Momentum used up, earth's gravity would again assume control. The rocket would slip back, tail first, slowly, slowly, then faster and faster, beginning the long, final plunge to the ground.
CHAPTER XVIII
Out of Control!
Rick came back to painful consciousness. He realized that the acceleration was at an end. The torture of G forces was over, and whatever happened from here on wouldn't compare with the past few minutes.
He tried to sit up, and strained muscles reacted. He groaned with pain and lay down again. Suddenly he realized he was no longer on the floor!
He hung in the air, as though by some weird magic, and tried to figure out what had happened to him. Of course he was weightless! The rocket was now in free flight, its inertia counteracting gravitational pull. He would continue weightless until gravity took over again.
