Trapped within the space taxi, Garry and Patch watched the darkness of
space enlarge before their eyes as the ship emerged from the air-lock
tunnel of the space station. The stars about them were countless lights,
some packed so closely together that they trailed across the sky like
distant streaming veils. But the boys had no eye for their beauty at
this time.
“Garry,” Patch asked in a dismal voice, “what’s going to happen to us?”
“As long as they have control of the ship, I guess we’ll be all right,”
Garry replied. “Maybe they are just sending the ship out on a practice
run or possibly to pick someone up.”
“Pick someone up?” Patch asked, puzzled.
“I was thinking of satellite workers or repairmen. The skies out here
are flooded with satellites, you know. They must have men working on
them all the time,” Garry explained.
Garry heard a hissing sound. He found a slit in the wall from which it
was coming. Near the opening was a gauge.
“That’s an oxygen mixture coming in,” Garry said. “It’s probably
automatic. It turns on whenever the air pressure drops or becomes
fouled.”
“That’s something in our favor,” Patch said grudgingly.
Garry found his feet beginning to lift weightlessly off the floor. His
body sagged off balance, and he had to hold onto a handle on one of the
seats.
“Garry, what’ll we do?” Patch exclaimed frantically. “We’re going
weightless!”
“Let’s look for a wardrobe compartment,” Garry suggested. “Since these
fliers are used as lifeboats sometimes, there must be space suits and
things. Maybe we’ll find magnetic shoes, too.”
“How’ll we ever get around in here to look for anything?” Patch
sputtered. By now he was floating, his legs and arms flailing helplessly
like a bug on its back.
Using the handles on the backs of the seats, Garry worked his way across
to a cabinet set in the wall. Then he moved from the last seat handle to
the wall rail and worked himself down it to the plastic case. Through
the clear window Garry could see space suits and accessories. He pressed
a button, and the door popped open.
“We’re in luck, Patch,” Garry reported. “There are magnetic shoes in
here. I hope the gravity plates in the floor are working.”
Garry managed to pick up two pairs of the shoes, tucking one pair under
one arm. That left one hand holding the second pair and the other hand
free.
Even then, it took quite some doing for him to work his way across to
Patch, who looked like a pennant floating in the breeze as he hung
crossways in the air, one hand tightly clutching a seat handle.
“Garry, I don’t feel so good,” Patch complained. “Everything in me feels
like its pushing upward. Even my brain seems to be floating.”
“It’s lack of gravity doing that,” Garry said. “You are used to gravity
always pulling down on you. When that pull is gone, it makes you feel as
if your body is moving up. At least that’s what all the books say. And I
believe them, because I feel that way myself. Here are your shoes.
They’re pretty big, but they’ll be better than nothing.”
“Garry, how’ll I ever get them on?” Patch protested.
“I’ll hold onto you while you put them on,” Garry offered. “That’ll make
it easier—I guess.”
Garry got behind Patch and held him by the collar. Then began Patch’s
struggles with the shoes. It was comical for Garry to see his friend
having such a hard time, but he knew Patch would have the laugh on him
later.
It took them both a good while to get the shoes on. When the floor
current of the gravity plates finally held them down, the boys laughed
at each other in their oversized equipment.
“I guess we look like snowshoe rabbits with our big feet!” Patch said
with a laugh. “Good thing those straps pulled up tight, or we’d never be
able to keep them on.”
The craft had been moving along smoothly, but before long it began to
shudder irregularly.
“The jets have cut out, Patch,” Garry said. “We’re coasting. Without any
air friction out here in space, we _could_ coast along forever.”
“Garry, don’t say that!” Patch gasped.
But Garry found out that his guess was wrong, and he was glad that it
had been. Presently, twin jets of flame were seen pouring from the front
of the craft.
“Garry, we’re on fire!” Patch shouted.
“No, they’re the braking jets,” Garry corrected. “We’re being slowed
down, Patch! I think we’ll find out very soon now what our destination
is.”
“Thank goodness for that,” Patch replied. “You know, you got me plenty
worried when you said that we might coast forever out here. Although
after about a hundred years I probably wouldn’t mind any longer!”
“Look, Patch,” Garry cried. “Up ahead—a satellite! That must be where
we’re headed!”
As they approached, the craft still being slowed by the braking jets,
Garry and Patch took in the scene before them. The satellite itself
somewhat resembled a giant radio speaker. Its largest area was a huge
reflecting surface, and this surface was made up of adjustable panels
that could be banked in any direction. The boys could see around the
side of the satellite, and backing up the front broad surface was a
block-shaped structure with windows.
As the tiny space craft drew closer, the boys saw a hatch open in the
rear structure, and two men in space suits emerged, holding onto hand
rails on the outside of the satellite.
“That’s one of the radio and TV relay satellites, Patch,” Garry said.
“There are three of them, spaced equally around the earth, for relaying
TV and radio all over the world. Our ship has probably been sent out to
pick up these men and bring them back to the station.”
“Won’t they be surprised when they see us aboard?” Patch remarked.
Garry noticed that the space taxi seemed to be moving a little off
course, and this disturbed him, especially since one of the forward jets
had cut off but the other hadn’t.
The craft was veering steadily away from the satellite and slowing
rapidly. Finally, it came to a dead stop several hundred yards from the
satellite, but then it began backing up. As the craft gained speed in
reverse, Garry and Patch were nearly knocked off their feet from the
acceleration.
“The front jet is propelling us backward!” Garry cried. “There’s
something wrong with the remote control!”
The craft began going into a dizzy spin. The boys had to hold on tightly
to some anchored support to keep from being flung against the wall.
Garry watched the satellite become lost against the sprawling background
of stars. He knew they were hurtling farther out into space, out of
control, headed for a destination now that even the space-station
operators might not know.
The boys were so disheartened by the latest bad break that, for the time
being, they did not care what happened to them. This lowering of their
spirits seemed to remind them that they were a long time past their
slumber time, and they suddenly became very sleepy. By earth time, it
would be the dark hours before dawn.
They went to sleep on their feet, because in the zero gravity there was
no need for them to lie down. Their magnetic soles held them in place to
keep them from drifting about as they slept.
Garry was the first to wake up, hours later. There was no way for him to
know how much time had passed. He woke his friend, who stretched and
yawned.
“I never thought I’d be able to sleep standing up,” Patch said. “I feel
like a horse.”
“We got a good rest,” Garry said. “I guess that’s because of the zero
gravity.”
Patch looked gloomily out of the front port of the flier. “We’re still
no better off than we were before, though, Garry, but, I think we have
stopped moving.”
Garry shook his head. “It just seems like we’re not moving because the
stars and everything else around us are so still. We’re moving all
right—and fast. This ship may still be moving after we’re dead, even if
we could live for a hundred years, because there’s nothing ever to slow
us down out here; that is, unless we happened to move into the gravity
field of some planet, which would pull us down.”
“I knew we should have turned ourselves in when we had the chance,”
Patch said mournfully. “If we had, we wouldn’t be in this fix now.”
Garry agreed. “It’s all my fault for trying to hold out so long.”
“Well, too late now to do anything,” Patch said.
“I don’t think we should give up hope,” Garry said. “They might still
send out a ship to try to pick up this one. They know it’s lost, but of
course they don’t know there’s anybody in it, and they may not know
where to look for it.”
He investigated the sloping wall between him and the front window. The
middle of it was shaped something like an old-fashioned roll-top desk,
closed up.
“Hmm,” Garry thought to himself. “This ship has been run by remote
control until now, but why shouldn’t it have controls of its own? If it
does have them, they should be right here in front of me.”
Garry’s hopes soared again as he ran his hands over the light-green
plastic slope in front of him.
“A button,” he whispered. “There must be a button or something that
opens this thing up.”
“Hey, what’re you mumbling about?” Patch asked.
Garry was too concerned with what he was doing to answer his friend.
Suddenly, he found something on the left side of the instrument. It was
a button. He pressed it.
Two covers began swinging open in front of him, as stage curtains would
do, revealing a bank of dials and levers.
“Patch!” Garry shouted. “Look what!”
Patch came clicking over in his magnetic shoes. “Hey, they’re
instruments for running this crate! Why didn’t we think of looking for
them before?” he cried.
“Probably because we don’t know how to operate them,” Garry replied.
There was a half-circle steering wheel that pulled out, and the boys
were sure what this was for.
“Garry,” Patch said happily, “the steering wheel—that may be all that
we’ll need! Since the ship is moving under its own power, all we have to
do is turn her around and head back for the space station. We can keep
circling it until one of the ships from the station intercepts us!”
Garry tried the wheel. It was locked tight.
“It’s not that easy, Patch,” he said. “First we’ve got to find how to
unlock the wheel.”
“That ought not to be hard,” Patch replied. “A button or switch....”
They both began carefully examining the steering column and wheel, but
did not find anything that would release the wheel. Then they went over
the console panel very closely. They found switches and levers that
could not be identified, but they decided to try them anyhow and see
what they controlled.
They got no result at first, but, when the fourth switch was thrown, the
console lighted up and the ship began to throb with a new life.
“That must have been one of the power levers,” Garry said. “Look—the
steering wheel is free! The power had to be on before it would unlock
the wheel.”
“Garry!” Patch exclaimed, “we’re on our way! We’re on our way.”
“I hope my sense of direction is correct,” Garry said, “because I can’t
read those directional meters. I think we’ll be headed in the general
direction of the station if we make a half turn. I remember the position
of that brilliant nebula over there and also the planet Venus.”
Garry was beginning to turn the wheel slowly for their gradual turnabout
in the sky when the smell of something burning issued from the console.
“Hey, something seems to be shorting out,” Patch said in alarm. “Look!
There’s smoke coming from the panel!”
No sooner had he spoken than there was a small explosion inside the
console, a strong odor of ozone filled the boys’ nostrils, and all the
lights went out. But what was worse, the steering wheel froze in Garry’s
hands and locked again.
“Patch, we’re ruined!” Garry groaned loudly. “I must have done something
wrong!”
Garry put his hands over his face in despair. “Patch, we were so close,
so very close....”
“It looks like something just doesn’t want us to get out of this alive,”
Patch said bitterly. “We’re jinxed, Garry!”
“It’ll do no good to start feeling sorry for ourselves again,” Garry
said. “Remember, we thought we were goners before. Something may turn up
to save us—something maybe like a Good Samaritan flying around in a
space ship just looking for wandering boys. But how many of those do you
think you would find in all the millions of miles of space that surround
us?”
Suddenly Garry stood upright, staring intently straight out the forward
port. “Speaking of Good Samaritans, Patch, that might not be so
farfetched after all. Look out there, straight ahead. There’s a light
moving against the stars. It just might be a space ship!”
“I see it,” Patch said, with a trace of hope returning, “but it’s most
likely a Sputnik or Tiros or some other satellite.”
“I don’t think so. Its movement isn’t perfectly straight. I’m sure I
just saw it change direction as if heading this way. Patch, if you’ve
ever prayed, do it now. The next few minutes may decide whether we live
or die out here in space!”