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REVOLT ON IO
"Fair enough," said Mallory, "but not sufficiently enticing. Like an albino on a desert planetoid. Ah, here's our hero now! Welcome, Sir Relief! Dump it into the basket and let poppa go seek the arms of Morpheus."
"Who's she?" growled Rick Norton, Third Mate. His eyes were puffy; he squinted and glared at the bright lights of the control turret. "Hell's howling acres, I'm tired! I just about got to sleep when--Oh, well. Log in order?"
"Directly." Mallory shot a curious glance at Norton. "Just got to sleep? How come? What were you doing up so late?"
But that wasn't any skin off his nose. He went to the chart table. Footsteps clattered up the Jacob's ladder, the door flew open and the Old Man stomped onto the bridge. He snapped, "'Zuwere!" and glowered over Mallory's shoulder, shrewd, space-faded eyes reading sense into the senior lieutenant's neat, precise columns. He jabbed a horny finger at one line of figures. "Sure o' that, Mallory? Velocity that high?"
Mallory said respectfully, "Yes, sir. All figures have been checked and double checked. We're point oh-oh-one on course. Forced speed, point thirty-nine above normal."
"Checked and double checked," said Captain Algase, "is good enough most of the time. But this trip is special. And vitally important. Forty thousand innocent lives depend on our reaching Io damn soon! Remember that, Mallory. All of you remember that."
The stern lines of his face eased a trifle. "It's been a hard shuttle, I know. A brutal, punishing trip. And we've all been under a terrific strain. But our difficulties are nothing compared to those of the garrison and the honest colonists of New Fresno. They're looking to us for aid, and we're bringing them aid.
Norton had started suddenly. Now he muttered, red-faced, "Sorry, sir. Sudden light in the visiplate. It looked like a meteoride."
"There's nothing there now," said the skipper.
"Because," explained the skipper grimly, "wherever there's an uprising there are converts to the new cause, traitors to the old. Where there are plans, there are spies to steal them. That's not a warning from H.Q.; that's plain, old-fashioned horse-sense. I fought through the Rollie Rebellion, you know. After the Grantland massacre I discovered that one of my own messmates was in the pay of the Mercurians.
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