boat slewed wildly as the Connie
shot took effect. Rip worked his controls frantically, trying to
straighten the rocket out more by instinct than anything else.

His eyes recovered from the blinding flash, and he gulped as he saw the
raw, twisted metal where the boat's nose had been. He managed to correct
the boat's twisting by using the stern tubes, but he lost full control of
the ship.

For a moment panic gripped him. Without full control he couldn't get back
to the asteroid! Then he forced himself to calm down. He sized up the
situation. They were still underway, the stern tubes pushing, but their
trajectory would take them right under the crippled Connie boat.

There was nothing he could do but pass close to the Connie. The enemy
gunners would fire, but he had to take his chances. He looked down at the
asteroid and saw an orange trail as Koa launched another rocket.

The shot from the asteroid ticked the bottom of the Connie boat and
exploded. The Connie rolled violently. Tubes flared as the pilot fought
to correct the roll. He slowed the spinning as Rip and Santos passed,
just long enough for a Connie gunner to get in a final shot.

The shell struck directly under Rip. He felt himself pushed violently
upward, and, at the same moment, he reacted--by hunch and not by reason.
He rammed the controls full ahead, and the dying rocket cut space,
curving slowly as flaming fuel spurted from the ruptured tanks.

Rip yelled, "Santos! You all right?"

"I think so. Lieutenant, we're on fire!"

"I know it. Get ready to abandon ship."

When the main mass of fuel caught, the rocket would become an inferno.
Rip smashed at the escape hatch above his head, grabbed propulsion tubes
from the rack, and called, "Now!"

He pulled the release on his harness, stood up on the seat, and thrust
with all his leg power. He catapulted out of the burning snapper-boat
into space.

Santos followed a second later, and the crippled rocket twisted wildly
under the two Planeteers.

"Don't use the propulsion tubes," Rip called. "Slow down with your air
bottles." He thrust the tubes into his belt, found his air bottles, and
pointed two of them in the direction they had been traveling. He wanted
to come to a stop, to let the wild snapper-boat get away from them.

The compressed-air bottles did the trick. He and Santos slowed down as
the little jets overcame the inertia that was taking them along with the
burning boat. The boat was spiraling