“He got out all right,” the colonel said. “He’s just stalling to make it look good.”
“We aren’t going to give up the search are we, sir?” asked the radioman.
“It would serve his soul right.” The colonel stopped pacing and faced the radioman. “Keep trying to raise him, Reinhardt. I’m going to bring us down to forty thousand feet and search the area where he went down. Helluva waste of rocket fuel tooling around in the atmosphere,” he muttered, disappearing through a bulkhead door.
“Wait! Colonel Towers!” Brandon called. But he knew it was no use. Obviously he could pick up Astro but they could neither see nor hear him.
“Captain Brandon, this is Astro calling. Over.” The radioman repeated the phrase a dozen times and each time Brandon acknowledged, swore and acknowledged again. Finally, in desperation, he switched off the tele-talkie.
He snapped open the back of the unit and studied the maze of transistors, resistors, and capacitators. If there was something wrong it was subtle, like a burned out resistor or a shorted condenser. Whatever it was, it was beyond emergency repair. He dropped the tele-talkie behind the seat and examined the gauge on his oxygen tank. There was enough to last the night but not much more.
He sat down in the capsule to think. The first thing they’d locate is the burning ship, he decided. Then they would probably start searching in ever-widening circles. But would they see him in the faint light of the ice moons?
He looked back at the nylon chute again. Another thought ran through his mind. Suppose they don’t spot me in the dark. When the sun—Sirius, I mean—comes up, there’s a good chance they’ll spot the parachute and search for him.
He slid the canopy open and looked down at the red soil of Sirius Three. He hesitated for a moment, then swung his feet over the side and dropped to the ground.
“At least I’ll have that satisfaction,” he said, grinning under his oxygen mask.