Strong, his face showing hope for the first time in weeks, burned the teleceivers, flashing orders to the various elements of the search fleet to converge on the disabled Avenger.
"Attention! All ships in quadrants C through M and Q through B-l! Proceed full thrust to quadrant A-2, section fifty-nine. On approaching target you will signal standard surrender message, and if not obeyed, you will open fire!"
Behind him, the three cadets of the Polaris unit listened to the decisive words of their commander and then let out an earsplitting yell.
"No time for celebrating," barked Strong. "We haven't caught him yet. He's the slickest thing to hit this system since the reptiles climbed out of the Venusian mud! It's going to be a case of our getting him before he can disappear into the asteroid belt, so let's hit the high, wide, and deep!"
Five minutes later, Strong and the boys were aboard their ship.
"Ready to blast off, sir," reported Tom. The curly-haired cadet's face was still pale and drawn, showing the effects of his ordeal in space.
"Get me direct teleceiver contact with Captain Randolph on the rocket cruiser Sirius," ordered Strong.
"Yes, sir," replied Tom. He turned to flip on the teleceiver, and a moment later the captain's face appeared on the screen.
"Randolph here. What's up, Steve?"
"I've got Squadron Nineteen of the Martian reserve fleet heading for the last reported position of the Avenger now, Randy. I'll take the point position of your squadron and direct operations. I'll relay course to you as soon as we're in space."
"O.K., Steve," replied Randolph. "I'm ready to raise ship."
"I'll go up first. Form up around me at about five thousand miles. End transmission!"
"End transmission!"
"All right, Tom," ordered Strong, "let's get out of here!"
The young cadet strapped himself into his acceleration chair, then picked up the control panel intercom and began calling out orders crisply.
"Stand by to raise ship! All stations check in!"
"Power deck standing by!" replied Astro from below.
"Radar bridge standing by!" acknowledged Roger over the intercom.
"Energize the cooling pumps!"
The whine of the mighty pumps began to fill the ship almost as quickly as Astro acknowledged the order.
"Feed reactant!" snapped Strong, strapping himself in beside Tom.
A low-muted hiss joined the sound of the whining pumps as Tom opened the valves. "Reactant feeding at D-9 rate, sir," he reported.
"Roger," called Strong into the intercom, "do we have a clear trajectory?"
"Clear as space, skipper!" was Roger's breezy answer.
"All right, Tom," said Strong, "cut in take-off gyros."
The cadet closed the master switch on the control panel and the noise from the power deck below began to build to an unbearable crescendo!
Watching the sweeping second hand of the chronometer, Tom called out, "Blast off minus five—four—three—two—one—zero!"
With a mighty roar, all main rockets of the spaceship exploded into life. Shuddering under the sudden surge of power, the ship rose from the ground, accelerated at the rate of seven miles per second, and arrowed into the sky, space-borne!
On the Academy spaceport, ships of Squadron L began to blast off one by one behind the Polaris at ten-second intervals. Three rocket cruisers, six destroyers, and twelve rocket scouts. The explosive blast of one hardly rolling away across the surrounding hills before another deafening blast lifted the next space vessel away from Earth.
Aboard the Polaris, Roger was busy over the chart table plotting the course when Strong appeared at his side.
"Have that course for you in a minute, sir," said Roger. He turned to the astrogation prism and made careful observations of Regulus, the fixed star always used in astrogation. He jotted several numbers down on a piece of paper, rechecked them against a table of relative values and handed the papers to Strong.
The captain immediately opened the teleceiver and relayed the information to other ships of the squadron. After the Polaris had made the course change, the ships followed, taking positions all around the lead vessel.
Like fingers of a giant hand, the Solar Guard squadrons converged on the reported position of the disabled Avenger. From every ship, radar scanners probed the space ahead with invisible electronic fingers for contact with the target. On the Polaris, Strong, his nimble brain figuring Coxine's possibilities of escape, hunched over the chart table and worked at plotting alternate courses on which he could send pursuit squadrons on a moment's notice. One thing worried Strong, and that was if Coxine should repair his ship and make the security of the asteroid belt before they could reach him, it would be almost impossible to track him through that tortuous maze of space junk.
Squadron Ten was the first to sight the enemy spaceship, though it was too far away to attack. The commander reported his finding to Strong immediately.
"We still have quite a way to go before we reach him, Strong. But if our luck holds out, we might be able to pin him down in a wide circle."
Strong studied the chart and marked the position of the Avenger just reported. He compared the position to that of the other fleet ships and decided that they were still too far away to tighten a ring of armor around the pirate. Strong was well aware that if the Solar Guard could spot Coxine, he in turn could spot them. Luck, mused Strong to himself, was what they needed now. A little luck to keep the pirate from repairing his ship and disappearing into the asteroid belt. He grabbed the intercom and bawled orders.
"Power deck, emergency space speed. Control deck, relay that order to every ship converging on the Avenger's position!"
"What's up, sir?" asked Tom from below.
"One of the ships has spotted Coxine. He's apparently still out of commission, but we're too far away to hail him."
Strong began to pace the deck of the radar bridge, and with each turn, he glanced at the radar scanner where Roger was waiting anxiously for the telltale blip of the Avenger to appear.
Suddenly the blond-haired cadet stiffened. He peered at the scanner screen, then cried, "There he is, sir!" His finger pointed to a white outline on the scanner.
Strong took a quick look at the pirate's position and compared it to the positions of the converging fleet. He turned to the teleceiver and signaled for the immediate attention of all ships.
"This is Strong aboard the flagship Polaris! All ships will proceed according to attack plan seventeen—code nine. Use full power! Emergency thrust!"
As the minutes passed and the Solar Guard fleet plunged forward, the ships forged a solid wall of guns around the drifting pirate vessel. From above, below, and almost every compass point on the plan of the ecliptic, they closed in, deadly blasters aimed, gunners ready to fire.
"We've got him, sir!" breathed Roger. "He can't escape now! Not in a million light years!"
Captain Strong didn't reply. Eyes were glued to the scanner, watching the target and the Solar Guard squadrons, searching for every possible loophole in the trap. Suddenly he spoke into the teleceiver.
"Attention all ships! Maintain present range, reduce speed, and take englobement formation!"
In reply, the elements of the fleet smoothly reformed until they formed a giant wheel in space with the pirate ship as the hub. Around and around they flew, all inboard guns trained on the enemy.
As the command ship, the Polaris flew high over the formation. Strong checked the formation carefully on the scanner and nodded his satisfaction.
"I think we've done it now, Manning," he sighed. "Coxine doesn't have a chance of breaking through."
Roger looked unhappy. "Ah, it was too easy, sir," he grumbled. "I was counting on having some fun."
"After all these weeks of heartache, I'll skip the fun if you don't mind," said Strong wryly and turned to the intercom. "Tom, check in!"
"Aye, aye, sir!"
"Head for the Avenger. Close in!"
"You mean
we're going to lead the attack, sir?" Tom shouted in a sudden burst of enthusiasm.
"From the looks of things, I don't believe an attack will be necessary," replied Strong. "We're going alongside to accept Coxine's surrender. Start blasting!"
"Aye, aye, sir!"
As Tom's voice was heard over the intercom speaker, issuing orders to Astro for change of course, Strong turned back to Roger.
"Open up the audioceiver to all-wave transmission!"
"You going to talk to Coxine, sir?"
"Yes. And I hope he'll listen. If he doesn't, I'll do my talking with six-inch blasters!"
Roger quickly adjusted the settings on the audioceiver and then turned to his skipper.
"She's all yours, sir. Give it to him good!"
Strong smiled thinly and picked up the microphone.
"Attention, Bull Coxine! Attention, Bull Coxine!" Strong's voice was cold and hard. "This is Captain Strong of the Solar Guard! You're surrounded. You haven't a chance of escape. I demand your unconditional surrender! Acknowledge immediately!"
Strong flipped the key to open the receiver and waited for the reply. Roger moved closer, his eyes glued to the image of the pirate ship looming larger and larger on the scanner.
Fifteen seconds passed. Thirty. There was no sound over the receiver. Sweat began to bead Strong's forehead and he opened the transmitter key again.
"Listen, Coxine! I know you can hear me! I'll only talk to you once more! Surrender or you'll be blasted into protons! I'll give you exactly thirty seconds to make up your mind!"
Again Strong opened the receiver key and waited, but as the seconds ticked by, there was no answer.
"Sir, do you think he's sucking us into a trap?" Roger whispered.
"Maybe," replied Strong grimly. "But he knows what would happen to him if he opened fire."
"Captain Strong! Captain Strong!" Tom's voice suddenly blared over the ship's intercom.
"Don't bother me now, Corbett," replied Strong irritably.
"But, sir," Tom persisted, "that isn't the Avenger!"
"What!" Strong was thunderstruck.
"No, sir," continued the young cadet. "I'm looking at her right now on my control-deck scanner. It's the same model ship as the Avenger, but it isn't Coxine's!"
"Are you sure?"
"Positive, sir. I was on her long enough to know."
"Blast it! Then what—?"
Roger suddenly interrupted Strong. "Sir, look at her over the magnascope! She's been abandoned!"
The Solar Guard captain quickly turned to the magnascope screen. There he saw a close-up view of the target. It was a helpless derelict. All emergency ports were open and the jet-boat locks were empty.
Strong's face grew pale and he slumped back in his chair.
"What—what do you suppose happened, sir?" asked Roger hesitantly.
"It's easy enough to figure," Strong replied, his voice dull and lifeless. "Coxine is using more than one ship now. And when this one was damaged, he simply transferred to another one. He's outfoxed us again!"
Slowly, with wooden legs, he walked over to the teleceiver.
"Attention all ships! Resume former search stations. All we've caught here is a red herring!"
And as the powerful engines of the Polaris picked up speed, Strong imagined he could hear Gargantuan laughter echoing in space around him.
CHAPTER 17
"Spaceman's luck, sir," said Tom, shaking Captain Strong's hand.
Silently the other two cadets in turn gripped their skipper's hand tightly.
"Thanks, boys," said Strong. "If we're going to get that space crawler, we have to trap him. And the best bait I know is a twenty-million-credit pay roll."
"But won't you take at least one man with you, sir?" pleaded Tom. "Sitting up there in space in a decoy ship waiting for Coxine is like—" Tom paused. "Well, you won't have much of a chance, sir, if Coxine opens fire before asking questions."
"That's the risk I've got to take, Tom," said Strong. "It took a lot of talking to get Commander Walters' permission to try this. But we've got to force Coxine to come out far enough from the asteroid belt to catch him before he can run back in and lose himself again." The young captain smiled wanly and added, "Don't think that your job is unimportant!"
Tom, Roger, and Astro nodded. On their return from the unsuccessful attempt to capture Coxine, they had been suddenly faced with the routine duty of transporting a twenty-million-credit pay roll from Atom City to the satellite of Titan for the crystal miners.
Thinking one sure way to catch any rat was to use a lure, Tom suggested that the Titan armored freighter be used as a decoy to capture the pirate, and the cadets could carry the pay roll in the Polaris.
Commander Walters had considered the plan, and then realizing that Coxine might fire on the freighter before seizing it, disapproved of placing a full crew aboard the lightly armed ship. Instead, he would send only one man. Strong had volunteered for the assignment and had persuaded the commander to allow him to man the decoy ship.
Now, the two ships, the Polaris and the armed freighter stood side by side at the Academy spaceport, and the three cadets and their commanding officer waited for the signal to blast off.
"You have your course for your trip out to Titan, Tom?" asked Strong.
"Yes, sir," replied Tom. "We're to blast off later to-night and take a course through the asteroid belt, traveling on the plane of the ecliptic. As soon as we get through, we are to proceed under full emergency thrust to our destination."
Strong nodded his head, satisfied.
"Do you think Coxine will come out after you, sir?" asked Roger.
"We've tried to make sure that he will, Roger," replied Strong. "It's pretty common knowledge that the Titan pay-roll ship leaves every month, and that it travels a different route each time. Sometimes it goes through the asteroid belt on the plane of the ecliptic and sometimes it goes over. We believe Coxine knows this, and with the thinly guised messages we've sent to Titan, we're hoping he'll try for it."
"But how will you get him, sir?" asked Astro, puzzled. "I mean, with no armor on the freighter to speak of, and no crew aboard, how can you nail him before he gets you?"
"Hyperdrive," replied the captain laconically.
"Hyperdrive?" echoed Tom quizzically.
"I'm going to take the decoy ship through the asteroid belt too, but through a different area, closer to the part we think Coxine is operating in. Seven full squadrons have blasted off ahead of me and taken up positions in that area. When and if Coxine attacks, I'll alert the waiting ships, who'll come in on hyperdrive. By the time Coxine spots them on his radar, they'll be on top of him."
"Then," ventured Tom, "you're staking your life on the ships arriving before Coxine can attack."
"That's right, Tom," said Strong. "If our plan works, we catch Coxine. If it doesn't, at least we know that the Titan pay roll is safe. That's why your job is as important as mine."
They were interrupted by the ground-crew chief who reported the decoy ship ready to blast off.
Strong nodded and the three cadets gripped their captain's hand again. Turning, he climbed into the freighter and five minutes later the Solar Guard officer blasted off from the Academy spaceport while Tom, Roger, and Astro watched from the traffic-control tower.
"Come on," said Tom. "It'll be two hours before we can blast off. We might as well get some sleep. We'll need it."
Reluctantly, Roger and Astro followed their unit-mate from the traffic tower, their eyes full of concern for their skipper. Each was grimly aware that they might never see their skipper alive again.
* * * * *
"Now shut your traps!" roared Bull Coxine. "The next crawler that opens his mouth gets taken apart!" He stood on top of a table and faced his crew of pirates who were sitting about swilling large cups of rocket juice.
The room in which the giant pirate spaceman had gathered his men was one of many in a building constructed since their arrival from the prison astero
id. Hidden from even the closest inspection by the smaller bodies circling around the main asteroid, Coxine had expanded the small hut used by Wallace and Simms into a huge rambling building containing armories, machine shops, and storage rooms packed with everything he and his murderous crew might need.
Now with a string of successful raids behind them and their personal pocketbooks bulging with stolen credits and valuables, the crew of pirates waited attentively while their cruel but brilliant leader outlined the most daring plan of all.
"Now listen," roared Coxine. "There's a few things I want to say before we start on the plans of the next strike!"
The big spaceman paused and glared at the men in front of him. "Ever since that space-crawling cadet pulled a fast one on me there's been talk about voting for another leader!" He spat the word as if it had left a foul taste in his mouth. "Well, get this. There'll be no voting! I'm the boss of this outfit! Any man who thinks he can take over my job," Coxine's voice dropped to a deadly whisper, "just let him try!"
Stony silence greeted the huge spaceman, a silence inspired by fear.
"Now!" roared Coxine, his coarse features changing from a scowl to a broad grin. "The strike!"
This was greeted with a roar of approval. The men demanded action after a week of idleness on the asteroid.
"Wallace!" yelled Coxine.
"Yes, sir," answered the spaceman, stepping up to the table and facing Coxine.
"We'll take up a position in the asteroid belt, here!" He placed a finger on a map of the belt. "Simms!" roared the giant spaceman.
"Yes, sir!" the wizened space pirate stepped forward.
"You remember that rocket scout we blasted? The one that got our other ship?"
"I sure do, sir."
"It's drifting around in orbit near asteroid seventeen. Take a crew of men and a few jet boats and go get her. Bring her back here and fix her up. Strip every pound of excess weight off her. I want a ship that'll fly faster than anything in the system and I want it in twenty-four hours."
Tom Corbett Space Cadet Page 47