head creased in a frown as he saw that only a few seconds remained
to departure time. He walked to the valve opening and looked out. If his
passengers were not in sight, he would have to reset the clock.

Rip went through the valve opening at top speed. He crashed head on into
the safety officer.

The safety officer was driven across the deck, his arms pumping for
balance. He grabbed at the nearest thing, which happened to be the deputy
cruiser commander.

The preset clock reached firing time. The valve slid shut and the takeoff
bell reverberated through the ship.

And so it happened that the spacemen of the SCN _Scorpius_ turned their
valves, threw their controls and disengaged their boron control rods, and
the great cruiser flashed into space--while the deputy commander and the
safety officer were completely tangled with a very flustered and unhappy
new Planeteer lieutenant.

Sergeant Major Koa and his men had made it before the valve closed. Koa,
a seven-foot Hawaiian, took in the situation and said crisply in a voice
all could hear, "I'll bust the bubble of any son of a space sausage who
laughs!"

CHAPTER TWO

Rake That Radiation!

The deputy commander and the safety officer got untangled and hurried to
their post, with no more than black looks at Rip. He got to his feet, his
face crimson with embarrassment. A fine entrance for a Planeteer officer,
especially one on his first orders!

Around him the spacemen were settling in their acceleration seats or
snapping belts to safety hooks. From the direction of the stern came a
rising roar as methane, heated to a liquid, dropped into the blast tubes,
flaming into pure carbon and hydrogen under the terrible heat of the
atomic drive.

Rip had to lean against the acceleration. Fighting for balance, he picked
up his spack and made his way to the nine enlisted Planeteers. They had
braced against the ship's drive by sitting with backs against bulkheads
or by lying flat on the magnesium deck. Sergeant Major Koa was seated
against a vertical brace, his brown face wreathed in a grin.

Rip looked him over carefully. There was a saying among the Planeteers
that an officer was only as good as his senior sergeant. Koa's looks were
reassuring. His face was good-humored, but he had a solid jaw and a mouth
that could get tough when necessary. Rip wondered a little at his size.
Big men usually didn't go to space; they were too subject to space
sickness. Koa must be a