On the scanner, Strong watched the flashes of blips as the squadrons roared out of concealment. The attacking ship slowed and began a wide-sweeping curve, but it was too late. The little scout made a desperate dash for Strong, hoping to use him as a shield from the mighty six-inch blasters trained on him.
Strong fired full thrust on his starboard jets, sending the decoy vessel into a screaming dive. The scout tried to follow, then tried to escape. Instinctively, Strong shouted for the pilot to surrender, but even as he spoke, firing flashes converged like lightning arrows on the speedy rocket scout. A burst of pure white fire on the scanner, and the attacking ship became a hulk of twisted metal.
Strong ordered Squadron L to launch rescue boats and begin salvage operations, then himself blasted in a jet boat toward the wreckage.
Communications among the departing fleet filled with talk of victory, but Strong alone felt uneasy. For Coxine to attack in a stripped-down rocket scout did not fit the pirate’s pattern. When he reached the wreck, his fears were confirmed.
A crew chief from one of the rescue squads grappled for a handhold on the twisted metal and reported over helmet spacephones, “We found only one person aboard, sir. And the ship appears to have been stripped of everything but engines and control panel.”
Strong grimaced behind his helmet glass. He turned to Captain Randolph. “We’ve been tricked again, Randy. We used a decoy and so did Coxine!”
“They’re closing in!” Roger’s voice crackled through the intercom from the radar bridge. “Do we fight or do we let those space crawlers take over?”
“Fight!” bellowed Astro from the power deck.
“No! Wait!” cried Tom. “We haven’t a chance!”
Rocketing through the asteroid belt with the Titan pay roll, the three space cadets were unaware that Bull Coxine had outsmarted Captain Strong. Sending in the rocket scout, the pirate had sprung the Solar Guard trap and cagily scanned the belt for another ship. Finding the Polaris easily, Coxine was blasting in for the attack.
“What’s the matter, Junior?” Roger called. “Scared to fight?”
“You know I’m not,” Tom snapped.
“By the rings of Saturn,” growled Astro, “I never thought you’d surrender to anybody, Tom!”
“Listen, both of you!” shouted Tom. “It’s no use! We’ve got to play this smart!”
Coxine’s voice came over the audioceiver, harsh and unmistakable. “This is Bull Coxine! Heave to or you’ll be blasted!”
“Cut all power, Astro—fast!” ordered Tom.
Tom then patiently laid out his plan. They had five minutes. He asked Roger to build a beacon that would transmit an automatic SOS on the Solar Guard special frequency, small enough to hide on the Polaris.
“Yeah,” said Roger, “but it’ll take me at least a half hour!”
“You’ve got to finish it faster!”
“I can’t, Tom. I just can’t.”
“Then we’ll have to stall. How big will it be?”
“No smaller than six inches. About like a shoe box.”
“Could you make it three inches thick, and longer, instead of box-shaped?”
“Yeah. Why?”
“Because I just thought of a good place to hide it. They’d have to tear the ship apart to find it.”
Coxine’s voice roared again. “Stand by to receive a boarding party. Any attempt to escape and you will be blasted!”
Tom grabbed the microphone. “Orders understood, but you’ll have to wait until we can build up air pressure in the air lock.”
“Very well. Fifteen minutes.”
“You’ll have to wait at least a half hour. We broke a valve and have to replace it!”
Coxine’s voice turned suspicious. “Hey, what’re you trying to pull?”
“Honest, Mister Coxine, we’re not doing anything.”
“Fifteen minutes, or I blast a hole in your ship!”
“Yes, sir!” Tom answered, fully aware the pirate would carry out his threat.
Dropping the microphone, Tom hurried to the power deck. “Grab a couple of cutting torches, Astro, and get me a lead-lined suit. I’m going into the reactant chamber.”
“In the reactant chamber?” demanded Astro. “Impossible!”
“Remember when we arrived at the prison asteroid? They even searched the space between the inner and outer hulls. There’s three inches of clearance. If I cut into that space through the chamber and put the beacon inside, the noise of the jets will keep Coxine from hearing it, and the radioactivity will keep them from picking it up!”
Astro’s face spread into a wide grin and he prepared the torches. Ten minutes later, Tom emerged and nodded triumphantly. “All set, Astro! Now all we need is the beacon.”
The Polaris rocked under a heavy explosion. “They’re firing!” yelled Astro.
“Roger! Have you finished the beacon?”
“I need another five minutes!”
“Will it send out anything?”
“I don’t know, Tom. I haven’t even tested it!”
A third explosion jarred the cruiser. “Bring down what you’ve got, Roger! We’ll just have to take a chance. And grab a space suit!”
In a moment, Roger appeared with the hurriedly contrived beacon. Tom quickly placed it between the two hulls and sealed the hole in the inner hull.
A fourth explosion rocked the ship. The three cadets climbed to the upper deck in their space helmets.
Coxine met them near the air lock, two paralo-ray guns in his gloved hands. Behind him, his crew swarmed in and fanned out all over the ship.
He glared at Tom. “Whaddya know! The Space Kid himself!”
“That’s right, Coxine. Only the real name is Corbett.”
Suddenly a pirate shouted triumphantly, “Skipper! The credits! All twenty million!”
Coxine ordered repairs to the air lock and immediate acceleration. A gleam in his eyes, he announced their destination. “With the Solar Guard on the other side of the belt, we’re going to hit the richest prize in the universe! The colony on Ganymede!”
He turned to the three prisoners with a menacing smile. “And we’ve got three passes to get us through the defenses!”
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