On the Trail of the Space Pirates, page 139 by Carey Rockwell
<< Return to Title Details & Download140
tro growled, "I don't care what he does to me. I won't tell him a thing!"
"Same here!" exclaimed Roger.
Tom merely nodded, his face a grim, expressionless mask.
Suddenly three men led by Brooks, the radar operator, appeared in the passageway outside the brig. Brooks stepped forward, opened the door, and gestured with the paralo-ray gun in his hand.
"All right, you punks! Outside!"
Astro started to lunge for the pirate, but Tom grabbed him by the arm. "Take it easy, Astro. That won't get us any place."
"You can say that again," sneered Brooks. "One crazy move like that, kid, and I'll freeze you solid as a cake of ice! Now come on! Move!"
Tom, followed by Astro and Roger, walked slowly out of the brig, and guarded closely by the three pirate crewmen they were taken to the main air lock.
"All right," said Brooks. "The big ox and blondie, get in there!"
One of the crewmen opened the air-lock portal while the other two jabbed Astro and Roger with ray guns. The two cadets stumbled into the chamber and the door was slammed behind them.
"Lock it!" snarled Brooks.
When the men had secured the portal, Brooks turned and pushed Tom roughly along the passageway. A moment later they reached the control deck where Bull Coxine was hunched over his charts.
"Here he is, Captain," said Brooks. "The other two are sealed up in the air lock like sardines!"
Coxine nodded and faced Tom, a thin smile on his face. "I told you I would get the recognition signal, Corbett," he said. "And I will!" Coxine walked over to a large valve on the after bulkhead and tapped the needle indicator right beside it. Satisfied, he turned back to the cadet.
"In two hours," began Coxine, "we'll be within range of the Ganymede garrison and its radar. It takes exactly eight turns on this valve to bleed the air out of the air lock where your two buddies are. So, every fifteen minutes I'm going to ask you for the recognition signal, and every time you say no, I'll tu