Jonah of the Jove-Run - 2

Total number of words is 812
Total number of unique words is 368
68.1 of words are in the 2000 most common words
76.7 of words are in the 5000 most common words
80.3 of words are in the 8000 most common words
Each bar represents the percentage of words per 1000 most common words.
Nibley watched the ship fire away and his eyes saw it and the Asteroid
Swarm and that brilliant point of light that was massive Jupiter. He
could almost feel the hunger and want and waiting up there in that star
flame.
He looked out into space and his eyes widened and space came in, opened
out like a flower, and already, natural as water flowing, Nibley's
mind, tired as it was, began to shiver out calculations. He started
talking.
"Captain? Take the ship straight out now. You hear?"
"_Fine_," answered the captain.
"Look at your dials."
"_Looking._"
"If number seven reads 132:87, okay. Keep 'er there. If she varies a
point, counteract it on Dial Twenty to 56.90. Keep her hard over for
seventy thousand miles, all that is clear so far. Then, after that, a
sharp veer in number two direction, over a thousand miles. There's a
big sweep of meteors coming in on that other path for you to dodge. Let
me see, let me see--" He figured. "Keep your speed at a constant of one
hundred thousand miles. At that rate--check your clocks and watches--in
exactly an hour you'll hit the second part of the Big Belt. Then switch
to a course roughly five thousand miles over to number 3 direction,
veer again five minutes on the dot later and--"
"_Can you see all those asteroids, Nibley. Are you sure?_"
"Sure. Lots of 'em. Every single one going every which way! Keep
straight ahead until two hours from now, after that last direction of
mine--then slide off at an angle toward Jupiter, slow down to ninety
thousand for ten minutes, then up to a hundred ten thousand for fifteen
minutes. After that, one hundred fifty thousand all the way!"
Flame poured out of the rocket jets. It moved swiftly away, growing
small and distant.
"Give me a read on dial 67!"
"_Four._"
"Make it six! And set your automatic pilot to 61 and 14 and 35.
Now--everything's okay. Keep your chronometer reading this way--seven,
nine, twelve. There'll be a few tight scrapes, but you'll hit Jupiter
square on in 24 hours, if you jump your speed to 700,000 six hours from
now and hold it that way."
"_Square on it is, Mr. Nibley._"
Nibley just lay there a moment. His voice was easy and not so high and
shrill any more. "And on the way back to Mars, later, don't try to find
me. I'm going out in the dark on this metal rock. Nothing but dark for
me. Back to perihelion and sun for you. Know--know where _I'm_ going?"
"_Where?_"
"Centaurus!" Nibley laughed. "So help me God I am. No lie!"
He watched the ship going out, then, and he felt the compact, collected
trajectories of all the men in it. It was a good feeling to know that
he was the guiding theme. Like in the old days....
Douglas' voice broke in again.
"_Hey, Pop. Pop, you still there?_"
A little silence. Nibley felt blood pulsing down inside his suit.
"Yep," he said.
"_We just gave Bruno your little note to read. Whatever it was, when he
finished reading it, he went insane._"
Nibley said, quiet-like. "Burn that there paper. Don't let anybody else
read it."
A pause. "_It's burnt. What was it?_"
"Don't be inquisitive," snapped the old man. "Maybe I proved to Bruno
that he didn't really exist. To hell with it!"
The rocket reached its constant speed. Douglas radioed back: "_All's
well. Sweet calculating, Pop. I'll tell the Rocket Officials back at
Marsport. They'll be glad to know about you. Sweet, sweet calculating.
Thanks. How goes it? I said--how goes it? Hey, Pop! Pop?_"
Nibley raised a trembling hand and waved it at nothing. The ship was
gone. He couldn't even see the jet-wash now, he could only feel that
hard metal movement out there among the stars, going on and on through
a course he had set for it. He couldn't speak. There was just emotion
in him. He had finally, by God, heard a compliment from a mechanic of
radar-computators!
[Illustration: _Nibley raised a trembling hand and waved it at
nothing._]
He waved his hand at nothing. He watched nothing moving on and on into
the crossed orbits of other invisible nothings. The silence was now
complete.
He put his hand down. Now he had only to chart that one last personal
orbit. The one he had wanted to finish only in space and not grounded
back on Mars.
It didn't take lightning calculation to set it out for certain.
Life and death were the parabolic ends to his trajectory. The long
life, first swinging in from darkness, arcing to the inevitable
perihelion, and now moving back out, out and away--
Into the soft, encompassing dark.
"By God," he thought weakly, quietly. "Right up to the last, my
reputation's good. Never fluked a calculation yet, and I never will...."
He didn't.
You have read 1 text from English literature.
  • Parts
  • Jonah of the Jove-Run - 1
    Total number of words is 4760
    Total number of unique words is 1271
    50.5 of words are in the 2000 most common words
    64.2 of words are in the 5000 most common words
    71.6 of words are in the 8000 most common words
    Each bar represents the percentage of words per 1000 most common words.
  • Jonah of the Jove-Run - 2
    Total number of words is 812
    Total number of unique words is 368
    68.1 of words are in the 2000 most common words
    76.7 of words are in the 5000 most common words
    80.3 of words are in the 8000 most common words
    Each bar represents the percentage of words per 1000 most common words.