Free Tom Swift on the Phantom Satellite by Victor Appleton II Page A

reverse orientation close to the surface. But now, reaching out, he switched on the gyros for the descent maneuver made necessary by these unexpected conditions. The craft responded by heeling over to a vertical, tail-down position. The atomic thruster was now engaged, the blast firing straight downward to slow the ship.
    "More power, skipper!" Bud urged.
    There was a jolt as Tom upped the thrust. The Titan hung motionless for a moment, Tom’s hands flying back and forth among the banked rows of levers and switches. At the same time, his keen blue eyes kept a hawklike watch on various dials. Don’t dare to trust the computer now! he thought.
    Under Tom’s guidance, the Titan began to sink groundward. But the rate of descent was very uneven.
    "By jingo, this is like goin’ down in a start-’n-stop elee-vator!" Chow gasped. "My stomach cain’t set itself down!"
    "The forces pulling on us must be changing rapidly," said Kent breathlessly. "Tom has to compensate by hand."
    "Minor problems," Northrup commented. "Nothing to worry about."
    "Does anything ever bug you, Colonel?" asked Gabe Knorff, irritated.
    "Sure, son," he replied suavely. "Photographers!"
    "One thousand feet!" Bud sang out.
    Moments later, Tom flicked a switch to extend a pair of long impact-cushioning struts, which Bud had christened the Daddy Long-Legs Gizmos. These hydraulic struts were to absorb the impact as the craft settled down on the four stubby landing legs that sprouted from the bottom of the propulsion module. Special anchoring mechanisms at the ends of the long struts, capable of penetrating the hardest rock, would drill themselves deeply into the ground to help stabilize the craft on the surface.
    "Impact five seconds!" Tom announced. The expeditioners braced themselves.
    A heartbeat later came a sharp jolt. The Swift expedition had landed!
    "Relax, everybody!" said Tom in a loud voice. "We’re here!"
    The cabin rang anew with cheers, and even Jason Graves joined in.
    Bud hugged Tom. "You did it, pal! Score one more for old Swift Enterprises!" Tom could only grin happily in response.
    After radioing mission control and reporting the successful touchdown, Tom turned to face his crew. "Okay. Into your space suits!" Tom directed, his heart thudding with excitement.
    Quickly the crew donned their gear and stepped through the airlock in small groups. Tom went first, carrying an American flag, the base of which was tipped with a long spike.
    As soon as his feet touched ground, Tom wedged the spike deep into a crevice between rocks. Then he stepped back and saluted the Stars and Stripes. The others did the same.
    At ease again, Chow exclaimed, "Sure feels good to stretch my legs!" He kicked his heels together and gave a little hop.
    The next second, Chow was soaring high above the ground! Screeching over his suit transiphone and flapping his arms wildly, he came down ten yards from the spot where his leap had begun.
    "A cowfly boy!" Bud quipped as the crew rocked with laughter.
    Chow looked sheepish. "Brand my jets!" he said, "I must have swallowed some helium pills!"
    "Don’t worry," Tom reassured him. "It’s just the low gravity here."
    "Yes, the gravity is low," commented Dr. Jatczak in puzzled tones. "Yet not at all what it should be. There is a mystery here to be solved."
    Kent Rockland agreed. "Up here, we weigh only one-twentieth as much as we did on Earth, according to my instruments. That’s enough to hold us down if we don’t get too frisky—but it’s a good thousand times stronger than we had estimated from Earth."
    "We’ll have plenty of time to investigate that," declared Col. Northrup. "At this moment, our commander has a duty to perform."
    Tom had left the channel open between the Titan and mission control, and he knew his words were now being broadcast to the entire world. Speaking over his suit mike, Tom described their space voyage, the survey flight around the satellite, and the landing. He concluded:
    "I hereby officially