Stand by for Mars!

  CHAPTER 9

  The three members of the _Polaris_ unit stepped off the slidewalk at theAcademy spaceport and stood before Warrant Officer McKenny.

  "There she is," said the stubby spaceman, pointing to the gleamingspaceship resting not two hundred feet away. "Rocket cruiser _Polaris_.The newest and fastest ship in space."

  He faced the three boys with a smile. "And she's all yours. You earnedher!"

  Mouths open, Tom, Roger and Astro stood gaping in fascination at themighty spaceship resting on the concrete ramp. Her long two-hundred-footpolished beryllium steel hull mirrored the spaceport scene around them.The tall buildings of the Academy, the "ready" line of space destroyersand scouts, and the hundreds of maintenance noncoms of the enlistedSolar Guard, their scarlet uniforms spotted with grime, were allreflected back to the _Polaris_ unit as they eyed the sleek ship fromthe needlelike nose of her bow to the stubby opening of her rocketexhausts. Not a seam or rivet could be seen in her hull. At the top ofthe ship, near her nose, a large blister made of six-inch clear crystalindicated the radar bridge. Twelve feet below it, six round window portsshowed the position of the control deck. Surrounding the base of theship was an aluminum scaffold with a ladder over a hundred feet highanchored to it. The top rung of the ladder just reached the power-deckemergency hatch which was swung open, like a giant plug, revealing thethickness of the hull, nearly a foot.

  "Well," roared the red-clad spaceman, "don't you want to climb aboardand see what your ship looks like inside?"

  "Do we!" cried Tom, and made a headlong dash for the scaffold. Astro letout one of his famous yells and followed right at his heels. Rogerwatched them running ahead and started off at a slow walk, but suddenly,no longer able to resist, he broke into a dead run. Those around the_Polaris_ stopped their work to watch the three cadets scramble up theladder. Most of the ground crew were ex-spacemen like McKenny, no longerable to blast off because of acceleration reaction. And they smiledknowingly, remembering their reactions to their first spaceship.

  Inside the massive cruiser, the boys roamed over every deck, examiningthe ship excitedly.

  "Say look at this!" cried Tom. He stood in front of the control boardand ran his hands over the buttons and switches. "This board makes themanual we worked on at the Academy look like it's ready for GalaxyHall!"

  "Yeeeooooooww!" Three decks below, Astro had discovered the rocketmotors. Four of the most powerful ever installed on a spaceship,enabling the _Polaris_ to outrace any ship in space.

  Roger stuck his head through the radar-bridge hatch and gazed in awe atthe array of electronic communicators, detection radar and astrogationgear. With lips pulled into a thin line, he mumbled to himself: "Too badthey didn't give _you_ this kind of equipment."

  "What'd you say, Roger?" asked Astro, climbing alongside to peer intothe radar bridge.

  Startled, Roger turned and stammered, "Ah--nothing--nothing."

  Looking around, Astro commented, "This place looks almost as good asthat power deck."

  "Of course," said Roger, "they could have placed that astrogation prisma little closer to the chart table. Now I'll have to get up every time Iwant to take sights on stars!"

  "Don't you ever get tired of complaining?" asked Astro.

  "Ah--rocket off," snarled Roger.

  "Hey, you guys," yelled Tom from below, "better get down here! CaptainStrong's coming aboard."

  Climbing back down the ladder to the control deck, Astro leaned over hisshoulder and asked Roger, "Do you really think he'll let us take thisbaby up for a hop, Manning?"

  "Get your head out of that cloud, Astro. You'll pull about three weeksof dry runs before this baby gets five inches off the ground."

  "I wouldn't be too sure of that, Manning!" Strong's voice boomed out ashe climbed up through the control-deck hatch. The three boys immediatelysnapped to attention.

  Strong walked around the control deck, fingering the controls lightly.

  "This is a fine ship," he mused aloud. "One of the finest thatscientific brains can build. She's yours. The day you graduate from theAcademy, _IF_ you graduate, and I can think of about a thousand reasonswhy you won't, you'll command an armed rocket cruiser similar to this.As a matter of fact, the only difference between this ship and thosethat patrol the space lanes now is in the armament."

  "Don't we have any arms aboard at all, sir?" asked Tom.

  "Small arms, like paralo-ray pistols and paralo-ray rifles. Plus fouratomic war heads for emergency use," replied Strong.

  Seeing a puzzled expression cross Astro's face, the Solar Guard officercontinued, "You haven't studied armament yet, Astro, but paralo rays arethe only weapons used by law-enforcement agencies in the Solar Alliance.They work on a principle of controlled energy, sending out a ray with aneffective range of fifty yards that can paralyze the nervous system ofany beast or human."

  "And it doesn't kill, sir?" inquired Astro.

  "No, Astro," replied Strong. "Paralyzing a man is just as effective askilling him. The Solar Alliance doesn't believe you have to kill anyone,not even the most vicious criminal. Freeze him and capture him, and youstill have the opportunity of making him a useful citizen."

  "But if you can't?" inquired Roger dryly.

  "Then he's kept on the prison asteroid where he can't harm anyone."Strong turned away abruptly. "But this isn't the time for a generaldiscussion. We've got work to do!"

  He walked over to the master control panel and switched the teleceiverscreen. There was a slight buzz, and a view of the spaceport outside theship suddenly came into focus, filling the screen. Strong flipped aswitch and a view aft on the _Polaris_ filled the glowing square. Thealuminum scaffolding was being hauled away by a jet truck. Again theview changed as Strong twisted the dials in front of him.

  "Just scanning the outside, boys," he commented. "Have to make surethere isn't anyone near the ship when we blast off. The rocket exhaustis powerful enough to blow a man two hundred feet, to say nothing ofburning him to death."

  "You mean, sir--" began Tom, not daring to hope.

  "Of course, Corbett," smiled Strong. "Take your stations for blast-off.We raise ship as soon as we get orbital clearance from spaceportcontrol!"

  Without waiting for further orders, the three boys scurried to theirstations.

  Soon the muffled whine of the energizing pumps on the power deck beganto ring through the ship, along with the steady beep of the radarscanner on the radar bridge. Tom checked the maze of gauges and dials onthe control board. Air locks, hatches, oxygen supply, circulatingsystem, circuits, and feeds. In five minutes the two-hundred-footshining steel hull was a living thing as her rocket motors purred,warming up for the initial thrust.

  Tom made a last sweeping check of the complicated board and turned toCaptain Strong who stood to one side watching.

  "Ship ready to blast off, sir," he announced. "Shall I check stationsand proceed to raise ship?"

  "Carry on, Cadet Corbett," Strong replied. "Log yourself in as skipperwith me along as supercargo. I'll ride in the second pilot's chair."

  Tom snapped a sharp salute and added vocally, "Aye, aye, sir!"

  He turned back to the control board, strapped himself into the commandpilot's seat and opened the circuit to the spaceport control tower.

  "Rocket cruiser _Polaris_ to spaceport control," he droned into themicrophone. "Check in!"

  "Spaceport control to _Polaris_," the voice of the tower operatorreplied. "You are cleared for blast-off in two minutes. Take out--orbit75 ... repeat ... 75...."

  "_Polaris_ to spaceport control. Orders received and understood. Endtransmission!"

  Tom then turned his attention to the station check.

  "Control deck to radar deck. Check in."

  "Radar deck, aye! Ready to raise ship." Roger's voice was relaxed, easy.

  Tom turned to the board to adjust the teleceiver screen for a clearpicture of the stern of the ship. Gradually it came up in as sharpdetail as if he had been standing on the ground.

 
He checked the electric timing device in front of him that ticked offthe seconds, as a red hand crawled around to _zero_, and when it sweptdown to the thirty-second mark, Tom pulled the microphone to his lipsagain. "Control deck to power deck. Check in!"

  "Power deck, aye?"

  "Energize the cooling pumps!"

  "Cooling pumps, aye!" repeated Astro.

  "Feed reactant!"

  "Reactant at D-9 rate."

  From seventy feet below them, Strong and Tom heard the hiss of thereactant mass feeding into the rocket motors, and the screeching whineof the mighty pumps that kept the mass from building too rapidly andexploding.

  The second hand swept up to the twenty-second mark.

  "Control deck to radar deck," called Tom. "Do we have a clear trajectoryforward?"

  "All clear forward and overhead," replied Roger.

  Tom placed his hand on the master switch that would throw the combinedcircuits, instruments and gauges into the single act of blasting themighty ship into space. His eyes glued to the sweeping hand, he countedpast the twelve-second mark--eleven--ten--nine--

  "Stand by to raise ship," he bawled into the microphone."Minus--five--four--three--two--one--_zero_!"

  Tom threw the master switch.

  There was a split-second pause and then the great ship roared into life.Slowly at first, she lifted her tail full of roaring jets free of theground. Ten feet--twenty--fifty--a hundred--five hundred--athousand--picking up speed at an incredible rate.

  Tom felt himself being pushed deeper and deeper into the softness of theacceleration cushions. He had been worried about not being able to keephis eyes open to see the dwindling Earth in the teleceiver over hishead, but the tremendous force of the rockets pushing him againstgravity to tear the two hundred tons of steel away from the Earth's gripheld his eyelids open for him. As the powerful rockets tore deeper intothe gap that separated the ship from Earth, he saw the spaceportgradually grow smaller. The rolling hills around the Academy closed in,and then the Academy itself, with the Tower of Galileo shrinking to awhite stick, was lost in the brown and green that was Earth. The rocketspushed harder and harder and he saw the needle of the acceleration gaugecreep slowly up. Four--five--six--seven--eight--nine--ten miles asecond!

  When the awful crushing weight on his body seemed unbearable, when hefelt as though he would never be able to draw another breath, suddenlythe pressure lifted and Tom felt amazingly and wonderfully buoyant. Heseemed to be floating in mid-air, his body rising against the webbedstraps of his chair! With a start and a momentary wave of panic, herealized that he _was_ floating! Only the straps kept him from rising tothe ceiling of the control room!

  Recovering quickly, he realized that he was in free fall. The ship hadcleared the pull of earth's gravity and was out in space whereeverything was weightless. Reaching toward the control panel, he flippedthe switch for the synthetic-gravity generator and, seconds later, feltthe familiar and reassuring sensation of the chair under him as thegenerator supplied an artificial-gravity field to the ship.

  As he loosened the straps in his chair, he noticed Captain Strong risingfrom his position beside him and he grinned sheepishly in answer to thetwinkle in Strong's eye.

  "It's all right, Tom," reassured Strong. "Happens to everyone the firsttime. Carry on."

  "Aye, aye, sir," replied Tom and he turned to the microphone. "Controldeck to all stations! We are in space! Observe standard cruiseprocedure!"

  "Power deck, aye!" was Astro's blasting answer over the loud-speaker."Yeeeoooww! Out where we belong at last."

  "Radar bridge here," Roger's voice chimed in softly on the speaker."Everything under control. And, Astro, you belong in a zoo if you'regoing to bellow like that!"

  "Ahhh--rocket off, bubblehead!" The big Venusian's reply wasgood-natured. He was too happy to let Roger get under his skin.

  "All right, you two," interrupted Tom. "Knock it off. We're on a shipnow. Let's cut the kindergarten stuff!"

  "Aye, aye, skipper!" Astro was irrepressible.

  "Yes, _sir_!" Roger's voice was soft but Tom recognized the biting edgeto the last word.

  Turning away from the controls, he faced Captain Strong who had beenwatching quietly.

  "_Polaris_ space-borne at nine hundred thirty-three hours, CaptainStrong. All stations operating efficiently."

  "Very competent job, Corbett," nodded Strong in approval. "You handledthe ship as if you'd been doing it for years."

  "Thank you, sir."

  "We'll just cruise for a while on this orbit so you boys can get thefeel of the ship and of space." The Solar Guard officer took Tom's placein the command pilot's chair. "You knock off for a while. Go up to theradar bridge and have a look around. I'll take over here."

  "Yes, sir." Tom turned and had to restrain himself from racing up theladder to the radar bridge. When he climbed through the hatch to Roger'sstation, he found his unit-mate tilted back in his chair, staringthrough the crystal blister over his head.

  "Hiya, spaceboy," smiled Roger. He indicated the blister. "Take a lookat the wide, deep and high."

  Tom looked up and saw the deep blackness that was space.

  "It's like looking into a mirror, Roger," he breathed in awe. "Onlythere isn't any other side--no reflection. It just doesn't stop, doesit?"

  "Nope," commented Roger, "it just goes on and on and on. And no oneknows where it stops. And no one can even guess."

  "Ah--you've got a touch of space fever," laughed Astro. "You'd bettertake it easy, pal."

  Tom suppressed a smile. Now, for the first time, he felt that there wasa chance to achieve unity among them. Kill him with kindness, hethought, that's the way to do it.

  "All right, boys!" Captain Strong's voice crackled over the speaker."Time to pull in your eyeballs and get to work again. We're heading backto the spaceport! Take your stations for landing!"

  Tom and Astro immediately jumped toward the open hatch and startedscrambling down the ladder toward their respective stations while Rogerstrapped himself into his chair in front of the astrogation panel.

  Within sixty seconds the ship was ready for landing procedure and at anod from Captain Strong, who again strapped himself into the secondpilot's chair, Tom began the delicate operation.

  Entering Earth's atmosphere, Tom gave a series of rapid orders forcourse changes and power adjustments, and then, depressing the masterturn control, spun the ship around so that she would settle stern firsttoward her ramp at the Academy spaceport.

  "Radar deck to control deck," called Roger over the intercom. "Onethousand feet to touchdown!"

  "Control deck, aye," answered Tom. "Control deck to power deck. Checkin."

  "Power deck, aye," replied Astro.

  "Stand by to adjust thrust to maximum drive at my command," ordered Tom.

  "Power deck, aye."

  The great ship, balanced perfectly on the hot exhaust, slowly slippedtoward the ground.

  "Five hundred feet to touchdown," warned Roger.

  "Main rockets full blast," ordered Tom.

  The sudden blast of the powerful jets slowed the descent of the ship,and finally, fifty feet above the ground, Tom snapped out another order.

  "Cut main rockets! Hold auxiliary!"

  A moment later there was a gentle bump and the _Polaris_ rested on theramp, her nose pointed to the heavens.

  "_Touchdown!_" yelled Tom. "Cut everything, fellas, and come up and signthe log. We made it--our first hop into space! We're spacemen!"