The Space Pioneers

by Carey Rockwell

  CHAPTER 3

  "Control deck to power deck, check in!" Tom's voice crackled over thepower-deck loud-speaker and Astro snapped to quick attention.

  "Power deck, aye!" replied the giant Venusian into the intercommicrophone. "What's up?"

  "Stand by for course change," said Tom. "Roger's picked up a meteor onthe radar scanner and--"

  "Here's the course change," Roger's voice broke in over the intercom."Three degrees up on the plane of the ecliptic and five degreesstarboard!"

  "Get that, Astro?" snapped Tom. "Stand by for one-quarter burst onsteering rockets!"

  "One-quarter--right!" acknowledged the power-deck cadet and turned tothe massive panel that controlled the rockets.

  On the control deck Tom Corbett continued talking to Roger. "Relay thepickup to the control-deck scanner, Roger," he ordered. "Let me take alook at that thing."

  In a moment the thin sweeping white line on the control-deck scannerswept around the green surface of the screen, picking out the blip thatmarked the meteor. Tom watched it for a moment and then barked into theintercom, "Stand by to execute change course!"

  He watched the meteor a few more seconds, making sure the course changewould take them out of its path, and then gave the command. "Fire!"

  Before he could draw another breath, Tom felt himself pressed into hisseat as the _Polaris_ quickly accelerated and curved up and away fromthe onrushing meteor in a long, smooth arc.

  Captain Strong suddenly stepped through the hatch into the control deck.Glancing quickly at the scanner screen, he saw the white blip that wasthe meteor flashing away from the _Polaris_ and he smiled.

  "That was nice work, Corbett!" said Strong. "Get us back on course assoon as you can. Governor Hardy wants to get to Venusport as quickly aspossible."

  "Shall I tell Astro to pour on extra thrust, sir?" asked Tom.

  "No, just maintain standard full space speed. No need to use emergencypower unless it's really an emergency."

  "Yes, sir," said Tom.

  Strong walked around on the control deck, making a casual check of theship's operation. But he knew he wouldn't find anything to complainabout. Past experience had taught him that the three cadets kept a tightship. At the sound of the hatch opening, he turned to see Governor Hardystanding just inside the hatch.

  "I have to compliment you, Captain," Hardy said as he watched Tomoperate the great control panel. "Your cadets really know theirbusiness. You've trained them well."

  "Thank you, sir," replied Strong, "but they did it themselves. One thingI've learned since I've become an instructor at the Academy and that isyou can't make a spaceman. He's born with the feeling and the instinct,or he isn't a spaceman."

  Hardy nodded. "I've got some important messages to send out, Captain.I'd like to use the teleceiver for a while."

  "Of course, sir," said Strong. "Right up that ladder there." The SolarGuard captain pointed to the ladder leading to the radar deck."Manning's on duty now and will take care of you, sir."

  "Thank you," said the governor, turning to the ladder.

  A moment later, as Captain Strong and Tom were idly discussing theforthcoming screening operations on Venusport, they were surprised tosee Roger climb down the ladder from the radar bridge.

  "What are you doing down here, Manning?" inquired Strong. "I thought youwere sending out messages for Governor Hardy."

  Roger dropped into the co-control pilots' seat and shrugged. "Thegovernor said he'd handle it. Said the messages were top secret and thathe wouldn't _burden_ me with their contents, since he knew how tooperate a teleceiver!"

  Puzzled, Tom looked at Roger. "What could be so secret about thismission?" he asked.

  "I don't know," answered Roger. "After that speech the president of theSolar Council made the other night, the whole Alliance must know aboutthe project, the screening, and practically everything else."

  Strong laughed. "You space brats see adventure and mystery ineverything. Now, why wouldn't a man in charge of a project as large asthis have secret messages? He might be talking to the president of thecouncil!"

  Tom blushed. "You're right, sir," he said. "I guess I let my imaginationrun riot."

  "Just concentrate on getting this wagon to Venus in one piece, Corbett,and leave the secret messages to the governor," joked Strong. "And anytime you get too suspicious, just remember that the governor wasappointed head of this project by the Solar Alliance itself!"

  Blasting through space, leaving a trail of atomic exhaust behind her,the _Polaris_ rocketed smoothly through the dark void toward the mistyplanet of Venus. In rotating watches, the cadets ran the ship, ate,slept, and spent their few remaining spare hours attending to theirclassroom work with the aid of soundscribers and story spools. Each ofthem was working for the day when he would wear the black-and-golduniform of the Solar Guard officer that was respected throughout thesystem as the mark of merit, hard work, distinction, and honor.

  Once, Captain Strong and Astro donned space suits and went outside toinspect the hull of the _Polaris_. The ship had passed through a swarmof small meteorites, each less than a tenth of an inch in diameter buttraveling at high speeds, and some had pierced the hull. It was a simpleand quick job to seal the holes with a special atomic torch.

  Like a giant silver bullet speeding toward a bull's-eye, the rocket shippin-pointed the planet Venus from among the millions of worlds in spaceand was soon hovering over Venusport, nose up toward space, ready for atouchdown at the municipal spaceport. As the braking rockets quicklystopped all forward acceleration, the main rockets were cut in and thegiant ship dropped toward the surface of the tropical planet tailfirst.

  Tom's face glowed with excitement as he adjusted one lever and thenanother, delicately balancing the ship in its fall, meanwhile talkinginto the intercom and directing Astro in the careful reduction ofthrust. On the radar deck Roger kept his eyes glued to the radar scannerand posted Tom on the altitude as the ship drew closer and closer to theground.

  "One thousand feet!" yelled Roger over the intercom. "Ninehundred--eight--seven--six--"

  "Open main rockets one half!" called Tom. "Reduce rate of fall!"

  The thunder of the rockets increased and the mighty ship quivered as itsplummeting descent was checked slightly. Tom quickly adjusted thestabilizer trim tabs to keep the ship perpendicular to the ground, thenwatched the stern scanner carefully as the huge blast-pitted concreteramp loomed larger and larger.

  "Five hundred feet to touchdown," tolled Roger in more slow and measuredtones. "Four hundred--three--two--"

  On the scanner screen Tom could see the exhaust flare begin to lick atthe concrete ramp, then splash its surface until it was completelyhidden. He grasped the main control switch tightly and waited.

  "One hundred feet," Roger's voice was tense now. "Seventy-five, fifty--"

  Tom barked out a quick order. "Blast all rockets!"

  In immediate response, the main tubes roared into thunderous life andthe _Polaris_ shook as the sudden acceleration battled the force ofgravity. The ship's descent slowed perceptibly until she hoveredmotionless in the air, her stabilizer fins only two feet from theconcrete ramp.

  "Cut all power!" Tom's voice blasted through the intercom. A splitsecond later there was a deafening silence, followed by a heavy muffledthud and the creak of straining metal as the _Polaris_ came to rest onthe ramp.

  "_Touchdown!_" yelled Tom. He quickly cut all power to the control boardand watched as one by one the gauges and dials registered zero or empty.The cadet stood up, noticed the time on the astral chronometer, andturned to face Captain Strong, rising from the chair beside him.

  "_Polaris_ made touchdown, planet Venus, at exactly 1543, sir," he saidand saluted crisply.

  Strong returned the salute. "Good work, Corbett," he said. "You handledher as though she was nothing more than a baby carriage!"

  Roger came bouncing down the ladder, grinning. "Well," he said, "we'reback on the planet where the monkeys walk around and call themselvesmen!"
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  "I heard that, Manning!" roared Astro, struggling through the hatch fromthe power deck. "One more crack like that and I'll stand you on yourhead and blast you off with your own space gas!"

  "Listen, you overgrown Venusian ape," replied Roger, "I'll--"

  "Yeah--" growled Astro, advancing on the smaller cadet. "You'll what?"

  "All right, you two!" barked Strong. "Plug your jets! By the craters ofLuna, one minute you act like hot-shot spacemen, and the next, youbehave like children in a kindergarten!"

  Suddenly the compartment echoed to hearty laughter. The cadets and theirskipper turned to see Governor Hardy standing on the radar-bridgeladder, brief case in hand, roaring with laughter. He climbed down andfaced the three cadets.

  "If kindergarten behavior will produce spacemen like you, I'm all forit. Congratulations, all three of you. You did a good job!"

  "Thank you, sir," said Tom.

  Hardy turned to Strong. "Captain, I'm going ahead to the Solar Councilbuilding and get things set up for the screening. I imagine there aremany anxious colonists ready to be processed!"

  As Strong and the cadets came to attention and saluted, Governor Hardyturned and left the control deck.

  Strong turned to the cadets. "From now on, you might as well forget thatyou're spacemen. Report to the Administration Building in one hour.You're going to do all your space jockeying in a chair from now on!"

  * * * * *

  For the next week, the three Space Cadets spent every waking hour in theSolar Council Administration Center, interviewing applicants who hadpassed their psychograph personality tests. Endlessly, from earlymorning until late at night, they questioned the eager applicants.Ninety-nine out of one hundred were refused. And when they were, theyall had different reactions. Some cried, some were angry, somethreatened, but the three cadets were unyielding. It was a thanklessjob, and after more than a week of it, tempers were on edge.

  "What would you do," Roger would ask an applicant, "if you were suddenlydrifting in space, in danger, and found that you had lost the vacuum inyour audio tubes? How would you get help?"

  Not one in over three hundred had realized that space itself was aperfect vacuum and could be substituted for the tubes. Roger had turnedthumbs down on all of them.

  Astro and Tom found their interviews equally as rough. One applicantadmitted to Tom that he wanted to go to the satellite to establish afactory for making rocket juice, a highly potent drink that was notoutlawed in the solar system, but was looked on with strong disfavor.When Tom turned down his application, the man tried to get Tom to enterinto partnership with him, and when Tom refused, the man became violentand the cadet had to call enlisted Solar Guardsmen to throw him out.

  While Tom and Roger made decisions quickly and decisively, Astro, on theother hand, patiently listened to all the tearful stories andsympathized with the applicants when they were unable to tear down asmall reactor unit and rebuild it blindfolded. Painfully, sometimes withtears in his own eyes, he would tell the applicant he had failed, justwhen the would-be colonist would think Astro was going to pass him.

  The three cadets were doing their jobs so well that in the one hundredand fifty-three applications approved by them Strong did not reject one,but sent them all on to Governor Hardy for final approval.

  On the morning of the tenth day of screening, Hyram Logan and hisfamily entered Roger's small office. A man of medium height with a thickshock of iron-gray hair and ruddy, weather-beaten features Logan lookedas though he was used to working in the outdoors. Flanked by his son anddaughter, he stood quietly before the desk as the young cadet, withoutlooking up, scanned his application quickly.

  "How old are the children?" asked Roger brusquely.

  "I'm nineteen," replied a low musical voice, "and Billy's twelve."

  Roger's head suddenly jerked up. He stared past Hyram Logan and a smalltowheaded boy, to gaze into the warm brown eyes of Jane Logan, aslender, pretty girl whose open, friendly features were framed by neatlycombed reddish blond hair. Roger sat staring at her, openmouthed, untilhe heard a loud cough and saw Logan trying to hide a smile. He quicklyturned back to the application.

  "I see here you're a farmer, Mr. Logan," said Roger. He stole a glanceat the young girl, but Billy saw him and winked. Roger flushed andturned to Logan as the older man answered his questioner.

  "That's right," said Logan. "I'm a farmer. Been a farmer all my life."

  "Why do you want to go to Roald, Mr. Logan?" asked Roger.

  "Well," said Logan, "I have a nice piece of land south of Venusport aways. Me and my wife developed it and we've been farming it for overtwenty-five years. But my wife died last year and I just sort of lostheart in this place. I figured maybe that new satellite will give me astart again. You'll have to have farmers to feed the people. And I canfarm anything from chemicals to naturals, in hard rock or muddy water."He paused and clamped his jaws together and said proudly, "My fatherwas a farmer, and his father before him. One of the first to put a plowinto Venusian topsoil!"

  "Yes--uh--of course, Mr. Logan," mumbled Roger. "I don't thinkthere'll--er--be any trouble about it."

  The young cadet hadn't heard a word Hyram Logan had said, but insteadhad been gazing happily into the eyes of Jane Logan. He stamped theapplication and indicated the door to Tom's screening room, followingthe girl wistfully with his eyes. He muttered to himself, "There oughtto be more applicants like Farmer Logan and his daughter for the bravenew world of Roald!"

  "And if there were, Cadet Manning," roared Captain Strong, standing inthe doorway from the hall, "we'd probably wind up with a satellitefilled with beautiful women!"

  "Yes, sir! Er--no, sir," stuttered Roger, jerking himself to attention."I mean, what's wrong with that?"

  "By the rings of Saturn," declared Strong, "you'll never change,Manning!"

  Roger grinned. "I hope not, sir."

  The door to Tom's room opened and the curly-haired cadet walked inholding an application.

  "Captain Strong," he said, "could I see you a minute?"

  "Sure, Tom. Any trouble?" asked Strong.

  Tom handed him the application silently and waited. Strong read thesheet and turned to Tom. "You know what to do in a case like this, Tom.Why come to me?"

  Tom screwed up his face, thinking. "I don't know, sir. There's somethingdifferent about this fellow. Astro passed him with flying colors. Saidhe knew as much about a reactor unit as he did. Roger passed him too."

  "Who is it?" asked Roger. Strong handed him the paper.

  "Sure, I passed him," said Roger. "That guy really knows hiselectronics."

  Strong looked at Tom. "How do you feel about it, Tom?"

  "Well, sir," began Tom, "I would pass him in a minute. He's hadexperience handling men and he's been in deep space before. He's loggedan awful lot of time on merchant spaceships, but--"

  "But what?" asked Strong. He took the paper and studied it again. "Looksto me as if he's what we're looking for," he said.

  "I know, sir," said Tom. "But why would a man like that, with all thatexperience, want to bury himself on Roald? He could get practically anyjob he wants, right here in the system."

  "Ummh," mused Strong. He reread the application. In the blank space forreason for going, the applicant had written simply: _Adventure._ Hehanded the application back to Tom. "I think I see what you mean, Tom.It does look too good. Better not take a chance. Seven years is a longtime to get stuck with a misfit, or worse, a--" He didn't finish, butTom knew he meant a man not to be trusted.

  "Tell Paul Vidac his application has been rejected," said Strong.