray mongrel from the streets of Moscow, she flew aboard the Sputnik 2 spacecra ...

. The story was also published under the title "Moondog".

Plot summary

An Astronomer on a

Moon base A moonbase is a facility on the surface of the Moon, enabling human activity on the Moon. As such, it is different from a lunar space station in orbit around the Moon, like the planned Lunar Gateway of the Artemis program. Moonbases can be fo ...

awakes from a dream in which his dog, Laika, is barking. All we know at this point is that the narrator is feeling a sense of dread enough to keep him awake. And then mentions that if he had gone back to sleep he would've been dead. He quickly flashes back to when he found Laika on the side of the road years ago, and how his fondness for her grew after she alerted him of an

earthquake An earthquake (also known as a quake, tremor or temblor) is the shaking of the surface of the Earth resulting from a sudden release of energy in the Earth's lithosphere that creates seismic waves. Earthquakes can range in intensity, from ...

, saving his life. When it was time for him to leave Earth and continue his studies on the Moon, he gave up Laika to a fellow employee Dr. Anderson. He comes out of the flashback just in time to sound the alert for a lunar tremor that, thanks to his prompt action, kills only two of his fellow crew members. He remembers his dead dog, realizing that Laika could not actually have saved him, for she was separated by 5 years time and a barrier that no man or dog could ever bridge (her death). It was his never sleeping subconscious mind, sensing the tremors, that knew how to wake him, by making him dream of Laika's barking as she did in the earlier earthquake. Thus ending on the idea of the supernatural bond between the narrator and Laika.

References

External links

*
"Moon Dog"
on the

Internet Archive The Internet Archive is an American digital library with the stated mission of "universal access to all knowledge". It provides free public access to collections of digitized materials, including websites, software applications/games, music, ...

1962 short stories Short stories by Arthur C. Clarke Short stories set on the Moon Works originally published in Galaxy Science Fiction Short stories about dogs {{1960s-sf-story-stub