The Past Through Tomorrow Part 27

"Glad to know you, Pilot. Kind of you, and all that."

"What would you like to see, Judge?" Jake said carefully.

"Oh, this and that. It's for the boy-his first trip. I'm an old s.p.a.cehound myself-probably more hours than half your crew." He laughed. Pemberton did not.

"There's not much to see in free flight."

"Quite all right. We'll just make ourselves at home-eh, Captain?"

"I wanna sit in the control seat," Schacht Junior announced.

Pemberton winced. Kelly said urgently, "Jake, would you mind outlining the control system for the boy? Then we'll go."

"He doesn't have to show me anything. I know all about it. I'm a Junior Rocketeer of America-see my b.u.t.ton?" The boy shoved himself toward the control desk.

Pemberton grabbed him, steered him into the pilot's chair, and strapped him in. He then flipped the board's disconnect.

"Whatcha doing?"

"I cut off power to the controls so I could explain them."

"Aintcha gonna fire the jets?"

"No." Jake started a rapid description of the use and purpose of each b.u.t.ton, dial, switch, meter, gimmick, and scope.

Junior squirmed. "How about meteors?" he demanded.

"Oh, that-maybe one collision in half a million EarthMoon trips. Meteors are scarce."

"So what? Say you hit the jackpot? You're in the soup."

"Not at all. The anti-collision radar guards all directions five hundred miles out. If anything holds a steady bearing for three seconds, a direct hook-up starts the jets. First a warning gong so that everybody can grab something solid, then one second later - Boom! - We get out of there fast."

"Sounds corny to me. Lookee, I'll show you how Commodore Cartwright did it in The Comet Busters-"

"Don't touch those controls!"

"You don't own this s.h.i.+p. My pop says-"

"Oh, Jake!" Hearing his name; Pemberton twisted, fish-like, to face Kelly.

"Jake, Judge Schacht would like to know-" From the corner of his eye Jake saw the boy reach for the board. He turned, started to shout-acceleration caught him, while the jets roared in his ear.

An old s.p.a.cehand can usually recover, catlike, in an unexpected change from weightlessness to acceleration. But Jake had been grabbing for the boy, instead of for anchorage. He fell back and down, twisted to try to avoid Schacht, banged his head on the frame of the open air-tight door below, and fetched up on the next deck, out cold. - Kelly was shaking him. ".You all right, Jake?"

He sat up. "Yeah. Sure." He became aware of the thunder, the s.h.i.+vering deckplates. "The jets! Cut the power!"

He shoved Kelly aside and swarmed up into the control room, jabbed at the cut-off b.u.t.ton. In sudden ringing silence, they were again weightless.

Jake turned, unstrapped Schacht Junior, and hustled him to Kelly. "Captain, please remove this menace from my control room."

"Leggo! Pop-he's gonna hurt me!"

The elder Schacht bristled at once. "What's the meaning of this? Let go of my son!"

"Your precious son cut in the jets."

"Junior-did you do that?"

The boy s.h.i.+fted his eyes. "No, Pop. It . . . it was a meteor."

Schacht looked puzzled. Pemberton snorted. "I had just told him how the radar-guard can blast to miss a meteor. He's lying."

Schacht ran through the process he called "making up his mind", then answered, "Junior never lies. Shame on you, a grown man, to try to put the blame on a helpless boy. I shall report you, sir. Come, Junior."

Jake grabbed his arm. "Captain, I want those controls photographed for fingerprints before this man leaves the room. It was not a meteor; the controls were dead, until this boy switched them on. Furthermore the anti-collision circuit sounds an alarm."

Schacht looked wary. "This is ridiculous. I simply objected to the slur on my son's character. No harm has been done."

"No harm, eh? How about broken arms-or necks? And wasted fuel, with more to waste before we're back in the groove. Do you know, Mister 'Old s.p.a.cehound,' just how precious a little fuel will be when we try to match orbits with s.p.a.ce Terminal-if we haven't got it? We may have to dump cargo to save the s.h.i.+p, cargo at $60,000 a ton on freight charges alone. Fingerprints will show the Commerce Commission whom to nick for it."

When they were alone again Kelly asked anxiously, "You won't really have to jettison? You've got a maneuvering reserve."

"Maybe we can't even get to Terminal. How long did she blast?"

Kelly scratched his head. "I was woozy myself."

"We'll open the accelerograph and take a look."

Kelly brightened. "Oh, sure! If the brat didn't waste too much, then we just swing s.h.i.+p and blast back the same length of time."

Jake shook his head. "You forgot the changed ma.s.s-ratio."

"Oh ... oh, yes!" Kelly looked embarra.s.sed. Ma.s.s-ratio under power, the s.h.i.+p lost the weight of fuel burned. The thrust remained constant; the ma.s.s it pushed shrank. Getting back to proper position, course, and speed became a complicated problem in the calculus of ballistics. "But you can do it, can't you?"

"I'll have to. But I sure wish I had Weinstein here."

Kelly left to see about his pa.s.sengers; Jake got to work. He checked his situation by astronomical observation and by radar. Radar gave him all three factors quickly but with limited accuracy. Sights taken of Sun, Moon, and Earth gave him position, but told nothing of course and speed, at that time-nor could he afford to wait to take a second group of sights for the purpose.

Dead reckoning gave him an estimated situation, by adding Weinstein's predictions to the calculated effect of young Schacht's meddling. This checked fairly well with the radar and visual observations, but still he had no notion of whether or not he could get back in the groove and reach his destination; it was now necessary to calculate what it would stake and whether or not the remaining fuel would be enough to brake his speed and match orbits.

In s.p.a.ce, it does no good to reach your journey's end if you flash on past at miles per second, or even crawling along at a few hundred miles per hour. To catch an egg on a plate - don't b.u.mp!

He started doggedly to work to compute how to do it using the least fuel, but his little Marchant electronic calculator was no match for the tons of IBM computer at Supra-New York, nor was he Weinstein. Three hours later he had an answer of sorts. He called Kelly. "Captain? You can start by jettisoning Schacht & Son."

"I'd like to. No way out, Jake?"

"I can't promise to get your s.h.i.+p in safely without dumping. Better dump now, before we blast. It's cheaper."

Kelly hesitated; he would as cheerfully lose a leg. "Give me time to pick out what to dump."

"Okay." Pemberton returned sadly to his figures, hoping to find a saving mistake, then thought better of it. He called the radio room. "Get me Weinstein at Supra-New York."

"Out of normal range."

"I know that. This is the Pilot. Safety priority-urgent. Get a tight beam on them and nurse it."

"Uh . . . aye aye, sir. I'll try."

Weinstein was doubtful. "Cripes, Jake, I can't pilot you."

"Dammit, you can work problems for me!"

"What good is seven-place accuracy with b.u.m data?"

"Sure, sure. But you know what instruments I've got; you know about how well I can handle them. Get me a better answer."

"I'll try." Weinstein called back four hours later. "Jake? Here's the dope: You planned to blast back to match your predicted speed, then made side corrections for position. Orthodox but uneconomical. Instead I had Mabel solve for it as one maneuver."

"Good!"

"Not so fast. It saves fuel but not enough. You can't possibly get back in your old groove - and then match T without dumping."

Pemberton let it sink in, then said, "I'll tell Kelly."

"Wait a minute, Jake. Try this. Start from scratch."

"Huh?"

"Treat it as a brand-new problem. Forget about the orbit on your tape. With your present course, speed, and position compute the cheapest orbit to match with Terminal's. Pick it!, new groove."

Pemberton felt foolish. "I never thought of that."

"Of course not. With the s.h.i.+p's little one-lung calculator it'd take you three weeks to solve it. You set to record?"

"Sure."

"Here's your data." Weinstein started calling it off. When they had checked it, Jake said, "That'll get me there?"

"Maybe. If the data you gave me is up to your limit of accuracy; if you can follow instructions as exactly as a robot, if you can blast off and make contact so precisely that you don't need side corrections, then you might squeeze home. Maybe. Good luck, anyhow." The wavering reception m.u.f.fled their goodbyes.

Jake signaled Kelly. "Don't jettison, Captain. Have your pa.s.sengers strap down. Stand by to blast. Minus fourteen minutes."

"Very well, Pilot."

The new departure made and checked, he again had time to spare. He took out his unfinished letter, read it, then tore it up.

"Dearest Phyllis," he started again, "I've been doing some hard thinking this trip and have decided that I've just been stubborn. What am I doing way out here? I like my home. I like to see my wife.

"Why should I risk my neck and your peace of mind to herd junk through the sky? Why hang around a telephone - waiting to chaperon fatheads to the Moon -numbskulls who couldn't pilot a rowboat and should have stayed at home in the first place?

"Money, of course. I've been afraid to risk a change. I won't find another job that will pay half as well, but, if you are game, I'll ground myself and we'll start over. All my love,"Jake"

He put it away and went to sleep, to dream that an entire troop of Junior Rocketeers had been quartered in his control room.

The closeup view of the Moon is second only to the s.p.a.ceside view of the Earth as a tourist attraction; nevertheless Pemberton insisted that all pa.s.sengers strap down during the swing around to Terminal. With precious little fuel for the matching maneuver, he refused to hobble his movements to please sightseers.

Around the bulge of the Moon, Terminal came into sight - by radar only, for the s.h.i.+p was tail foremost. After each short braking blast Pemberton caught a new radar fix, then compared his approach with a curve he had plotted from Weinstein's figures-with one eye on the time, another on the 'scope, a third on the plot, and a fourth on his fuel gages.

"Well, Jake?" Kelly fretted. "Do we make it?"

"How should I know? You be ready to dump." They had agreed on liquid oxygen as the cargo to dump, since it could be let boil out through the outer valves, without handling.

"Don't say it, Jake."

"d.a.m.n it-I won't if I don't have to." He was fingering his controls again; the blast chopped off his words. When it stopped, the radio maneuvering circuit was calling him.

"Flying Dutchman, Pilot speaking," Jake shouted back.

"Terminal Control-Supro reports you short on fuel."

"Right."

"Don't approach. Match speeds outside us. We'll send a transfer s.h.i.+p to refuel you and pick up pa.s.sengers."

"I think I can make it."

"Don't try it. Wait for refueling."

"Quit telling me how to pilot my s.h.i.+p!" Pemberton switched off the circuit, then stared at the board, whistling morosely. Kelly filled in the words in his mind: "Casey said to the fireman, 'Boy, you better jump, cause two locomotives are agoing to b.u.mp!'"

"You going in the slip anyhow, Jake?"

"Mmm-no, blast it. I can't take a chance of caving in the side of Terminal, not with pa.s.sengers aboard. But I'm not going to match speeds fifty miles outside and wait for a piggyback."

He aimed for a near miss just outside Terminal's...o...b..t, conning by instinct, for Weinstein's figures meant nothing by now. His aim was good; he did not have to waste his h.o.a.rded fuel on last minute side corrections to keep from hitting Terminal. When at last he was sure of sliding safely on past if unchecked, he braked once more. Then, as he started to cut off the power, the jets coughed, sputtered, and quit.

The Flying Dutchman floated in s.p.a.ce, five hundred yards outside Terminal, speeds matched.

Jake switched on the radio. "Terminal-stand by for my line. I'll warp her in."

He had filed his report, showered, and was headed for the post office to radiostat his letter, when the bullhorn summoned him to the Commodore-Pilot's office. Oh, oh, he told himself, Schacht has kicked the Bra.s.s-I wonder just how much stock that bliffy owns? And there's that other matter - getting snotty with Control.

He reported stiffly. "First Pilot Pemberton, sir."

Commodore Soames looked up. "Pemberton-oh, yes. You hold two ratings, s.p.a.ce-to-s.p.a.ce and airless-landing."