Steve would have found their adventure a lot of fun if things weren’t so serious at the moment. It wasn’t every day that a boy had the chance to drive a giant rocket sled on a distant planet! At last Steve saw the round top of the space ship just over the horizon. It was at that moment that Sue called out the good news: “Biff’s awakening, Steve!” The boy saw their friend slowly rise up, then shake his head to clear it. When he smiled at them in his pleasant way, they were sure that he was going to be all right. By the time they had told him what had happened, he was his old self again. He took the controls and looked at his watch. “Time’s running out,” he said. “We’ve got to hit top speed again. Hold onto your helmets! Here we go!” And off they went at lightning speed once more. It seemed to Steve as if they covered the distance between them and the space ship in seconds. As the sled came to a gentle stop beneath the giant freighter, Biff said, “It looks like we’ll make our Thanksgiving dinner on time after all, doesn’t it, kids?” “Yeah,” Steve answered, “and this is certainly one Thanksgiving that I’m really thankful!” “I know what you mean, Steve,” Sue said thoughtfully. “We’re thankful that we’re alive!” Biff and Steve both nodded. It was a holiday none of them would ever forget. _CARGO FOR CALLISTO_ The big rocket freighter was speeding through the star dust of outer space. It was carrying supplies to Callisto (one of the twelve moons of Jupiter) and the Shannons, on another space adventure. Steve and Sue looked out a window of the freighter at the airless world growing in size. Callisto was a gigantic roughened rock, but it was a globe larger than the planet Mercury. It reminded Steve of a giant cockle-burr hanging in the sky. Suddenly the children heard a tiny voice behind them say, “Rocket away!” They turned and Sue exclaimed, “It’s Bud!” The blue parakeet, a budgy, blinked lazily at them. The twins had met Mr. Whittle’s pet a week ago. He had taken a liking to them from the very start. They didn’t know that a few hours from now their very lives would depend on this little fellow. “We’d better take him back to Mr. Whittle,” Steve said. The budgy kept studying them with his flat face and blinking his tiny button eyes. Then he squawked again, “Rocket away!” “It’ll be ‘rocket away’ for you, young fellow!” Steve said sternly. “Up on my finger, Bud!” The bird did as he was ordered. They took him down the hall to Mr. Whittle’s room. Bud’s owner, off duty now, was a tall, spidery crewman with a big Adam’s apple. He always gave his pet full run of the ship. Mr. Whittle whistled to the parakeet, but the bird stayed on Steve’s finger. Mr. Whittle chuckled. “Hey, I believe he likes you two better than his master!” “We like him, too,” Sue told the crewman. “You can keep him for a few days if you want to,” Mr. Whittle said. “I’m going to be pretty busy after we land.”