They were flung off their feet again, this time backward along the boat.
As they picked themselves up, Seldar Glav was shaking his head, sadly.
"That was the ship going up," he said; "the blast must have caught us
dead astern."
"All right." Kalvar Dard rubbed a bruised forehead. "Set course for
Tareesh, then cut out the jets till we're ready to land. And get the
screens on, somebody; I want to see what's happened."
The screens glowed; then full vision came on. The planet on which they
would land loomed huge before them, its north pole toward them, and its
single satellite on the port side. There was no sign of any rocket-boat
in either side screen, and the rear-view screen was a blur of yellow
flame from the jets.
"Cut the jets, Glav," Dard repeated. "Didn't you hear me?"
"But I did, sir!" Seldar Glav indicated the firing-panel. Then he
glanced at the rear-view screen. "The gods help us! It's yellow flame;
the jets are burning out!"
Kalvar Dard had not boasted idly when he had said that his people would
not panic. All the girls went white, and one or two gave low cries of
consternation, but that was all.
"What happens next?" Analea wanted to know. "Do we blow, too?"
"Yes, as soon as the fuel-line burns up to the tanks."
"Can you land on Tareesh before then?" Dard asked.
"I can try. How about the satellite? It's closer."
"It's also airless. Look at it and see for yourself," Kalvar Dard
advised. "Not enough mass to hold an atmosphere."
Glav looked at the army officer with new respect. He had always been
inclined to think of the Frontier Guards as a gang of scientifically
illiterate dirk-and-pistol bravos. He fiddled for a while with
instruments on the panel; an automatic computer figured the distance to
the planet, the boat's velocity, and the time needed for a landing.
"We have a chance, sir," he said. "I think I can set down in about
thirty minutes; that should give us about ten minutes to get clear of
the boat, before she blows up."
"All right; get busy, girls," Kalvar Dard said. "Grab everything we'll
need. Arms and ammunition first; all of them you can find. After that,
warm clothing, bedding, tools and food."
With that, he jerked open one of the lockers and began pulling out
weapons. He buckled on a pistol and dagger, and handed other
weapon-belts to the girls behind him. He found two of the heavy
big-game rifles, and several bandoliers of ammunition for them. He
tossed out carbines, and boxes of carbine and pistol cartridges. He
found two bomb-bags, each containing six light anti-personnel grenades
and a big demolition-bomb. Glancing, now and then, at the forward
screen, he caught glimpses of blue sky and green-tinted plains below.
"All right!" the pilot yelled. "We're coming in for a landing! A couple
of you stand by to get the hatch open."
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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