In other words, the explosion the harmless-looking cylinder could produce was equivalent to ten thousand tons of TNT, a chemical explosive no longer in actual use but still used for comparison.
Rip asked huskily, "Any more of those things?" The importance of the job was becoming increasingly clear to him. Nuclear explosives were not used without good reason. The fissionable material was too valuable for other purposes.
The sides came off the remaining cases. Some of them held fat tubes of conventional rocket fuel in solid form, the igniters carefully packed separately.
There were three other atomic bombs, making four in all. There were two bombs each of five KT and ten KT.
Commander O'Brine looked at the amazing assortment of stuff. "Does that check, clerk?"
The spaceman nodded. "Yes, sir. I found another notation that says food supplies and personal equipment to be supplied by the Scorpius."
"Well, vack me for a Venusian rabbit!" O'Brine muttered. He tugged at his ear. "You could dump me on that asteroid with this assortment of junk, and I'd spend the rest of my life there. I don't see how you can use this stuff to move an asteroid!"
"Maybe that's why the Federation sent Planeteers," Rip said—and was sorry the moment the words were out.
O'Brine's jaw muscles bulged, but he held his temper. "I'm going to pretend I didn't hear that, Foster. We have to get along until the asteroid is safely in an orbit around Earth. After that, I'm going to take a great deal of pleasure in feeding you to the space fish, piece by piece."
It was Rip's turn to get red. "I'm sorry, Commander. Accept my apologies." He certainly had a lot to learn about space etiquette. There was a time for spacemen and Planeteers to fight each other and a time for them to cooperate.