His right hand fumbled for the switch of the suit’s rocket motor, found it, snapped it on to full acceleration. Something seemed to hit him on the head and he sailed into the depths of blackness.
VI
BILLY JONES sat is the office of the repair shop, cigarette dangling from his lip, pouring smoke into his watery eye.
“Never saw anything like it in my life,” he declared. “How he made that ship go at all with half the plates ripped off is way beyond me.”
The dungareed mechanic sighted along the toes of his shoes, planted comfortably on the desk.
“Let me tell you, mister,” he declared, “the solar system never has known a pilot like him… never will again. He brought his ship down here with the instruments knocked out. Dead reckoning.”
“Wrote a great piece about him,” Billy said. “How he died in the best tradition of space. Stuff like that. The readers will eat it up. The way that ship let go he didn’t have a chance. Seemed to go out of control all at once and went weaving and bucking almost into Saturn. Then blooey… that’s the end of it. One big splash of flame.”
The mechanic squinted carefully at his toes. “They’re still out there, messing around,” he said, “But they’ll never find him. When that ship blew up he was scattered halfway out to Pluto.”
The inner lock swung open ponderously and a spacesuited figure stepped in.
They waited while he snapped back his helmet.
“Good evening, gentlemen,” said Oliver Meek.
They stared, slack-jawed.
Jones was the first to recover. “But it can’t be you! Your ship… it exploded!”
“I know,” said Meek. “I got out just before it went. Turned on my suit rocket full blast. Knocked me out. By the time I come to I was halfway out to the second Ring. Took me awhile to get back.”
He turned to the mechanic. “Maybe you have a second hand suit you would sell me. I have to get rid of this one. Has some bugs in it.”
“Bugs? Oh, yes, I see. You mean something’s wrong with it.”
“That’s it,” said Meek. “Something’s wrong with it.”
“I got one I’ll let you have, free for nothing,” said the mechanic. “Boy, that was a swell game you played!”
“Could I have the suit now?” asked Meek. “I’m in a hurry to get away.”
Jones bounced to his feet. “But you can’t leave. Why, they think you’re dead. They’re out looking for you. And you won the cup… the cup as the most valuable team member.”
“I just can’t stay,” said Meek. He shuffled his feet uneasily. “Got places to go. Things to see. Stayed too long already.”
“But the cup…”
“Tell Gus I won the cup for him. Tell him to put it on that mantelpiece. In the place he dusted off for it.”
Meek’s blue eyes shone queerly behind his glasses. “Tell him maybe he’ll think of me sometimes when he looks at it.”
The mechanic brought the suit. Meek bundled it under his arm, started for the lock.
Then turned back.
“Maybe you gentlemen…”
“Yes,” said Jones.
“Maybe you can tell me how many goals I made. I lost count, you see.”
“You made nine,” said Jones.
Meek shook his head. “Must be getting old,” he said. “When I was a kid I was a ten goal man.”
Then he was gone, the lock swinging shut behind him.
An A\NN/A Preservation Edition.
Scanned with preliminary proofing by A\NN/A
March 16th, 2008—v1.0
from the original source: Planet Stories, Fall 1944