Stand by for Mars! Part 38

Tom quickly ran his hands up and down Roger's arms and legs, his chest, collarbone and at last, with gently probing fingers, his head.

"No broken bones," he said, still looking at Roger, "but I don't know about internal injuries."

"He wasn't pinned under that thing," said Astro at last. "It was resting on a beam. No weight was on him."

"Uh--huh--ahhh--uhhhh," moaned Roger.

"Roger," said Tom gently, "Roger, are you all right?"

"Uh--huh?--Ohhhh! My head!"

"Take it easy, hot-shot," said Astro, "that head of yours is O.K.

Nothing--but _nothing_ could hurt it!"

"Ooohhhh!" groaned Roger, sitting up. "I don't know which is worse, feeling the way I do, or waking up and listening to you again!"

Tom sat back with a smile. Roger's remark clinched it. No one was hurt.

"Well," said Astro at last, "where do we go from here?"

"First thing I suggest we do is take a survey and see what's left," said Tom.

"I came up from the power deck," said Astro, "all the way through the ship. You see this radar deck?" He made a sweeping gesture around the room that looked like a junk heap. "Well, it's in good shape, compared to the rest of the ship. The power deck has the rocket motors where the master panel should be and the panel is ready to go into what's left of the reactant chamber. The jet boat is nothing but a worthless piece of junk!"

The three boys considered the fate of the jet boat soberly. Finally Astro broke the silence with a question. "Where do you think we are?"

"Somewhere in the New Sahara desert," answered Tom. "I had the chart projector on just before we splashed in, but I can't tell you any more than that."

"Well, at least we have plenty of water," sighed Roger.

"You _had_ plenty of water. The tanks were smashed when we came in. Not even a puddle left in a corner."

"Of course it might rain," said Roger.

Tom gave a short laugh. "The last time it rained in this place dinosaurs were roaming around on Earth!"

"How about food?" asked Roger.

"Plenty of that," answered Astro. "This is a pa.s.senger ship, remember!

They have everything you could ask for, including smoked Venusian fatfish!"

"Then let's get out of here and take a look," said Tom.

The three bruised but otherwise healthy cadets climbed slowly down to the control deck and headed for the galley, where Tom found six plastic containers of Martian water.

"s.p.a.ceman, this is the biggest hunk of luck we've had in the last two hours," said Roger, taking one of the containers.

"Why two hours, Roger?" asked Astro, puzzled.

"Two hours ago we were still in s.p.a.ce expecting to splash in," said Tom.

He opened one of the containers and offered it to Astro. "Take it easy, Astro," said Tom. "Unless we find something else to drink, this might have to last a long time."

"Yeah," said Roger, "a _long_ time. I've been thinking about our chances of getting out of this mess."

"Well," asked Astro, "what has the great Manning brain figured out?"

"There's no chance at all," said Roger slowly. "You're wrong, Corbett, about this being midday. It's early morning!" He pointed to a chronometer on the bulkhead behind Astro. "It's still running. I made a mental note before we splashed in, it was eight-O-seven. That clock says nine-O-three. It doesn't begin to get hot here until three o'clock in the afternoon."

"I think you're wrong two ways," said Tom. "In the first place, Captain Strong probably has a unit out looking for us right now. And in the second place, as long as we stay with the ship, we've got shade. That sun is only bad because the atmosphere is thinner here on Mars, and easier to burn through. But if we stay out of the sun, we're O.K. Just sit back and wait for Strong!"

Roger shrugged his shoulders.

"Well," commented Astro with a grin, "I'm not going to sit around waiting for Strong without eating!" He tore open a plastic package of roast-beef sandwiches and began eating. Tom measured out three small cups of Martian water.

"After we eat," suggested Roger, "I think we ought to take a look around outside and try to set up an identification signal."

"That's a good idea," said Tom, "but don't you think the ship itself is big enough for that?"

"Yeah," answered Roger, "I guess you're right."

"Boy!" said Astro. "We sure are lucky to still be able to argue."

"That's about all you can call it. Luck! s.p.a.ceman's luck!" said Tom.

"The only reason I can figure why we didn't wind up as permanent part of the scenery around here is because of the course we were on."

"How do you figure that?" asked Astro.

"Luckily--and I _mean_ luckily, we were on a course that took us smack onto the surface of Mars. And our speed was great enough to resist the gravity pull of the planet, keeping us horizontal with the surface of the desert. We skidded in like a kid does on a sled, instead of coming in on our nose!"

"Well, blast my jets!" said Astro softly.

"In that case," said Roger, "we must have left a pretty long skid mark in back of us!"

"That should be easy to see when the jet scouts come looking for us,"

commented Astro.

"I wonder if we could rig up some sort of emergency signal so we could send out a relative position?"

"How are you going to get the position?" asked Astro.

"I can give you some sort of position as soon as I get outside and take a sight on the sun," replied Roger.

"Can you do it without your astrogation prism?" asked Astro.

"Navigation, not astrogation, Astro," said Roger. "Like the ancient sailors used on the oceans back on Earth hundreds of years ago. Only thing is, I'll have to work up the logarithms by hand, instead of using the computer. Might be a little rough, but it'll be close enough for what we want."

The three cadets finished the remaining sandwiches and then picked their way back through the ship to the control deck. There, they rummaged through the pile of broken and shattered instruments.

"If we could find just one tube that hasn't been damaged, I think I might be able to rig up some sort of one-lung communications set," said Roger. "It might have enough range to get a message to the nearest atmosphere booster station."