“None of us wants to become an impromptu barbecue, so I will ask each of you not to move unnecessarily from the neighborhood of your couch. The ship has an automatic compensator for a limited amount of movement, but we must not overload it—so get permission from your ship’s aide before moving as much as six inches from your present positions.”
He grinned again and it was suddenly a most unpleasant grin. “Any one violating this rule will be strapped down by force—and the Captain will assign punishment to fit the crime after we are no longer under drive.”
There wasn’t any ship’s aide in our compartment; all we could do was wait. I got acquainted with the boys in the bunkroom, some older, some younger. There was a big, sandy-haired boy about seventeen, by the name of Edwards—”Noisy” Edwards. He got tired of waiting.
I didn’t blame him; it seemed like hours went past and still nothing to eat. I thought we had been forgotten.
Edwards had been hanging around the door, peering out. Finally he said, “This is ridiculous! We can’t sit here all day. I’m for finding out what’s the hold up. Who’s with me?”
One of the fellows objected, “The Captain said to sit tight.”
“What if he did? And what can he do if we don’t? We aren’t part of the crew.”
I pointed out that the Captain had authority over the whole ship, but he brushed me off. “Tommyrot! We got a right to know what’s going on—and a right to be fed. Who’s coming along?”
Another boy said, “You’re looking for trouble, Noisy.”
Edwards stopped; I think he was worried by the remark but he couldn’t back down. Finally he said, “Look, we’re supposed to have a ship’s aide and we haven’t got one. You guys elect me ship’s aide and I’ll go bring back chow. How’s that?”
Nobody objected out loud. Noisy said, “Okay, here I go.”
He couldn’t have been gone more than a few seconds when a ship’s aide showed up carrying a big box of packaged rations. He dealt them out and had one left over. Then he counted the bunks. “Weren’t there twenty boys in here?” he asked.
We looked at each other but nobody said anything. He pulled out a list and called our names. Edwards didn’t answer, of course, and he left, taking Noisy’s ration with him.
Then Noisy showed up and saw us eating and wanted to know where his lunch was. We told him; he said, “For the love of Mike! Why didn’t you guys save it for me? A fine bunch you turned out to be.” And he left again.
He came back shortly, looking mad. A ship’s aide followed him and strapped him down.
We had about reached the teeth-picking stage when the screen on the ceiling lit up again and there was the Moon. It looked as if we were headed right toward it and coming up fast. I began to wonder if Captain Harkness had dropped a decimal point.
I lay back on my couch and watched it grow. After a while it looked worse. When it had grown until it filled the screen and more and it seemed as if we couldn’t possibly miss, I saw that the mountains were moving past on the screen from right to left. I breathed a sigh of relief; maybe the Old Man knew what he was doing after all.
A voice came over the speaker: “We are now passing the Moon and tacking slightly in so doing. Our relative speed at point of closest approach is more than fifty miles per second, producing a somewhat spectacular effect.”
I’ll say it was spectacular! We zipped across the face of the Moon in about half a minute, then it faded behind us. I suppose they simply kept a TV camera trained on it, but it looked as if we had dived in, turned sharply, and raced out again. Only you don’t make sharp turns at that speed.
About two hours later they stopped gunning her. I had fallen asleep and I dreamed I was making a parachute jump and the chute failed to open. I woke up with a yell, weightless, with my stomach dropping out of me again. It took me a moment to figure out where I was.