E-text prepared by Greg Weeks, Mary Meehan, and the Project Gutenberg Online Distributed Proofreading Team (http://www.pgdp.net/) A Golden Griffon Space Adventure RIP FOSTER IN RIDE THE GRAY PLANET by BLAKE SAVAGE Golden Press New York Golden Griffon TM of Western Publishing Company, Inc. Copyright 1952 by Western Publishing Company, Inc. All rights reserved. Printed in the U.S.A. Published by Golden Press, New York, N.Y. First Golden Griffon Printing, 1969 TABLE OF CONTENTS CHAPTER ONE: Spacebound CHAPTER TWO: Rake That Radiation! CHAPTER THREE: Capture and Drive! CHAPTER FOUR: Find the Needle! CHAPTER FIVE: The Gray World CHAPTER SIX: Rip's Planet CHAPTER SEVEN: Earthbound! CHAPTER EIGHT: Duck--or Die! CHAPTER NINE: Repel Invaders! CHAPTER TEN: Get the Scorpion! CHAPTER ELEVEN: Hard Words CHAPTER TWELVE: Mercury Transit CHAPTER THIRTEEN: Peril! CHAPTER FOURTEEN: Between Two Fires CHAPTER FIFTEEN: The Rocketeers CHAPTER SIXTEEN: Ride the Planet! CHAPTER SEVENTEEN: Visitors! CHAPTER EIGHTEEN: Courtesy--With Claws CHAPTER NINETEEN: Spacefall CHAPTER TWENTY: On the Platform CHAPTER ONE Spacebound A thousand miles above Earth's surface the great space platform sped from daylight into darkness. Once every two hours it circled the earth completely, spinning along through space like a mighty wheel of steel and plastic. Through a telescope on Earth the platform looked to be a lifeless, lonely disk, but within it, hundreds of spacemen and Planeteers went about their work. In a ready room at the outer edge of the platform, a Planeteer officer faced a dozen slim, black-clad young men who wore the single golden orbits of lieutenants. This was a graduating class, already commissioned, having a final informal get-together. The officer, who wore the three-orbit insignia of a major, was lean and trim. His short-cropped hair covered his head like a gray fur skull cap. One cheek was marked with the crisp whiteness of an old radiation burn. "Stand easy," he ordered briskly. "The general instructions of the Special Order Squadrons say that it's my duty as senior officer to make a farewell speech. I intend to make a speech if it kills me--and you, too." The dozen new officers facing him broke into grins. Maj. Joe Barris had been their friend, teacher, and senior officer during six long years of training on the space platform. He could no more make a formal speech than he could breathe high vacuum, and they all knew it. Lt. Richard Ingalls Peter Foster, whose initials had given him the nickname "Rip," asked, "Why don't you sing for us instead, Joe?" Major Barris fixed Rip with a cold eye. "Foster, three orbital turns, then front and center." Rip obediently spun around three times, then walked forward and stood at attention, trying to conceal his grin. "Foster, what does SOS mean?" "Special Order Squadrons, sir." "Right. And what else does it mean?"