calmer. "But where do you get the power if the
engines are gone? Surely the emergency batteries won't supply that
kind of power."

"Of course not. Each screamer has its own power supply. It's a
hydrogen-oxygen fuel cell that generates a hell of a burst of power
for about thirty minutes before it burns out from the overload. It's
meant to be used only once, but it does the job."

"How do they know where to find us from a burst like that?" Hull
asked.

"Well, suppose we only had one screamer. We'd beam it toward Pluto,
since it would be easier for an IP ship to get to us from there. Since
all screamers have the same frequency--don't ask me what it is; I'm
not a radio man--the velocity of our ship will be indicated by the
Doppler Effect. That is, our motion toward or away from them can be
calculated that way. Our angular velocity with respect to them can be
checked while the screamer is going; they will know which direction
we're moving, if we're moving at an angle.

"With that information, all they have to do is find out which ship is
in that general area of the sky, which they can find out by checking
the schedule, and they can estimate approximately where we'll be. The
IP ship will come out, and when they get in the general vicinity, they
can find us with their meteor detectors. Nothing to it."

"And," Captain Al-Amin added, "since we have eight screamers still
left with us, we have plenty of reserves to call upon. There's
nothing to worry about, Mr. Hull."

"But how can you aim a beam when we're toppling end-over-end like
this?" Hull asked.

"Well, if we couldn't stop the rotation," said the captain, "we'd
broadcast instead of beaming. Anywhere within the Solar System, a
screamer can broadcast enough energy to overcome the background noise.

"The IP would have a harder time finding us, of course, but we'd be
saved eventually."

"I see," said Hull "How do we go about stopping the rotation?"

"That's the next thing on the agenda," Al-Amin said. "This seasick
roll is caused by the unevenness of the load, and I'm pretty sick of
it, myself. Smith, will you and Mr. Kelvin get out the emergency
rockets? We'll see what we can do to stabilize our platform."

* * * * *

It took better than an hour to get the ship straightened out. For the
main job, emergency rockets were set off at the appropriate spots
around the hull to counteract the rotation. The final trimming was
done with car