"Here," he explained, "are a group of possible time-versus-velocity courses. Follow 'em exactly and we'll make space contact on the other side."
Wilson looked at Allison. "Wish me luck," he said.
Allison nodded. "You've got it," he said quietly. "You know we're for you, or we'd not be here."
"If I don't come back—"
Allison's face drew taut. "If you flop out there," he said solemnly, "Toby Manning is next in command, and he'll be forced to follow orders from Base. So don't flop, Ted."
"I won't," promised Wilson.
He fired up the tender, waited until everything was running hot and ready, and blasted himself out of the exit port forward. He set his magnetic detector and patch-corded it to the drive so that the warp-generator would close down and the drive would cease at the proper instant for deceleration in close proximity of the lifeship.
Although the long-range search radar was completely useless at velocities even approaching the speed of light, Wilson turned it on and checked it out in readiness. He patch-ordered it also to the basic space drive, to take over after the velocity of his ship fell below the speed at which radar became useful.
Then he waited, with one eye on the timer. The detector ship faded behind him and was lost as his lighter spacecraft responded to the drive.
He wished helplessly for an auto-timer drive, because he knew that his hand and eye were not accurate enough to do the job as smoothly as he'd have liked. He wanted a bigger ship with a monster-sized drive. One of those spaceport luggers that can hump spacers from berth to berth would have been fine, even though they carried insufficient storage power for anything more than close to Base operations. He wondered whether such a ship would be too massive for fast maneuverability, and decided to ask about that, some day.