Vietnam or Thailand ? Vote for the TOP Country of the Week !
Updated: June 14, 2025
Her gesture reassured the lookout, who was alertly watching the stern watchtower. I stepped out, and followed her forward along the deck, which now was bright with the radiance of the nearby asteroid. A fair little world. I had thought so before; and I thought so now as I gazed at the asteroid hanging so close before our bow. A huge, thin crescent, with the Sun off to one side behind it.
Other small mining outfits had fallen by the wayside until now over two-thirds of all asteroid mining claims were held by Jupiter Equilateral, and the small independent miners were forced more and more to take what was left. They reached the gate to the Dutchman's launching slot and entered.
Rip watched the cruiser take the craft and thorium aboard, then drive toward Mercury, brilliant sunlight reflecting from its sleek sides. The planet was only a short distance away by spaceship. It was the largest thing in space, except for the sun, as seen from the asteroid. To Rip it looked about three times the size of the moon as seen from earth.
Work at the Planeteer base had probably been finished within an hour of the time word was received. When they opened the cases brought aboard by the Martians, he would see that the method of blasting the asteroid into a course for Earth was all figured out for him. Rip was anxious to get at those cases. Not until he saw the method of operation could he begin to figure his course.
He had his first man! His first hand-to-hand fight had ended in victory so easily that he could hardly believe it. He took time to look around him and saw that he was a good five feet above the asteroid. Below him, a Connie belt light sent its shaft parallel with the ground, and he knew the second man was down. The question was, had either of them shouted before their communicators were cut off?
When the asteroid reached the correct position relative to Earth, the charge would not change its course but only slow its speed somewhat. The asteroid would go around Earth in a series of ever tightening ellipses, using Terra's gravity, plus rocket fuel, to slow it down to orbital speed.
Finally, they had given up, at least for the moment. "It has to be there," the Major had said wearily. "It hasn't vanished, or miraculously ceased to exist. We know he was working on one claim, one asteroid. There were no other asteroids in the region ... and even the ones within suicide radius have been searched." "It's there, all right," Tom said. "We're missing something, that's all."
Like the first colony in the new world, then on the Moon, Mars, Venus, Mercury, Titan, and Ganymede, and hundreds of outposts in the asteroid belt, these Earthmen were braving new dangers and hardships, leaving the comfort of their homes to establish the first star colony.
It wasn't much of a mining rig for anybody to use, and the dangers of a small mining operation in the Asteroid Belt were frightening.
The long hours passed, and only Rip’s chronometer told him when the end of a day was reached. The Planeteers alternately worked on the surface and rested in the air of the landing boat compartment while the asteroid sped steadily on its way.
Word Of The Day
Others Looking