The Space Pioneers

by Carey Rockwell

  Produced by Greg Weeks, Joseph R. Hauser and the OnlineDistributed Proofreading Team at https://www.pgdp.net

  TOM CORBETT SPACE CADET THE SPACE PIONEERS By CAREY ROCKWELL WILLY LEY, Technical Adviser]

  THE SPACE PIONEERS

  THE TOM CORBETTSPACE CADET STORIESBy Carey Rockwell

  STAND BY FOR MARS!DANGER IN DEEP SPACEON THE TRAIL OF THE SPACE PIRATESTHE SPACE PIONEERSTHE REVOLT ON VENUSTREACHERY IN OUTER SPACESABOTAGE IN SPACETHE ROBOT ROCKET

  A TOM CORBETT Space Cadet Adventure

  THE SPACE PIONEERS

  By CAREY ROCKWELL

  WILLY LEY _Technical Adviser_

  GROSSET & DUNLAP _Publishers_ New York

  COPYRIGHT, 1953, BY ROCKHILL RADIOALL RIGHTS RESERVEDILLUSTRATIONS BY LOUIS GLANZMANPRINTED IN THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA

  [Transcriber's Note: Extensive research can find no evidence of therequired copyright renewal on this work.]

  ILLUSTRATIONS

  _Frontispiece_

  Her nose pointed skyward, the _Polaris_ was ready to blast off 21 The Solar Guard worked late into the night, examining every ship in the Alliance 50 The speedy little ship shot ahead of the fleet toward the gigantic mass of asteroids 90 The _Polaris_ landed safely on the surface of the satellite 105 Bush pulled a paralo-ray gun from his belt and said, "All right, march!" 143 "Hasn't anybody figured out why four hundred ships crashed in landing?" Strong asked. 159 "We better take it easy, Astro," said Tom. "Turn off the lights." 171

  THE SPACE PIONEERS

  CHAPTER 1

  "Go on, Astro," shouted the young Space Cadet. "Boot that screwy ballwith everything you've got!"

  The three cadets of the _Polaris_ unit raced down the Academy fieldtoward the mercuryball, a plastic sphere with a vial of mercury inside.At the opposite end of the field, three members of the _Arcturus_ unitran headlong in a desperate effort to reach the ball first.

  Astro, the giant Space Cadet from Venus, charged toward the ball like ablazing rocket, while his two unit mates flanked him, ready to block outtheir opponents and give Astro a clear shot at the ball.

  On the left wing, Tom Corbett, curly-haired and snub-nosed, ran lightlydown the field, while on the opposite wing, Roger Manning, his blondhair cut crew style, kept pace with him easily. The two teams closed.Roger threw a perfect block on his opposing wingman and the two boyswent down in a heap. Tom side-stepped the _Arcturus_ cadet on his sideand sent him sprawling to the ground. He quickly cut across the fieldand threw his body headlong at the last remaining member of theopposition. Astro was free to kick the ball perfectly for a fifty-yardgoal.

  Jogging back toward their own goal line, the three _Polaris_ cadetscongratulated each other. Astro's kick had tied the score, two-all.

  "That was some feint you pulled on Richards, Tom," said Roger. "Yousucked him in beautifully. I thought he was going to tear up the fieldwith his nose!"

  Tom grinned. Compliments from Roger were few and far between.

  Astro clapped his hands together and roared, "All right, fellas, let'ssee if we can't take these space bums again! Another shot at thegoal--that's all I need!"

  Lining up at the end of the field again, the cadets kept their eyes onthe cadet referee on the side lines. They saw him hold up his hand andthen drop it suddenly. Once again the teams raced toward the ball in themiddle of the field. When they met, Roger tried to duplicate Tom's featand feint his opponent, but the other cadet was ready for the maneuverand stopped dead in his tracks. Roger was forced to break stride justlong enough for the _Arcturus_ cadet to dump him to the ground and thenrace for Astro. Tom, covering Astro on the left wing, saw the cadetsweeping in and lunged in a desperate attempt to stop him. But hemissed, leaving Astro unprotected against the three members of the_Arcturus_ unit. With his defense gone, Astro kicked at the ballfrantically but just grazed the side of it. The mercury inside the ballbegan to play its role in the game, and as though it had a brain of itsown, the ball spun, stopped, bounced, and spiraled in every direction,with the cadets kicking, lunging, and scrambling for a clean shot.Finally Astro reached the tumbling sphere and booted it away from thegroup. There was a roar of laughter from the _Arcturus_ unit and a lowgroan from Tom and Roger. Astro saw that he had kicked the ball over hisown goal line.

  "Why, you clobber-headed Venusian hick!" yelled Roger. "Can't you tellthe difference between our goal and theirs?"

  Astro grinned sheepishly as the three jogged back to their own goal toline up once more.

  "Lay off, Roger," said Tom. "How come you didn't get Richards on thatplay?"

  "I slipped," replied the blond cadet.

  "Yeah, you slipped all right," growled Astro good-naturedly, "with agreat big assist from Richards."

  "Ah, go blast your jets," grumbled Roger. "Come on! Let's show thosespace crawlers what this game is all about!"

  But before the cadet referee could drop his hand, a powerful, low-slungjet car, its exhaust howling, pulled to a screeching stop at the edge ofthe field and a scarlet-clad enlisted Solar Guardsman jumped out andspoke to him. Sensing that it was something important, the two teamsjogged over to surround the messenger.

  "What's up, Joe?" asked Roger.

  The enlisted spaceman, an Earthworm cadet who had washed out of theAcademy but had re-enlisted in the Solar Guard, smiled. "Orders for the_Polaris_ unit," he said, "from Captain Strong."

  "What about?" asked Roger.

  "Report on the double for new assignments," replied the guardsman.

  "_Yeeeeooooow!_" Astro roared in jubilation. "At last we can get out ofhere. I've been doing so blamed much classroom work, I've forgotten whatspace looks like."

  "Know where we're going, Joe?" asked Tom.

  "Uh-uh." Joe shook his head. He turned away, then stopped, and calledback, "Want a lift back to the Tower?"

  Before Tom could answer, Richards, the captain of the _Arcturus_ unitspoke up. "How about finishing the game, Tom? It's been so long sincewe've had such good competition we hate to lose you. Come on. Only a fewmore minutes."

  Tom hesitated. It had been a long time since the two units had playedtogether, but orders were orders. He looked at Roger and Astro. "Well,what about it?"

  "Sure," said Roger. "We'll wipe up these space jokers in nothing flat!Come on!"

  There was a mock yell of anger from the _Arcturus_ unit and the twoteams raced back to their starting positions. In the remaining minutesof play, the cadets played hard and rough. First one team would scoreand then the other. A sizable crowd of cadets had gathered to watch thegame and cheered lustily as the players tore up and down the field.Finally, when both teams were nearly exhausted, the game was over andthe score was eight to seven in favor of the _Polaris_ unit. Roger hadmade the final point after Tony Richards had left the game with a badlybruised hip. A substitute called in from the bystanders, an Earthwormcadet, had eagerly joined the _Arcturus_ team for the last minutes ofplay but had been hopelessly outclassed by the teamwork of the _Polaris_unit.

  Promising a return match soon, Roger, Tom, and Astro hurried to theirlockers, showered, and dressed in their senior cadet uniforms of vividblue, then raced to the nearest slidewalk to head toward the main groupof buildings that made up Space Academy.

  Whisked along on the moving belt of plastic that formed the principlemethod of transportation in and around the Academy grounds, Tom turnedto his unit mates. "What do you think it'll be?" he asked.

  "You mean the assignment?" asked Roger, answering his own question inthe next breath. "I don't kno
w. But anything to get out of here. I'vebeen on Earth so long that I'm getting gravity-itis!"

  Tom smiled. "It'll sure be nice to get up in the wide, high, and deepagain," he said, glancing up at the cloudless sky.

  "Say it again, spaceman," breathed Astro. "One more lesson on thedifferential potential between chemical-burning rocket fuels andreactant energy and I'll blast off without a spaceship!"

  Roger and Tom laughed. They both sympathized with the big cadet'sinability to cope with the theory of atomic energy and fuel conservationin spaceships. In charge of the power deck on the _Polaris_, Astroearlier had gained firsthand experience in commercial rocket ships as anable spaceman and later had been accepted in the Academy for cadettraining. The son of colonists on Venus, the misty planet, his formaleducation was limited, and though he had no equal while on the powerdeck of a rocket ship, in theory and classroom study he had to depend onRoger and Tom to help him get passing grades.

  The slidewalk moved smoothly and easily toward the gleaming Tower ofGalileo, the largest and most imposing of the structures of SpaceAcademy. Made entirely of clear crystal mined on Titan, satellite ofSaturn, the Tower rose over the smaller buildings like a giantshimmering jewel. Housing the administration offices of the Solar Guardand the Space Academy staff, it also contained Galaxy Hall, the museumof space, which attracted thousands of visitors from every part of theSolar Alliance.

  Tom Corbett, his eyes caressing the magnificent gleaming Tower,remembered the first time he had seen it. While it hadn't been so longin months or years since becoming a Space Cadet, it seemed as though hehad been at the Academy all of his life and that it was his home. In thestruggle to develop into a well-knit dependable rocket team, composed ofan astrogator, power-deck cadet, and a command cadet, Tom had assumedthe leadership of the unit, and the relationship between Astro, RogerManning, and himself had ripened until they were more like brothers thanthree young men who had grown up millions of miles apart.

  As they rode toward the Tower, the three cadets could see the green-cladfirst-year Earthworms getting their first taste of cadet life--hours ofclose-order formations and drills. The nearer they came to the Tower,the more intense and colorful became the activity as the crisscrossingslidewalks carried enlisted guardsmen in their red uniforms, and theofficers of the Solar Guard in magnificent black and gold, across thequadrangle to the various dormitories, laboratories, lecture rooms, messhalls, and research rooms. Space Academy was a beehive of activity, withthe education of thousands of cadets and the operational mechanics ofthe Solar Guard going on incessantly, day and night, never stopping inits avowed task of defending the liberties of the planets, safeguardingthe freedom of space, and upholding the cause of peace throughout theuniverse.

  As their slidewalk glided over the quadrangle, Roger suddenly turned tohis unit mates. "Think we might get assigned to that radar projectthey're setting up on the Moon?" he asked. "I have a few ideas--"

  Tom laughed. "He can't wait until he gets his hands on that new scannerDr. Dale just finished, Astro," he said with a wink.

  The big Venusian snorted. "Can you imagine the ego of that guy? Dr. Dalespends almost a year building that thing, with the help of the leadingelectronic scientists in the Alliance, and _he_ can't wait to _tell_them about a few of _his_ ideas!"

  "I didn't mean that," complained Roger. "All I said was--"

  "You don't have to say a word, hot-shot," interrupted Astro. "I can readyour thoughts as though they were flashed on a stereo screen!"

  "Oh, yeah!" growled Roger. "You should be that telepathic for yourexams. Why didn't you read my thoughts when I beat my brains out tryingto explain that thrust problem the other night?" He turned to Tom,shrugging his shoulders in mock despair. "Honestly, Tom, if I didn'tknow that he was the best power jockey in the Academy, I'd say he wasthe dumbest thing to leave Venus, _including_ the dinosaurs in theAcademy Zoo!"

  With a hamlike hand Astro suddenly grabbed for Roger's neck, but thewiry cadet dashed along the slidewalk out of reach and the big Venusianrumbled after him. Tom roared with laughter.

  As he started to follow his unit mates, one of the passengers on theslidewalk grabbed Tom by the arm and he turned to see Mike McKenny,Chief Warrant Officer in the enlisted Solar Guard and the firstinstructor the _Polaris_ unit had met on their arrival at the Academy.

  "Corbett!" demanded McKenny. "Are those two space crawlers still actinglike monkeys out of their cages?"

  Tom laughed and shook hands with the elderly spaceman. "Yes, sir," hesaid. "But you could hardly call Astro a monkey!"

  "More along the lines of a Venusian gorilla, if you ask me!" snortedMcKenny. The short, squat spaceman's eyes twinkled. "I've been hearingsome mighty fine things about you three space bongos, Tommy. It's awonder the Solar Guard didn't give you a unit citation for aiding in thecapture of Coxine, the pirate!"

  "Thanks, Mike. Coming from you that compliment really means something!"

  "Just be sure you keep those two space lunatics in their proper cages,"said Mike, indicating Roger and Astro, who at the moment were racingback and forth along the slidewalk bumping passengers left and right,"and you'll all be heroes someday."

  "Yes, sir," said Tom. He glanced up, and noticing that he was in frontof the Tower building, hopped to the walkway, waving a cheery good-by toMike. "Blast over to our mess and have dinner with us some night, Mike!"he yelled to the departing figure.

  "And interrupt the happiest hours in Astro's life?" bawled Mike. "Nothank you!"

  Tom laughed and turned to the huge open doorway of the Tower where Rogerand Astro waited for him impatiently. In a few moments the three werebeing carried to the upper floors of the crystal structure by aspiraling band of moving plastic that stretched from the top of theTower to the many floors below surface level. Tom glanced at his wristchronograph as they stepped off the slidestairs and headed for CaptainStrong's quarters.

  "We're about twenty minutes late," he said to Roger and Astro. "HopeCaptain Strong's in good spirits!"

  "If he isn't," said Roger, "we can--"

  "Don't say it," protested Astro. "I only just finished working off mylast bunch of galley demerits."

  They stopped in front of a door, straightened their uniforms, and thenslid the door to one side and stepped smartly into the room. They cameto rigid attention before a massive desk, flanked by two wall windows ofclear sheet crystal reaching from ceiling to floor. Standing at thewindow, Captain Steve Strong, _Polaris_ unit cadet supervisor, his broadshoulders stretching under his black-and-gold uniform, turned to facethem, his features set in grim lines of trouble.

  "_Polaris_ unit reporting for orders, sir," said Tom. The three cadetssaluted crisply.

  Strong snapped a return salute and walked to the front of his desk."Getting pretty big for your britches, aren't you?" he growled. "I'vebeen watching you from this window. I saw the messenger deliver myorders to you, and then, I saw you return to your game and finish it,apparently deciding that the business of the Solar Guard can wait!"

  "But, sir--" Roger started to say.

  "Close your exhaust, Manning!" snapped Strong. "I'm doing the talking!"

  "Yes, sir," stammered the blond-haired cadet.

  "Well, Cadets," asked Strong in a silken voice, "if I sent you toCommander Walters' office _on the double_, do you think I could trustyou to get there on the _double_?"

  "Oh, yes, sir," replied Tom. "_Yes, sir!_" The other two boys noddedviolently.

  "Then blast out of here and report to Commander Walters for yourassignments. Tell him I'll be there in a few minutes."

  "Yes, sir!" said Tom, and the three cadets saluted sharply.

  "Unit--" bawled Strong, "_dis_--missed!"

  Outside in the hall once more, the three cadets wiped their faces.

  "Captain Strong definitely was not in a good mood!" commented Roger.

  "I've never seen him so angry!" said Tom. "Wonder why."

  "Think it might be something to do with our assignments?" asked Astro.

 
"Never can tell, Astro," said Tom. "And there's only one way to findout. That's to get to Commander Walters' office on the double!"

  Without another word the cadets hurried to the slidestairs, each ofthem hungry for excitement. Already having participated in threeoutstanding adventures, the cadet members of the _Polaris_ unit wereeager to begin a fourth.