sir!" Stevens was the top Planeteer,
commanding officer of all the Special Order Squadrons.

"We've piped this circuit into every channel in the system," the colonel
said. "Every Planeteer in the Squadrons is listening and rooting for you.
Is there anything we can do?"

"Yes, sir," Rip replied. "Do you know if Terra base has been plotting our
course this far?"

There was a brief silence, then the colonel answered, "Yes, Foster. We
have a complete track from the time you started showing on the Terra
screens, about halfway between the orbits of Mars and Earth."

"Did you just get our change of direction?"

"Yes. We're following you on the screens."

"Then, sir, I'd appreciate it if you'd put the calculators to work and
make a time-distance plot for the next few hours. The blast we're saving
to push to escape velocity is about three kilotons. Let us know the last
moment when we can fire."

"You will have it within fifteen minutes. Anything else, Foster?"

"Nothing else I can think of, sir."

"Then, good luck. We'll be standing by."

"Yes, sir. Foster off."

Rip disconnected and turned up his helmet communicator, repeating the
conversation to his men. Koa came and stood beside him. "Lieutenant,
how do we set off this next charge?"

There was only one way. When the time came to blast, they would be too
close to the sun to take to the boats. The blast had to be set off
from the asteroid.

"We'll get underground as far away from the bomb as we can," Rip said. He
surveyed the dark side, which was rapidly growing less dark. "I think the
second crater will do. Kemp can square it off on the side toward the
blast to give us a vertical wall to hide behind."

Koa looked doubtful. "Plenty of radiation left in those holes, sir."

Rip grinned mirthlessly. "Radiation is the least of our problems. I'd
rather get an overdose of gamma then get blasted into space."

A yell rang in his helmet. "Here comes the Connie!"

Rip looked up, startled. The Consops cruiser passed directly overhead,
about ten miles away. It was decelerating rapidly. Rip wondered why they
hadn't spotted it earlier, then realized the Connie had come from the
direction of the hot side.

The enemy cruiser was probably the same one that had attacked them
before. He must have lain in wait for days, keeping between the sun
and Terra. That way, the screens wouldn't pick him up, since very few
observatories scanned the sun with regularity. To the observator