to do?"

"I don't have to do anything, sir," answered Tom, nodding to the solar
clock over his head. "In nine minutes and twenty seconds, the reactor
units go off automatically at one-second intervals."

Roger and Astro entered the control deck and came to attention. Connel
returned their salute and put them at ease.

"All right, our work here is done," said Connel. "No point in hanging
around any longer. Tom, you can blast off immediately."

"Yes, sir," replied Tom.

Connel climbed the ladder to the radar bridge to contact Space Academy.
Astro, Roger, Shinny, and Alfie went to their posts and began quick
preparations for the blast-off. One by one, they checked in to Tom on
the control deck.

"Power deck, ready to blast off!" reported Astro.

"Radar bridge, all set. Clear trajectory forward and up," said Roger.

"Energize the cooling pumps!" bawled Tom into the intercom.

The great pumps began to wheeze under the strain of Astro's sudden
switch to full load without the usual slow build-up. Tom watched the
pressure needle rise slowly in front of him and finally reached out and
gripped the master switch.

"Stand by to raise ship!" he yelled. "Blast off minus
five--four--three--two--one--_zeroooooo!_"

He threw the switch. The great ship shivered, vibrated, and then
suddenly shot away from the precious satellite. Tom quickly adjusted for
free fall by switching on the synthetic-gravity gyro generators and then
announced over the intercom,

"Major Connel! Cadet Corbett reporting. Ship space-borne at exactly
thirty-one, sir!"

"Very well, Corbett," replied Connel. "Space Academy sends the crew a
'_well done!_' Everything's set back home to take over the beam as soon
as Junior starts on his way back. How much time until zero blast-off on
the satellite?"

Tom glanced at the clock. "Less than two minutes, sir!"

"All right," said Connel over the intercom, "everybody to the control
deck if you want to see Junior do his stuff!"

In a moment the six spacemen were gathered around the magnascope waiting
for the final act of their great effort. Breathlessly, their eyes
flicking back and forth from the solar clock to the magnascope, they
waited for the red hand to sweep around.

"Here it comes," said Tom excitedly. "One second--two
seconds--three--four--_five!_"

On the surface of the planetoid, giant mushrooming clouds appeared
climbing into the airless void. One by one the reactor units exploded.
Connel count