Tales of Pirx the Pilot Read Online Free PDF Page A

impotent fury directed at the fly.
    “AMU-27 Terraluna to PAL Central. Negative, am not abandoning outer quadrant, to hell with your transsolar, am flying in tri-formation. AMU-27, JO-2 ditto JO-2, squadron leader AMU-27 Terraluna. Out.”
    I didn’t have to say “to hell with your transsolar,” he thought. That’ll cost me a few points for sure. Oh, they can alt damn well go to hell! I’ll probably get docked for the fly, too.
    It could only have happened to him. A fly! Wow, big deal! He could just see Smiga and Boerst busting a gut when they got wind of that crazy-assed fly. It was the first time since lift-off that he caught himself thinking of Boerst. But right now he didn’t have a moment to lose, because PAL was dropping farther and farther behind. They had been flying in formation for a good five minutes.
    “AMU-27 to JO-2 ditto JO-2 Terraluna. It is now 2007 hours. Insertion parabolic orbit Terraluna to commence at 2010 hours. Course one hundred eleven…” And he read off the course data from the flight sheet, which, by a feat of acrobatics, he was able to retrieve from overhead. The two JO ships radioed their reply. PAL dropped out of sight, but he could still hear it signaling ever so faintly. Or was that the fly he was hearing?
    For a moment the fly seemed to multiply, to be in two different places at once. Pirx rubbed his eyes. Just as he suspected: there was not one, but two of them. Where did the second one come from?!
    Now I’m really a goner, he reflected with absolute calm, without a sign of any emotion. He even felt relieved somehow, knowing that it no longer mattered—either way he was sunk. His thoughts were diverted by a glance at the clock: it was 2010 hours, the time he himself had scheduled for the maneuver—and he had yet to even place his hands on the controls!
    The daily grind of training exercises must have taken their toll because without a moment’s hesitation he grabbed both control sticks, pressed first the left and then the right one, and all the time kept his eye on the trajectometer. The engine responded with a hollow roar until it gradually tapered off to a whisper. Ouch! Something landed on his forehead, just under his visor, and remained stationary. The navigation book! It was blocking his vision, but he couldn’t brush it aside without taking his hands from the controls. His earphones were alive and astir as the two flies went about pursuing their love life on the computer. If only I had a gun on me, he thought, feeling the navigation book start to flatten his nose with the increase in acceleration. In desperation he began tossing his head around like a madman; he had to be able to see the trajectometer, for crying out loud! Suddenly the book crashed to the floor with a bang—and small wonder: at 4 g it must have weighed nearly 3 kilos. He immediately decelerated to the level required by the maneuver, and at 2g put the levers on hold. He threw a glance at the mating flies. They were not the least bit fazed by the deceleration; on the contrary, they looked to be in seventh heaven. Hm, another eighty-three minutes to go. He checked the radarscope: the two JO ships were now trailing him at a distance of 70 kilometers. I must have jumped out in front that time I hit 4 g, he thought. Oh well, no sweat.
    From now until the end of the accelerated flight he would have a little time to kill. Two g was tolerable, despite his combined weight of 142 kilos. How many times had he spent up to a half hour in the centrifuge at 4 g !
    But then, it wasn’t exactly a picnic, either, what with your arms and legs weighing like iron, your head completely immobilized by the blinding light…
    He verified the position of the two ships, and again thought of Boerst, picturing to himself how very much the movie star he must have looked. What a jaw that guy had! Not to mention that perfectly straight nose, those steely gray eyes… You can bet he didn’t have to rely on any cribsheet! But come to