Stand by for Mars! Part 34

He made adjustments on the nozzle of the cutting torch, and then, focusing his chest light, called to Astro.

"O.K., Astro," he said, "shoot me the juice!"

"Coming up, Tom!" answered Astro. "And wait till I get my hands on that Manning! I'm going to smear that yellow s.p.a.ce crawler from one corner of the universe to another!"

"Never mind the talk," snarled Roger, who at the moment was re-entering the tube. "Just get that juice down to this torch and make it fast!"

Tom turned to see Roger crawling back into the tube and adjusting a cutting torch.

"Glad to have you aboard, Roger," said Tom with a smile that Roger could not see in the darkness of the tube. The two boys went to work.

Suddenly the torches came to life. And immediately Tom and Roger began to cut away at the cleats that held the tube lining to the skin of the ship. Steadily, the cadets worked their way up toward the center of the ship, cutting anything that looked as though it might hold the giant tube to the ship.

"Boy," said Tom, "it's getting hot in here!"

From inside the ship, Astro's rea.s.suring voice came back in answer.

"You're getting close to the reactant-ma.s.s chamber. The last cleat is up by one of the exhaust gratings. Think you can last it?"

"Well, if he can't," snarled Roger, "he's sure to get that medal anyway!" He inched up a little. "Move over, Corbett, I'm skinnier than you are, and I can reach that cleat easier than you can."

Roger slipped past Tom and inched his way toward the last cleat. He pulled his torch up alongside and pulled the trigger. The flame shot out and began eating the steel. In a moment the last cleat was cut and the two boys started their long haul down the tube to the outside of the ship.

As they walked across the steel surface, back to the air lock, Tom stuck out his hand.

"I'm glad you came back, Roger."

"Save it for the boys that fall for that stuff, Corbett," said Roger sarcastically. "I came back because I didn't want you and that Venusian hick to think you're the only ones with guts around here!"

"No one has ever accused you of not having guts, Roger."

"Ah--go blast your jets," snarled Roger.

They went directly to the power deck where Astro was waiting for them, the Geiger counter in his hand.

"All set to get rid of the rotten apple?" he asked with a smile.

"All set, Astro," said Tom. "What's the count?"

"She seems to have steadied around fourteen hundred ninety--and believe me, the ten points to the official danger mark of fifteen hundred is so small that we could find out where the angels live any moment now!"

"Then what're we waiting for," said Tom. "Let's dump that thing!"

"How?" snarled Roger.

Tom and Astro looked at him bewilderedly. "What do you mean 'how'?"

asked Astro.

"I mean how are you going to get the tube out of the ship?"

"Why," started Tom, "there's nothing holding that tube a.s.sembly to the ship now. We cut all the cleats, remember? We can jettison the whole unit!"

"It seems to me," drawled Roger lazily, "that the two great heroes in their mad rush for the Solar Medal have forgotten an unwritten law of s.p.a.ce. There's no gravity out here--no natural force to pull or push the tube. The only way it could be moved is by the power of thrust, either forward or backward!"

"O.K. Then let's push it out, just that way," said Astro.

"How?" asked Roger cynically.

"Simple, Roger," said Tom, "Newton's Laws of motion. Everything in motion tends to keep going at the same speed unless influenced by an outside force. So if we blasted our nose rockets and started going backward, everything on the ship would go backward too, then if we reversed--"

Astro cut in, "Yeah--if we blasted the stern rockets, the ship would go forward, but the tube, being loose, would keep going the other way!"

"There's only one thing wrong," said Roger. "That ma.s.s is so hot now, if any booster energy hit it, it would be like a trigger on a bomb. It'd blow us from here to the next galaxy!"

"I'm willing to try it," said Tom. "How about you, Astro?"

"I've gone this far, and I'm not quitting now."

They turned to face Roger.

"Well, how about it, Roger?" asked Tom. "No one will think you're yellow if you take the jet boat and leave now."

"Ah--talk again!" grumbled Roger. "We always have to talk. Let's be original for a change and just do our jobs!"

"All right," said Tom. "Take an emergency light and signal Captain Strong. Tell him what we're going to do. Warn him to stay away--about two hundred miles off. He'll know if we're successful or not within a half hour!"

"Yeah," said Roger, "then we'll send him one big flash to mean we failed! _Bon voyage!_"

Fifteen minutes later, as the _Lady Venus_ drifted in her silent but deadly orbit, Tom, Roger and Astro still worked feverishly as the Geiger counter ticked off the increasing radioactivity of the wildcatting reaction ma.s.s in number-three rocket tube.

"Reading on the counter still's going up, Astro," warned Roger.

"Fifteen-O-five."

"Hurry it up, Astro," urged Tom.

"Hand me that wrench, Tom," ordered Astro. The big cadet, stripped to the waist, his thick arms and chest splattered with grease and sweat, fitted the wrench to the nut and applied pressure. Tom and Roger watched the muscles ripple along his back, as the big Venusian pitted all of his great strength against the metal.

"Give it all you've got," said Tom. "If we do manage to jettison that tube, we've got to keep this part of the power deck airtight!"

Astro pulled harder. The veins standing out on his neck. At last, easing off, he stood up and looked down at the nut.

"That's as tight as I can get it," he said, breathing heavily.

"Or anyone else," said Tom.

"All the valve connections broken?" asked Astro.

"Yep," replied Roger. "We're sealed tight."