III It took three months to make the Aspera spaceworthy again, and when I had bought the shielded tele-camera, vitanalyzer, and the other little toys I would need to prove that there was a pirate hideout in Callisto, my bank account was within saluting distance of absolute zero. This was space-ratting for fair, without even a chance for paydirt at the end of the orbit. And Translunar, or any other outfit, wouldn't have me even as a swamp hog after this. I was the smart Joe who was going to have me a Career. You never know. I stopped at Phobos to fill up on reactant. I didn't mean to land on Callisto. I didn't even mean to be seen if I could help it, but still I might have some dodging to do, and full tanks could be nice to have. For the same reason I put in a new power slug, because the emission had begun to go a little soft on the way out from Luna City. With the salvage of the old one, that left me just enough for a couple of highballs at the port canteen. I thought I needed them more than two loose coins. I left the slug monkey grumbling about having to root around among the obsolete parts to find a Group VI slug, and headed for the bar. Let him grumble. The Aspera was still a good ship, even if she didn't have the tungsil tubes it takes to handle Group IV fissionables. Wait a minute! Maybe he got tired of rooting and put in a Group IV slug just out of laziness and ignorance. I made my way back to the power shack, cracked the case, and took a look through the periscope. The IV on the can was as big as a house. Well, when I got back I would be able to prove to Betty that I was right about trained personnel not being wasted in the engineering department. If I got back. Seven and a half years in a space can is a horrible thought, but to do it in free fall is out of the question. I swung a pair of steering rockets to tangent position and cranked up enough rotation to give me a few pounds of weight. That made a mess out of the visual screens, but the radek would still let me know if anything came close enough to worry about, and this way a cup of coffee would at least stay in the cup. I brewed a pot of it, stuffed a pipe full of tobacco, and started to settle down to do my time. I don't know how many days later it was that the radek began to groan. I quit counting days after the first week--if I needed the date I could get it off the chronograph. The signal was feeble, but I took the twist off her to get a fix on what it was. The radek gave the range as extreme--nearly a million miles--and anything that would trip the relay at that range must be big. After a few sweeps I found it in the scope, and it showed a perceptible disk. That meant an asteroid. I didn't know which one--the General Emphemeris of the asteroids hasn't been published yet. * * * * *