Part 2

"You're the boss," Kendall said. "Until this caper is over, anyway. Then I'm heading back to Earth and you can all rot so far as I care."

They took him far out of town, circled around the outlying districts until he was pretty thoroughly confused, then brought him back. By now it was night, and the twin moons were in the sky--tiny Phobos, only ten miles in diameter, and Deimos, half her size.

The ship was a small, sleek job, some twenty years old. Where they got it didn't seem evident; possibly they had blackmailed some other pilot into surrendering it, possibly they had hijacked it in some fashion or other.

He climbed aboard, followed by Das Shamra and his five henchmen.

"You'll have to weigh yourselves," he announced. "With all six of you on board I'll have some tricky mass-calculations to do."

It took him a few hours to calculate the orbit, another hour to run a routine check on the ship. It was in beautiful shape, ready to go.

"Strap down for blastoff," he said, when he was satisfied.

The Martians frowned in bewilderment. "We've never been in space," one of them said. "We don't know how to get into the acceleration cradles."

Kendall showed them. Das Shamra lay closest to him, a blaster cradled in his arms. "You're the only one who can move around now, Kendall. One move out of place and I'll drill you."

"Sure you will," Kendall said. "And which one of you is going to pilot the ship back down again? If you want to live, Das Shamra, keep that blaster from going off."

He nestled down in the control webbing, and readied the ship for blasting. A sharp thrill ran through him, as it always did as he readied a ship for a leap into the great blackness. But there was a special thrill this time. Only hours ago he had resigned himself to a short, dreary few years of life remaining to him on barren Mars; now he was behind the controls of a powerful ship again.

He touched the power stud. A reassuring throbbing shuddered through the ship.

"We're about to blast off," he said. "Just relax, and it won't bother you much. I'm going to put the ship in orbit around Phobos and then we can wait for the dionate ship at leisure. Okay?"

"Good enough," Das Shamra grunted. The fat blueskin's face was beaded with sweat. Obviously the Martians weren't looking forward to their trip through space--but they were willing to put up with it for the sake of the millions in dionate to be grabbed off Phobos.

Kendall grinned and jammed down the blastoff key. The ship sprang skyward.

* * * * *

He had his back to a man with a gun. That didn't make him feel happier. But the little ship bit a chunk out of the sky, climbed higher and higher.

He heard a groan from behind him, but didn't turn around. He kept himself bent over the controls, forced himself to remain conscious as the acceleration mounted.

Three g's. Four. He yelled over his shoulder, "How you doin' back there? Comfortable?"

There was no reply. He grinned and stepped up the acceleration. Seven g's. Eight. The gravity was tearing at him like a demon's claws, but he clung to consciousness.

A figure ran through his mind:

Mars--gravity, O.38. He could stand two-and-a-half times as much acceleration as the blueskins behind him. His Earth-trained muscles, used to responding to a much heavier grav, could handle eight g's without too much strain. The Martians must be having fits.

Nine g's. Ten. He turned, looked back for the first time.

Reddish-brown blood trickled from Das Shamra's fleshy lips. The blaster had long since fallen from his limp hand and lay on the spaceship's deck. They were all unconscious--all of them, battered and beaten by the sort of acceleration an Earthman was able to take with relative ease.

Grinning savagely, Kendall boosted the thrust until he nearly blacked out himself. Then he seized the controls and started to reverse the ship.

Some time later, he landed it neatly outside the Space Service headquarters. Taking a loving look at the Martians, with their wrenched, distorted faces, he scooped up Das Shamra's blaster and opened the hatch.

The computer technician he had fought with before came running out on the landing field.

"What is the meaning of this? An unauthorized flight? Who are you? Oh--Kendall!"

"Yes, Kendall," he said, leaning dizzily against the side of the ship.

Jerking his thumb over his shoulder, he said, "Get the Port Police out here on the double. There are six very sick would-be smugglers inside this ship. When you've got our green-faced blueskins packed away, I want another date with that computer. I think I can get an okay now--and I can't get back to Earth soon enough!"