Lee Wallot

“ You may be twenty years older than I am; you may have been one of the pioneers in space travel; you may still be a good man if you could forget that the whole world didn't plot that accident that left you with a bad leg—but you're still taking orders from me. We have some good men in this department, and you can either keep your mouth shut and work with us or you can get out. Interstellar drive isn't the only solution to space travel and the answer to the problem is going to come from this laboratory. ”

“ Fine ships that opened up the realm of travel in outer space." His voice was firm, stringent with his inner excitement, his faith in his idea. "In fact, it was just such a ship as this that Joc Kenton, Mars to you folks, was on when they made their first landing on Mars. These ships had their good points and still are excellent over short distances but certainly are of no use for intergalactic flight. They are much too slow, requiring more than a lifetime to make the trip there and back.
"Then came the interstellar drive, the method we are now using. ”

“ He ran a trembling hand through his close-cropped hair and swore at himself when he saw Mars noticed the trembling. Why did he have to start shaking every time he got mad? The person he was mad at invariably took the shaking to be fear, and he would always be forced to drive his point home all the harder in order to get the respect he demanded.
Mars Kenton sneered. "Mind telling me just how you are going to eliminate interstellar drive from our rocket ships? ”

“ We therefore have a ship that has the velocity of the drive and maybe more, without the cost of drive. It has safety since our old rockets proved to be remarkably accident-free and this design would actually be working on almost the same principle as the old rockets, except for the blast off. The difference in outer space would be this. The old ships used rockets throughout the trip to increase their velocity. The new ones will be traveling so fast when they enter outer space, they won't have to use any power because they will already have the velocity needed. ”

“ Bronsen found himself smiling at his young assistant. Vern, although he was twenty-four, had the spirit and air of a teenager and usually succeeded in keeping the lab in a state of high humor. The tenseness of the argument with Mars dispelled itself and Bronsen relaxed.
"Get word to the men that we are having a special meeting this afternoon, in the conference room. We're going to blow the lid right off the present concepts of space travel and really give those people out there something that will make their eyes bulge. ”

“ How? He stopped. He reviewed the parts in his mind, then suddenly lurched to the files and pulled out the rocket plans. He compared the ship's construction bit by bit with a shell, his mind working quickly, accurately, with a new enthusiasm....
Hours later he leaned back from his drawing table and his voice rumbled out into the quiet reaches of the empty room.
"Men will fly to the stars like a bullet," he prophesized. "Because I know why the rocket crashed."
It was dark but the light in Bronsen's office was still on. Mars pulled himself erect and turned toward Bronsen's room, then faltered. ”

“ You're a jealous old man. You're afraid to have someone else do what you no longer can do. You want things to stay the way they were when you got hurt, so no one else can live your dream. If time stood still, there would be no trips to new planets, no new discoveries and Mars Kenton would still be the hero of his dream."
He tried to revolt, to denounce the self-accusations. "What about Bronsen Corbow?" ”

“ His mind could focus on nothing but what Mars was trying to say.
"The nose of the ship is long. The only guides were on the tail at the rotating band. Think of shells. Bourrelets. The big shells have bourrelets ... bands around the nose that dig into the grooves and steady the front of the shell. The ship ... its front began trembling because there was nothing to guide the nose in a steady path. The more velocity the rocket had, the worse the trembling became until it threw the whole ship out of control. ”

“ There wouldn't even be need for rocket power while in actual galactic flight. The initial momentum would carry it through to its destination. The rocket could do all this because this spiral launching would give us more 'muzzle velocity', and in a given time after blast off, the spinning ship would have reached a much greater speed than the regularly fired one. This means operating cost will be confined to blast off, landing and to skirt around any sudden dangers that might arise in space. ”

“ This drive, utilizing Carbolium which we have to manufacture, makes full use of space as a medium of travel. There's only one catch. We can make only a certain amount of Carbolium, and the costs of making it are astronomical. However, no matter what the expense, the supply is limited. Still, everything's fine. We use the old rockets for short distances and the interstellar drive for intergalactic trips. ”

“ He paused to swallow the dryness in his mouth and noticed with pleasure that more than one face was twisted in thought. Good. All they have to do is be given a theory to think about, the time to do that thinking and they'd be on their way. ”

“ They all use the same principle to get off the ground—blast off with rockets. But let's add a second type of blasting off area, also using rockets, but one that looks like a monstrous rifle barrel, complete to the fields and grooves. We have a launching apparatus that is like a grooved rifle compared to a smooth barreled one. The smooth barrel that we now use, the rockets taking off straight, gives good acceleration but not enough top speed. Our old rockets had that fault and never could get good velocity even when in flight. ”

“ Reed chewed more savagely at the end of his cold cigar. "We spent two million dollars on research and development and all we have to show for it is a pile of scrap metal and four corpses scattered over the lunar landscape. ”