CHAPTER 21
"How much water left?" asked Astro thickly.
"Enough for one more drink apiece," Tom replied.
"And then what happens?" mumbled Roger through his cracked lips.
"You know what will happen, Roger--you know and I know and Tom knows,"muttered Astro grimly.
For eight days they had been struggling across the blistering shiftingsands, walking by night, sweltering under the thin space cloth duringthe day. Their tongues were swollen. Scraggly beards covered their chinsand jaws. Roger's lips were cracked. The back of Tom's neck had sufferedten minutes of direct sun and turned into a large swollen blister. OnlyAstro appeared to be bearing up under the ordeal. There was no sign oftheir being close to the canal.
"Wanta try marching during the day?" asked Astro. They had broken campon the evening of the eighth day and were preparing to move on into thenever-changing desert.
"If we don't hit the canal sometime during the night, there might be achance it's close enough to reach in a couple of hours," replied Tom."Either that, or we've miscalculated altogether."
"How about you, Roger?" asked Astro.
"Whatever you guys decide, I'll be right in back of you." Roger hadgrown steadily weaker during the last three days and found it difficultto sleep during the hours of rest.
"Then we'll keep marching tomorrow," said Astro.
"Let's move out," said Tom. Roger and Astro shouldered the remainingslender food packs, with Tom carrying the water and space cloth, andthey started out into the rapidly darkening desert.
Once again, as on the previous eight nights, the little moon, Deimos,swung across the sky, casting dim shadows ahead of the three marchingboys. Tom found it necessary to look at the compass more often. Hecouldn't trust his sense of direction as much as he had earlier. Once,he had gone for two hours in a direction that was fifty degrees offcourse. The rest stops also were more frequent now, with each boythrowing his pack to the ground and lying flat on his back, to enjoy thecool breeze that never failed to soothe their scorched faces.
When the sun rose out of the desert on the morning of the ninth day,they stopped, ate a light breakfast of preserved figs, divided the juiceevenly among them, and, ripping the space cloth into three sections,wrapped it around themselves like Arabs and continued to walk.
By noon, with the sun directly overhead, they were staggering. Attwo-thirty the sun and the heat were so overpowering that they stoppedinvoluntarily and tried to sit on the hot sand only to find that theycouldn't and so they stumbled on.
Neither Roger nor Astro asked for water. Finally Tom stopped and facedhis two unit-mates wobbling on unsteady legs.
"I've gone as far as I can without water. I--I don't think I can goanother step. So come on, we'll finish what we've got."
Astro and Roger nodded in quiet agreement. They watched with dull eyesas Tom carefully opened the plastic container of water. He gave each acup and slowly, cautiously, measured out the remaining water into threeequal parts. He held the container up for a full minute allowing thelast drop to run out before tossing the empty bottle to one side.
"Here goes," said Tom. He wet his lips, placed a wet finger on histemples and sipped the liquid slowly, allowing it to trickle down hisparched throat.
Roger and Astro did the same. After he had wet his lips, Astro took thefull amount in his mouth and washed it around, before swallowing it.Roger brought the cup up slowly to his mouth with trembling hands,tipped it shakily, and then before Astro or Tom could catch him, fell tothe ground. The precious water spilled into the sand.
Tom and Astro watched dumfounded as the dry sand sucked away the wateruntil nothing remained but a damp spot six inches wide.
"I guess--" began Tom, "I guess that about does it!"
"We'll have to carry him," said Astro simply.
Tom looked up into the eyes of his unit-mate. There he saw adetermination that would not be defeated. He nodded his head and stoopedover to grapple with Roger's legs. He got one leg under each arm andthen tried to straighten up. He fell to the sand and rolled to one side.Astro watched him get up slowly, wearily, his space-cloth coveringremaining on the ground, and then, with gritted teeth, try once more topick Roger's legs up.
Astro put out his hand and touched Tom on the shoulder. His voice waslow, hardly above a whisper. "You lead the way, Tom. I'll carry him."
"_You lead the way, Tom. I'll carry him._"]
Tom looked up at the big Venusian. Their eyes locked for a moment andthen he nodded his head and turned away. He pulled out the pocketcompass and through blurred vision read the course beneath its waveringneedle. He waved an arm in a direction to the right of them andstaggered off.
Astro stooped down, picked Roger up in his arms and slowly got himacross his shoulders. Then steadying himself, he walked after Tom.
Suddenly a blast of wind, hot as fire, swept across the sandy plains,whipping the sand up and around the two walking figures, biting intoexposed hands and faces. Tom tried to adjust his goggles when the sandbegan to penetrate around the edges but his fingers shook and he droppedthem. In a flash, the sand drove into his eyes, blinding him.
"I can't see, Astro," said Tom in a hoarse whisper when Astro staggeredup. "You'll have to guide."
Astro took the compass out of Tom's hand and then placed his unit-mate'shand on his back. Tom gripped the loose folds of the space cloth anduniform beneath and struggled blindly after the big cadet.
The hot sun bore down. The wind kept blowing and Astro, with Roger slungacross his back like a sack of potatoes and Tom clinging blindly to hisuniform, walked steadily on.
He felt each step would be his last, but with each step he told himselfthrough gritted teeth that he could do ten more--and then ten more--tenmore.
He walked, he staggered, and once he fell to the ground, Tom slumpingbehind him and Roger being tossed limply to the scorching sand. SlowlyAstro recovered, helped Tom to his feet, then with the last of his greatstrength, picked up Roger again. This time, he was unable to get him tohis shoulder so he carried him like a baby in his arms.
At last the sun began to drop in the red sky. Astro felt Roger's limpbody slipping from his grip. By now, Tom had lost all but the very lastounce of his strength and was simply being pulled along.
"Tom--" gasped Astro with great effort, "I'm going to count to athousand and then--I'm going to stop."
Tom didn't answer.
Astro began to count. "One--two--three--four--five--six--" He tried tomake each number become a step forward. He closed his eyes. It wasn'timportant which way he went. It was only important that he walk thosethousand steps, "five hundred eleven--five hundred twelve--five hundredthirteen--"
Involuntarily he opened his eyes when he felt himself climbing up asmall rise in the sand. He opened his eyes and ten feet away was theflat blue surface of the canal they had been searching for.
"You can let go now, Tom," said Astro in a voice hardly above a whisper."We made it. We're on the bank of the canal."
* * * * *
"Hey, Roger," yelled Astro from the middle of the canal, "ever see a guymake like a submarine?"
Tom and Roger sat on the top of the low bank of the canal drying offfrom a swim, while Astro still splashed around luxuriating in the coolwater.
"Go on," yelled Roger, "let's see you drown yourself!"
"Not me, hot-shot," yelled Astro. "After that walk, all I'd have to dois open my mouth and start drinking."
Finally tiring of his sport, the big Venusian pulled himself up onto thebank of the canal and quickly dressed. Pulling on his space boots, heturned to Tom and Roger, who were breaking out the last two containersof food.
"You know, Astro," said Roger quietly, "I'll never be able to repay youfor carrying me."
Tom was quiet for a moment, and then added, "Same here, Astro."
Astro grinned from ear to ear. "Answer me this one question, both ofyou. Would you have done it for me?"
The two boys nodd
ed.
"Then you paid me. As long as I know I'm backed up by two guys like you,then I'm paid. Carrying you, Roger, was just something I could do foryou at that particular time. One of these days, when we get out of thisoven, there'll come a time when you or Tom will do something for me--andthat's the way it should be."
"Thanks, Astro," said Roger. He reached over and put his hand on top ofAstro's, and then Tom placed his hand on top of theirs. The three boyswere quiet for a moment. There was an understanding in each of them thatthey had accomplished more than just survival in a desert. They hadlearned to respect each other. They were a unit at last.
"What do we do next?" asked Roger.
"Start walking that way," said Tom, pointing to his left along the bankof the canal that stretched off in a straight line to the very horizon."If we're lucky, we might be able to find something to use as a raft andthen we can ride."
"Think there are any fish in this canal?" asked Astro, gazing out overthe cool blue water.
"Doubt it. At least I've never heard of there being any," replied Tom.
"Well," said Roger, standing up, "you can go a lot farther without foodthan you can without water. And we still have that big container of hamleft."
"Yeah, as soon as it gets hot, we just swim instead of walk," saidAstro. "And, believe me, there's going to be a lot of swimming done!"
"Think we might strike anything down that way," asked Roger. He lookeddown the canal in the direction Tom had indicated.
"That's the direction of the nearest atmosphere booster station. Atleast that was the way it looked on the chart. All of them were builtnear the canals."
"How far away do you think it is?" asked Astro.
"Must be at least three hundred miles."
"Let's start moving," said Roger, "and hope we can find somethingthat'll float us on the canal."
Single file, wearing the space cloths once more as protection againstthe sun, they walked along the bank of the canal. When the heat becameunbearable, they dipped the squares of space cloths into the water andwrapped themselves in them. When they began to dry out, they wouldrepeat the process. At noon, when the sun dried the fabric nearly asfast as they could wet it, they stopped and slipped over the edge of thebank into the cool water. Covering their heads with the cloths theyremained partly submerged until the late afternoon. When the sun hadlost some of its power, again they climbed out and continued walking.
Marching late into the night, they made camp beside the canal, finishedthe last container of food, and, for the first time since leaving theship, slept during the night. By the time Deimos had risen in the sky,they were sound asleep.
CHAPTER 22
"Eeeeeeoooooooow!" Astro's bull-like roar shattered the silence of thedesert. "There--up ahead, Tom--Roger--a building!"
Tom and Roger stopped and strained their eyes in the bright sunshine.
"I think you're right," said Tom at last. "But I doubt if anyone'sthere. Looks like an abandoned mining shack to me."
"Who wants to stand here and debate the question?" asked Roger, andstarted off down the side of the canal at a lope, with Astro and Tomright behind him.
During the last three days the boys had been living off the contents ofthe last remaining food container and the few lichens they found growingalong the canal. Their strength was weakening, but with an abundantsupply of water near at hand and able to combat the sun's heat withfrequent swims, they were still in fair condition.
Tom was the first to reach the building, a one-story structure made ofdried mud from the canal. The shutters and the door had long since beentorn away by countless sandstorms.
The three boys entered the one-room building cautiously. The floor wascovered with sand, and sand was piled in heaping drifts in front of theopen windows and door.
"Nothing--not a thing," said Roger disgustedly. "This place must be atleast a hundred and fifty years old."
"Probably built by a miner," commented Tom.
"What do you mean 'nothing'?" said Astro. "Look!"
They followed Astro's pointing finger to the ceiling. Crisscrossed, fromwall to wall, were heavy wooden beams.
"Raft!" Tom cried.
"That's right, spaceman," said Astro, "a raft. There's enough wood upthere to float the _Polaris_. Come on!"
Astro hurried outside, with Tom and Roger following at his heels. Theyquickly climbed to the roof of the old building and soon were rippingthe beams from the crumbling mud. Fortunately the beams had been joinedby notching the ends of the crosspieces. Astro explained that this wasnecessary because of the premium on nails when the house was built.Everything at that time had to be hauled from Earth, and no one wantedto pay the price heavy nails and bolts demanded.
One by one, they removed the heavy beams, until they had eight of themlined up alongside the edge of the canal.
"How do we keep them together?" asked Roger.
"With this!" said Tom. He began ripping his space cloth into longstrips. Astro and Roger tugged at the first beam. At last they had it inthe water.
"It floats," cried Astro. Tom and Roger couldn't help but shout for joy.They quickly hauled the remaining beams into the water and lashed themtogether. Without hesitation, they shoved the raft into the canal,climbing aboard and standing like conquering heroes, as the raft movedout into the main flow of the canal and began to drift forward.
"I dub thee--_Polaris the Second_," said Tom in formal tones and gavethe nearest beam a kick.
Astro and Roger gave a lusty cheer.
Steadily, silently, the raft bore them through the never-changing sceneof the canal's muddy banks and the endlessness of the desert beyond.
Protecting themselves from the sun during the day by repeated dunkingsin the water, they traveled day and night in a straight course down thecenter of the canal. At night, the tiny moon, Deimos, climbed across thedesert and reflected light upon the satin-smooth water.
The third day on the raft they began to feel the pangs of hunger. Andwhere during their march through the desert, their thoughts were ofwater, now visions of endless tables of food occupied their thoughts. Atfirst, they talked of their hunger, dreaming up wild combinations ofdishes and giving even wilder estimates of how much each could consume.Finally, discovering that talking about it only intensified theirdesire, they kept a stolid silence. When the heat became unbearable,they simply took to the water. Once Tom's grip on the raft slipped andRoger plunged in after him without a moment's hesitation, only to haveAstro go in to save both of them.
On and on--down the canal, the three boys floated. Days turned intonights, and nights, cooling and refreshing, gave way to the blazing sunof the next day. The silent desert swept past them.
One night, when Astro, unable to sleep, was staring ahead into thedarkness, he heard a rustling in the water alongside the raft. He movedslowly to the edge of the raft and peered down into the clear water.
He saw a fish!
The big cadet watched it dart around the raft. He waited, his bodytense. Once the fish came to the edge of the raft, but before Astrocould move his arm, it darted off in another direction.
At last the fish disappeared and Astro sank back on the timbers. Hetrailed one hand over the side in the water, and suddenly, felt therough scales of the fish brush his fingers. In a flash, Astro closed hishand and snatched the wriggling creature out of the water.
"Tom--Roger--" he shouted. "Look--look--a fish--I caught a fish with mybare hands!"
Tom rolled over and opened his eyes. Roger sat in bewilderment.
"I watched him--I was watching him and then he went away. And then Iheld my hand over the side of the raft and he came snooping aroundand--well, I just grabbed him!"
He held the fish in the viselike grip of his right hand until it stoppedmoving.
"You know," said Tom weakly, "I just remembered. When we were in theScience Building in Atom City, one of their projects was to breed bothEarth and Venus fish in the canals."
"I am going to shake, personally, the hand o
f the man who started thisproject when we get back to Atom City," said Astro.
Suddenly Roger gripped Tom's arms. He was staring in the direction theraft was going. "Tom--" he breathed, "Astro--look!"
They turned and peered into the dusk. In the distance, not a mile away,was the huge crystal-clear dome of the atmosphere booster station, itsroaring atomic motors sending a steady purring sound out across thedesert.
"We made it," said Tom, choking back the tears. "We made it!"
"Well, blast my jets," said Astro. "We sure did!"
* * * * *
"And you mean to tell me, you _walked_ across that desert?" askedCaptain Strong.
Tom glanced over at Astro and Roger. "We sure did, sir."
"With Astro doing the last stretch to the canal carrying me and draggingTom," said Roger as he sipped his hot broth.
The room in the chief engineer's quarters at the atmosphere station wascrowded with workers, enlisted Solar Guardsmen and officers of the SolarGuard. They stood around staring in disbelief at the three disheveledcadets.
"But how did you ever survive?" asked Strong. "By the craters of Luna,that blasted desert was hotter this past month than it has ever beensince Mars was first colonized by Earthmen. Why--why--you were walkingthrough temperatures that reached a hundred and fifty degrees!"
"You don't have to convince us, sir," said Roger with a smile. "We'llnever forget it as long as we live."
Later, when Tom, Roger and Astro had taken a shower and dressed in freshuniforms, Strong came in with an audioscriber and the three cadets gavethe full version of their adventure for the official report back to theAcademy. When they had finished, Strong told them of his efforts to findthem.
"We knew you were in trouble right away," said Strong, "and we trackedyou on radar. But that blasted storm fouled us all up. We figured thatthe sand would have covered up the ship, and that the chances of findingyou in a scout were very small, so I got permission from CommanderWalters to organize this ground search for you." He paused. "Frankly wehad just about given up hope. Took us three weeks finally to locate thesection of desert you landed in."
"We knew you would come, sir," said Tom, "but we didn't have enoughwater to wait for you--and we had to leave."
"Boys," said Strong slowly, "I've had a lot of wonderful things happento me in the Solar Guard. But I have to confess that seeing you threespace-brained idiots clinging to that raft, ready to eat a rawfish--well, that was just about the happiest moment of my life."
"Thank you, sir," said Roger, "and I think I can speak for Tom and Astrowhen I say that seeing you here with over a hundred men, and all thisequipment, ready to start searching for us in that desert--well, itmakes us feel pretty proud to be members of an outfit where the skipperfeels that way about his crew!"
"What happens now, sir?" asked Tom.
"Aside from getting a well-deserved liberty, it's back to the old grindat the Academy. The _Polaris_ is at the spaceport at Marsopolis, waitingfor us." He paused and eyed the three cadets with a smile. "I guess theroutine at Space Academy will seem a little dull now, after what you'vebeen through."
"Captain Strong," said Astro formally, "I _know_ I speak for Tom andRoger when I say that _routine_ is all we want for a long time to come!"
"Amen!" added Tom and Roger in unison.
"Very well," said Strong. "_Polaris_ unit--Staaaaand _TO_!"
The three boys snapped to attention.
"You are hereby ordered to report aboard the _Polaris_ at fifteenhundred hours and stand by to raise ship!"
He returned their salutes, turned sharply and walked from the room.
Outside, Steve Strong leaned against the wall and stared through thecrystal shell of the atmosphere station into the endless desert.
"Thank you, Mars," he said softly, "for making spacemen out of the_Polaris_ crew!" He saluted sharply and walked away.
Tom suddenly burst from the room with Roger and Astro yelling after him.
"Hey, Tom, where you going?" yelled Roger.
"I've got to get a bottle of that water out of the canal for my kidbrother Billy!" shouted Tom and disappeared down a slidestairs.
Roger turned to Astro and said, "That's what I call a real spaceman."
"What do you mean?" asked Astro.
"After what we've been through, he still remembers that his kid brotherwants a bottle of water from a canal as a souvenir!"
"Yeah," breathed Astro, "Tom Corbett is--is--a real spaceman!"
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