John Barrett

“ Don't forget you have another rocket due in twenty minutes—a passenger rocket."
Rawlins' face went pale. "My God! I'd forgotten." He threw up his hands. "Turn 'em back," he shrieked. "Send 'em back to earth! It's suicide to land on that guide beam."
"I can't send them back to Earth," Dan said quietly. "They haven't enough fuel."
"Then send 'em to one of Roehm's fields. It's an admission of complete defeat, but we can't kill 'em."
Dan swallowed. "You're forgetting that Roehm uses invisible light for landing—not ultra short waves. ”

“ It would be simple for anyone to climb the framework of one of the buildings and shine that light in here."
Rawlins straightened up. "I'll search every tower on the field."
"But you haven't time. That passenger rocket will be here in five minutes."
The supervisor sucked in his breath. "What's your idea?"
"I'll sit at the control table myself. You can do the preliminary locating in the observation tower." He ran to the door. "Where's the welder that cut the lock?"
The doctor and a medic were carrying out Stevens when he came back a few seconds later. Dan was slipping on the welder's helmet. ”

“ Then the door of the tower room opened and Rawlins, the supervisor, stepped in.
"All right, Kearns," he said curtly, "you're through. And if anyone asks me about your ability as an electronics engineer, I'll write out the blackest recommendation I can think of." ”