Strong turned back to the boys. "Better hop out to the spaceport and get the Polaris over the exposition site, cadets. Soon as you set her down, clean her up a little, then relax. I'll be at the Galaxy Hotel if you need me."
"Yes, sir," said Tom.
The cadets saluted sharply and left the office.
Arriving at the spaceport, they found the Polaris stripped of her guns and her galley stocked with food. The chief petty officer in charge of the enlisted spacemen detail was roving through the passageways of the rocket cruiser when Tom found him.
"Everything set, chief?" asked Tom.
"All set, Cadet Corbett," reported the elderly spaceman, saluting smartly. He gave Tom a receipt for the list of the equipment that had been removed from the ship and signed the logbook. Tom thanked him and made a hurried check of the control deck, with Roger and Astro reporting from the radar and power decks. With the precision and assurance of veteran spacemen, the three Space Cadets lifted the great ship up over the heart of the sprawling Venusian city and brought it down gently in the clearing provided for it at the exposition site, a grassy square surrounded on three sides by buildings of shimmering crystal walls.
No sooner had the giant ship settled itself to the ground, than a crew of exposition workers began laying a slidewalk toward her, while another crew began the construction of an aluminum staircase to the entrance port in her giant fin.
Almost before they realized it, Tom, Roger, and Astro found themselves busy with a hundred little things concerning the ship and their part in the fair. They were visited by the subcommissioner of the exposition and advised of the conveniences provided for the participants of the fair. Then, finally, as a last worker finished the installation of a photoelectric cell across the entrance port to count visitors to the ship, Tom, Roger, and Astro began the dirty job of washing down the giant titanium hull with a special cleaning fluid, while all around them the activity of the fair buzzed with nervous excitement.
Suddenly the three cadets heard the unmistakable roar of jets in the sky. Automatically, they looked up and saw a spaceship, nose up, decelerating as it came in for a touchdown on a clearing across one of the wide spacious streets of the fairgrounds.
"Well, blast my jets!" exclaimed Astro, his eyes clinging to the flaming exhausts as the ship lowered itself to the ground.