Irving W. Lande

“ A pulsing, throbbing city, dedicated to the long slow struggle to get into space and stay there. The service crew eyed them with studied indifference, as they writhed out of the small hatch and stepped to the ground. They drew a helijet at operations, and headed immediately for Los Angeles.
Kovacs had been impressed when Paul asked if he'd care to room together while they were on leave. He was quiet on the flight, as he had been on the way down, listening contentedly, while Paul talked combat and women with Bob Parandes, another pilot going on leave. ”

“ They were about eighty thousand miles out. He set course for Earth at about five and a half mps, which Johnson calculated to bring them in on the station on the "going away" side of its orbit, and settled back for the tedious two hours of free wheeling. For ten or fifteen minutes, the interphone crackled with the gregariousness born of recent peril, and gradually the ship fell silent as each man returned to his own private thoughts.
Paul was wondering about the men on the other ship—whether any of them were still alive. Eighty thousand miles to fall. ”

“ You'd think they'd have found something better than these thirty caliber popguns by now, but the odds say we've got to throw as many different chunks of iron as we can, to have a chance of hitting anything, and even then it's twenty to one against us. You wouldn't have one chance in a thousand of scoring a hit with a bomb at that distance, even if they didn't spot it and take off. What you'd need would be a rocket that could chase them, with the bomb for a head. And there's no way we could carry that size rocket, or fire it if we could. ”

“ They parked the helijet at Municipal Field and headed for the public PV booths, picking up a coterie of two dogs and five assorted children on the way. The kids followed quietly in their wake, ecstatic at the sight of their uniforms.
Paul squared his shoulders, as befitted a hero, and tousled a couple of uncombed heads as they walked. The kids clustered around the booths, as Kovacs entered one to locate a hotel room, and Paul another, to call Sylvia. ”

“ Then Jean, cool and self-possessed and slightly disapproving, with warmth and humor peeping through from underneath when she smiled. A lazy, crinkly kind of smile, like Christmas lights going on one by one. ”

“ Kovacs and the kids were waiting. The armament officer had apparently been telling them of Paul's exploits. They glowed with admiration. The oldest boy, about eleven, had true worship in his eyes. He hesitated a moment, then asked gravely: "Would you tell us how you kill a Red, sir?" ”

“ It seemed they'd been firing for centuries. At ten-mile range, the combat radar kicked the automatics in, turning the ship ninety degrees to her course in one and a half seconds. He heard the lee side firing cut out, as Garrity hung on with two, then three guns. ”

“ They just don't want us playing around with bombs, till the experts get all the angles figured out, and build ships to handle them. And besides, who do you think will rig a bomb like that, without anybody finding out? And where do you think we'd get a bomb in the first place? They don't leave those things lying around. ”

“ Coulter shook his head at the memory. And on the last mission they'd been lucky to get a draw. Those boys were good shots.
"We're crossing his track, Paul. Turn to nine point five o'clock and hold 4 G's for thirty-two seconds, starting on the count ... five—four—three—two—one—go!" He completed the operation in silence, remarking to himself how lucky he was to have Johnson. The boy loved a chase. ”

“ With one hour of fuel at 5 G's, you didn't fire a single squirt unless there was a good reason for it. Most of their time on a mission was spent free wheeling, in the anxiety-laden boredom that fighting men have always known. ”

“ To start on the enemy's tail, just out of his radar range. To come up his track at 2 mps relative velocity, firing six .30 caliber machine guns from fifty miles out. In the last three or four seconds, to break out just enough to clear him, praying that he won't break in the same direction. And to keep on going.
Four minutes and thirty-four seconds to the break. Sixty seconds at 5 G's; one hundred ninety-two seconds of free wheeling ”