Rip Foster Rides the Gray Planet Page 18

  CHAPTER SEVENTEEN - THE ARCHER AND THE EAGLE

  Trudeau held tight to the launcher, but the rocket racks opened andspilled attack rockets into space. They flew in a dozen differentdirections. Trudeau gave vent to his feelings in colorful French.

  Koa and Santos laughed so hard they had trouble collecting the scatteredequipment. Rip, slowed by his crash with Trudeau, got his feet under himagain.

  The asteroid had turned into the sun before they collected everything butRip's stylus and five attack rockets. The space-pencil was the only thingthat could write on the computing board. It had to be found.

  "Next time around," Rip called to the others, and led the way full speedahead until they regained the safety of shadow.

  Rip suspected the stylus was somewhere above the rock and probablywouldn't return to the surface for some minutes. While he was wonderingwhat to do, there was a chorus of yells. A rocket sped between thePlaneteers and shot off into space.

  "Our own rockets are after us," Trudeau gasped. There hadn't been time tocollect them all after Rip's unwilling attack on the Frenchman scatteredthem. Now the sun was setting them off. Another flashed past, fortunatelyover their heads. The sun's heat was causing them to fire unevenly. Riphoped they would all go off soon and get it over with.

  "Three more to go," Koa called. "Watch out!"

  Only two went, and they were far enough away to offer no danger.

  Santos had been fishing around in the instrument case. He triumphantlyproduced another stylus. "It was under the sextant," he explained. "Ithought there was another one around somewhere."

  "If we get through this I'll propose you for ten more stripes," Rip vowed."We'll make you the highest ranking sergeant that ever made a private'slife miserable."

  Working slowly but more safely, Rip figured that slightly more than twoand a half tubes would do the trick.

  Now to fire them. That meant finding a thorium crystal properly placed andbig enough. There were plenty of crystals, so that was no problem. Thenext step was for Kemp to cut holes with his torch, so that the thrust ofthe rocket fuel would be counter to the direction in which the asteroidwas spinning.

  Rip explained to all hands what had to be done. The burden would fall onKemp, who would need a helper. Rip took that job himself. He took oneoxygen tank from Kemp. Koa took the other, leaving the torchman with onlyhis torch.

  Then Rip took a container of chemical fuel from Bradshaw. Working whilerunning, he lashed the two containers together with his safety line. Thenhe improvised a rope sling so they could hang on his back. He wanted hishands free.

  Kemp, meanwhile, assembled his torch and put the proper cutting nozzle inplace. When he was ready, he moved to Rip's side and connected the hosesof the torch to the tanks the lieutenant carried. Kemp had the torchmechanism strapped to his own back. It was essentially a high pressurepump that drew oxygen and fuel from the tanks and forced them through thenozzle under terrific pressure.

  When he had finished, he pressed the trigger that started the cuttingtorch going. The fuel ignited about a half inch in front of the nozzle.The nozzle had two holes in it, one for oxygen and the other for fuel. Theholes were placed and angled to keep the flame always a half inch away,otherwise the nozzle itself would melt.

  "How do we work this?" Kemp asked.

  "We'll get ahead of the others," Rip explained. "Keep up speed until we'rerunning at the forward sun line. Then, when the crystal we want comesaround into the shadow, we can stop running and work until it spins intothe sunshine again."

  "Got it," Kemp agreed.

  Rip estimated the axis on which the asteroid was spinning and selected acrystal in the right position. He had to be careful, otherwise theircounter-blast might do nothing more than start the gray planet wobbling.

  He and Kemp ran ahead of the others. The Planeteers and their prisonerswere running at a speed that kept them right in the middle of the darkarea.

  It was like running on a treadmill. The Planeteers were making good speed,but were actually staying in the same place relative to the sun'sposition, keeping the turning asteroid between them and the sun.

  Rip and Kemp ran forward until they were right at the sun line. Then theyslowed down, holding position and waiting for the crystal they had chosento reach them. As it came across the sun line into darkness they stoppedrunning and rode the crystal through the shadow until it reached the sunagain. Then the two Planeteers ran back across the dark zone to meet thecrystal as it came around again. There was only a few minutes' workingtime each revolution.

  Kemp worked fast, and the first hole deepened. Rip helped as best he couldby pushing away the chunks of thorium that Kemp cut free, but it wasessentially a one-man job.

  As Kemp neared the bottom of the first hole, Rip reviewed his plan andrealized he had overlooked something. These weren't nuclear bombs; theywere simple tubes of chemical fuel. The tubes wouldn't destroy the holeKemp was cutting.

  He reached a quick decision and called Koa to join them. Koa appeared asKemp pulled his torch from the hole and started running again to avoid thesun. Rip and Koa ran right along with him, crossing the dark zone to meetthe crystal as it came around again.

  "There's no reason to drill three holes," Rip explained as they ran."We'll use one hole for all three charges. They don't have to be fired allat once."

  "How do we fire them?" Koa asked.

  "Electrically. Who has the exploders and the hand dynamo?"

  "Dowst has the exploders. One of the Connies is carrying the dynamo."

  Speaking of the Connies ... Rip hadn't seen the Consops cruiser recently.He looked up, searching for its exhaust, and finally found it, a faintline some distance away.

  The Connie commander was stalemated for the time being. He couldn't landhis cruiser on a spinning asteroid, and he had no more boats. Rip thoughthe probably was just waiting around for any opportunity that might presentitself.

  The Federation cruisers should be arriving. He studied his chronometer.No, the nearest one, the _Sagittarius_ from Mercury, wasn't due foranother ten minutes or so. He turned up his helmet communicator andordered all hands to watch for the exhaust of a nuclear drive cruiser,then turned it down again and gave Koa instructions.

  "Have Trudeau turn his load over to a Connie and collect the exploders andthe dynamo. We'll need wire, too. Who has that?"

  "Another Connie."

  "Get a reel. Cut off a few hundred feet and connect the dynamo to one endand an exploder to the other."

  The crystal came around again and Kemp got to work. Rip stood by, againreviewing all steps. They couldn't afford to make a mistake. He had nomargin of error.

  Kemp finished the hole a few seconds before the crystal turned into thesunlight again. Rip told him to keep the torch going. There might be somelast minute cutting to do. Then the lieutenant hurried off at an angle towhere Dominico was plodding along with the fuel tubes.

  Koa had turned the tube he carried over to a Connie. Rip got it, and toldDominico to follow him. Then he angled back across the asteroid to whereKemp was holding position.

  The asteroid turned twice before Koa arrived. He had a coil of wire slungover his arm and he carried the dynamo in one hand and an exploder in theother, the two connected by the wire.

  Rip took the exploder. "Uncoil the wire," he directed. "Go to its fulllength at right angles to the hole. We have to time this exactly right.When the crystal comes around again, I'll shove the tube into the hole,then scurry for cover. When I'm clear I'll yell and you pump the dynamo.Dominico and Kemp stay with Koa. Make sure no one is in the way of theblast."

  Koa unreeled the wire, moving away from Rip. The lieutenant pushed theexploder into one end of the fuel tube and crimped it tightly with hisgloved hand.

  Koa and the others were as far away as they could get now, the wirestretching between them and Rip. Kemp had made sure no one was runningnear the line of blast.

  Rip watched for the crystal. It would be coming around any second now. Heheld the tube with
the exploder projecting behind him, ready for the holeto appear.

  Koa's voice echoed in his helmet. "All set, Lieutenant."

  "So am I," Rip answered. "Stand by."

  The crystal appeared across the sun line and moved toward him. He met it,slowed his speed, put the end of the tube into the hole and shoved. Kemphad allowed enough clearance. The tube slid into place. Rip turned andangled off as fast as he could glide. When he was far enough away from theblast line he called, "Fire!"

  "Fire!" Called Rip]

  "Fire!" Called Rip

  Koa squeezed the dynamo handle. The machine whined and current shotthrough the wire. A column of orange fire spurted from the crystal.

  Rip watched the stars instead of the exhaust. He kept running as it burnedsoundlessly. In air, the noise would have deafened him. In airless space,there was nothing to carry the sound.

  The apparent motion of the stars was definitely slowing. The spinningwouldn't cease entirely, but it would slow down enough to give them moretime to work.

  The tube reached brennschluss and Rip called orders. "Same process. Getready to repeat. Dominico, bring one of your tubes."

  While Koa was connecting another exploder to the wire, Rip took a tubefrom Dominico. "Take your space knife and saw through the tube you haveleft. We'll need about three-fifths of it. Keep both pieces."

  Dominico pulled his knife, pressed the release, and the gas capsule shotthe blade out. He got to work.

  Koa called that he was ready. Rip took the wired exploder from him andthrust it into the tube Dominico had given him.

  As the crystal came around again, the process was repeated. The hole wasundamaged.

  There was more time to get clear because of the asteroid's slower speed.The second tube slowed the rock even more, so that they had to wait longminutes while the crystal came around again.

  Rip did some estimating. He wanted to be sure the next charge would donothing more than slow the asteroid to a stop. If the charge were tooheavy, it would reverse the spin. He didn't want to make a career ofrunning on the asteroid. He was tired and he knew his men were gettingweary, too. He could see it in their strides--they were less sure oL foot.

  He decided it would be best to use a little less fuel rather than a littlemore. If the asteroid failed to stop its spin completely, they couldalways set off a small charge or two.

  "Hold it," he ordered. "We'll use the small end of Dominico's tube andsave the big one."

  The fuel was a solid mass, so cutting the tube in two sections caused nodifficulty. Rip pushed the exploder into the small section, seated it inthe hole, and hurried to cover. As he watched the fuel burn, he wonderedwhy the last nuclear charge had started the spin. He had made a mistakesomewhere. The earlier blasts had been set so they wouldn't cause a spin.He made a mental note to look at the place where the charge had explodedwhen things were more quiet.

  The rocket fuel slowed the asteroid down to a point where it was barelyturning, and Rip was glad he had been cautious. The heavier charge wouldhave reversed it a little. He directed the placing of a very small chargeand was moving away from it so Koa could set it off when Santos suddenlyyelled, "Sir! The Connie is coming!"

  Rip called, "Fire the charge, Koa," then looked up. The Consops cruiserwas moving slowly toward them. The canny Connie had been waiting forsomething to happen on the asteroid, Rip guessed. When the spinning slowedand then stopped, the Connie probably had decided that now was the timefor a final try.

  "Where is the communicator?" Rip asked Koa.

  "One of the Connies has it."

  "Get it. I'll notify Terra base of what happened."

  Koa found the Connie with the communicator, tested it to be sure theprisoner hadn't sabotaged it, and brought it to Rip.

  "This is Foster to Terra base. Over."

  "Come in, Foster."

  Rip explained briefly what had happened and asked, "How is our orbit? Ihaven't had time to take sightings."

  "You're free of the sun," Terra base answered. "Your orbit will have to becorrected sometime within the next few hours. The last blast pushed youoff course."

  "That's a small matter," Rip stated. "Unless we can think of somethingfast, this will be a Connie asteroid by then. The Consops cruiser ismoving in on us. He's careful, because he isn't sure of the situation. Buteven at his present speed he'll be here in ten minutes."

  "Stand by." Terra base was silent for a few moments, then the voicereplied. "I think we have an answer for you, Foster. Terra base off. Goahead, MacFife."

  A Scottish burr thick enough to saw boards came out of the communicator."Foster, this is MacFife, commander of the _Aquila_. Y'can't see me onaccount of I'm on yer sunny side. But, lad, I'm closer to ye than theConnie. We did it this way to keep the asteroid between us and him. Also,lad, if ye'll take a look up at Gemini, ye'll see somethin' ye'll like.Look at Alhena, in the Twins' feet. Then, lad, if ye'll be patient thewhile, ye'll have a grandstand seat for a real big show."

  Rip tilted his bubble back and stared upward at the constellation of thetwins. He said softly, "By Gemini!" For there, a half degree south of thestar Alhena, was the clean line of a nuclear cruiser's exhaust. The_Sagittarius_, out of Mercury, had arrived.

  He cut the communicator off for a moment and spoke exultantly to his men."Stand easy, you hairy Planeteers. Forget the Connie. He doesn't know it,but he's caught. He's caught between the Archer and the Eagle!"