"But it won’t take ten days," Rip pointed out. "It will only take a couple, and it won’t hurt us." MacFife had arrived to hear the last exchange. He nodded sympathetically. "Doctor, I can appreciate how the lad feels. He started something and he wants to finish it. If y’can let him, safely, I think ye should." The doctor shrugged. "I can let him. There’s a nine to one chance it will do him no harm. But the one chance is what I don’t like." "I’ll know it if the suppressives start to wear off, won’t I?" Rip asked. "You certainly will. You’ll get weaker rapidly." "How rapidly?" "Perhaps six hours. Perhaps more." Rip nodded. "That’s what I thought. Doctor, we’re less than six hours from Terra by ship. If the stuff wears off, we can be in the hospital within a couple of hours. Once we go into a braking ellipse, we can reach a hospital in less than an hour by snapper-boat." "Let him go," MacFife said. The doctor wasn’t happy about it, but he had run out of arguments. "All right, Commander. If you’ll assume responsibility for getting him off the asteroid and into a Terra or space platform hospital in time." "I’ll do that," MacFife assured him. "Now get your hyposprays and fill him full of that stuff you use. The corporal, too." "Sergeant," Rip corrected. His first action on getting back to the asteroid would be to recommend Santos’s promotion to Terra base. He intended to recommend Kemp for corporal, too. He was sure the Planeteers at Terra would make the promotions. The two Federation cruisers were still holding course along with the asteroid, the Connie cruiser between them. Within an hour, Rip and Santos, both in false good health thanks to medical magic, were on their way back to the asteroid in a ball-bat boat. [Illustration: "Let Him Go Back to the Asteroid, Doctor."] "Let Him Go Back to the Asteroid, Doctor." The remaining time passed quickly. The sun receded. The Planeteers corrected course. Rip sent in his recommendations for promotions, and looked over the last nuclear crater to see why the blast had started the asteroid spinning. The reason could only be guessed. The blast probably had opened a fault in the crystal, allowing the explosion to escape partially in the wrong direction. Once the course was corrected, Rip calculated the position for the final nuclear charge. When the asteroid reached the correct position relative to earth, the charge would not only change its course but slow its speed somewhat. The asteroid would go around the earth in a series of ever-tightening ellipses, using Terra’s gravity, plus rocket fuel, to slow it down to the right orbital speed. When it reached the proper position, tubes of rocket fuel would change the course again, putting it into an orbit around the earth close to the space platform. It wasn’t practical to take the thorium rock in for a landing. They would lose control and the asteroid would flame to earth like the greatest meteor ever to hit the planet.