TRAPPED IN THE ABYSS 139
Finally Tom beamed his suit light in Bud’s direction. His friend shook his head hopelessly. With tired groans they gave up the attempt and slid back to the bottom of the crevasse.
The same thought ran through the boys’ minds as they slumped, panting, to catch their breath. “If only we could take off these space suits!” Yet to do so would mean instant death in the moon’s vacuum.
Meanwhile, back in the Challenger, Chow had been fussing and worrying ever since Tom and Bud had left. “I think we oughta go after them young’uns!” he told Bert Everett.
“Relax, Chow. They’ll be all right,” Bert replied.
“I sure wouldn’t bet on that,” Chow said. “Suppose they run into them kidnapers? Arv says he can’t see the boys through the cabin window! Can’t pick ‘em up on the radio neither.”
“So what? The skipper and Bud can take care of themselves.”
“I’d feel a heap better if we could keep an eye on ‘em, or at least hear ‘em,”
Chow insisted.
Finally Bert agreed to go with Chow. After launching their repelatron donkeys from the ship’s landing platform, Chow and Bert sailed off in the general direction of the mountains which Tom had intended to explore.
Suddenly the cook gave a startled gasp. “Hey, pardner! Take a look up ahead near that crack in the ground! Ain’t them shiny things a couple o’ flyin’
donkeys?”
140
SPACE SOLARTRON
Bert scanned the objects below. “You’re right, Chow! But what happened to the boys?”
TRAPPED IN THE ABYSS 141
“I aim to find out!” Chow declared.
“Be careful,” Bert warned. “I think maybe the boys got sucked down in that hole in the ground. We’ll stay on this side of it.”