Presently he touched the dials. The indicator moved from "idle" to "take-off." He gunned the rockets.
The ship lurched forward, groaned, and wallowed deeper into the ooze. It was no go.
Rawson returned the power to idle and waited patiently. Perhaps it could still be done.
Perhaps—but more likely not!
Rawson was not ready to despair. He waited with the courage of his conviction that a way could be found through science.
He waited for three hours, and then he touched the controls again. He set the dials to depress the nose, pulled the lever for the reverse. Then he punched the needle for full power. He geared in the traction.
The space ship leaped backward with a jerk, found firm footing, and crawled with accelerated power. It surged swifter and swifter like an unleashed Neptune cyclone.
And as he felt the motion of the vessel beneath his feet, Rawson looked up and saw the light stream through the muck that covered the port windows.
He had broken free!
By instinct he guided the vessel all alone to a new landing. He had to be navigator, engineer, pilot, and do the many tedious things that require many hands and brains to control a ship.