Rip Foster in Ride the Gray Planet | Page 2

The comfortable uniforms concealed
any slight differences in build. All twelve were lean of face, with hair cropped to the

regulation half inch. Rip was the only redhead among them.
"Sit down," Barris commanded. "Here's my speech."
The twelve seated themselves on plastic stools. Major Barris remained standing.
"Well," he began soberly, "you are now officers of the Special Order Squadrons. You're
Planeteers. You are lieutenants by order of the Space Council, Federation of Free
Governments. And--space protect you!--to yourselves you're supermen. But never forget
this: To ordinary spacemen, you're just plain simps. You're trouble in a black tunic. They
have about as much use for you as they have for leaks in their air locks. Some of the
spacemen have been high-vacking for twenty years or more, and they're tough. They're as
nasty as a Callistan teekal. They like to eat Planeteer junior officers for breakfast."
Lt. Felipe "Flip" Villa asked, "With salt, Joe?"
Major Barris sighed. "No use trying to tell you space chicks anything. You're lieutenants
now, and a lieutenant has the thickest skull of any rank, no matter what service he
belongs to."
Rip realized that Barris had not been joking, no matter how flippant his speech. "Go
ahead," he urged. "Finish what you were going to say."
"Okay. I'll make it short. Then you can catch the Terra rocket and take your eight weeks'
Earth leave. You won't really know what I'm talking about until you've batted around
space for a while. All I have to say adds up to one thing. You won't like it, because it
doesn't sound scientific. That doesn't mean it isn't good science, because it is. Just
remember this: When you're in a jam, trust your hunch and not your head."
The twelve stared at him, openmouthed. For six years they had been taught to rely on
scientific methods. Now their best instructor and senior officer was telling them just the
opposite!
Rip started to object, but then he caught a glimmer of meaning. He stuck out his hand.
"Thanks, Joe. I hope we'll meet again."
Barris grinned. "We will, Rip. I'll ask for you as a platoon commander when they assign
me to cleaning up the goopies on Ganymede." This was the major's idea of the worst
Planeteer job in the solar system.
The group shook hands all around; then the young officers broke for the door on the run.
The Terra rocket was blasting off in five minutes, and they were to be on it.
Rip joined Flip Villa, and they jumped on the high-speed track that would whisk them to
Valve Two on the other side of the platform. Their gear was already loaded. They had
only to take seats on the rocket, and their six years on the space platform would be at an
end.

"I wonder what it will be like to get back to high gravity," Rip mused. The centrifugal
force of the spinning platform acted as artificial gravity, but it was considerably less than
Earth's.
"We probably won't be able to walk straight until we get our Earth legs back," Flip
answered. "I wish I could stay in Colorado with you instead of going back to Mexico City,
Rip. We could have a lot of fun in eight weeks."
Rip nodded. "Tough luck, Flip. But anyway, we have the same assignment."
Both Planeteers had been assigned to Special Order Squadron Four, which was attached
to the cruiser Bolide. The cruiser was in high space, beyond the orbits of Jupiter and
Saturn, doing comet research.
They got off the track at Valve Two and stepped through into the rocket's interior. Two
seats just ahead of the fins were vacant, and they slid into them. Rip looked through the
thick port beside him and saw the distinctive blue glow of a nuclear drive cruiser sliding
toward the platform.
"Wave your eye stalks at that job," Flip said admiringly. "Wonder what it's doing here."
The space platform was a refueling depot, where conventional chemical fuel rockets
topped off their tanks before flaming for space. The newer nuclear drive cruisers had no
need to stop. Their atomic piles needed new neutron sources only once every few years,
and they carried thousands of tons of methane, compressed into solid form, for their
reaction mass.
The voice horn in the rocket cabin sounded. "The SCN Scorpius is passing Valve Two,
landing at Valve Eight."
"I thought that ship was with Squadron One on Mercury," Rip recalled. "Wonder why
they pulled it back here."
Flip had no chance to reply, because the chief rocket officer took up his station at the
valve and began to call the roll. Rip answered to his name.
The rocket officer finished the roll, then announced: "Buttoning up in twenty seconds.
Blast off in forty-five. Don't bother