When Wallace reappeared, he was carrying a coil of wire with a double plug to attach to the spacephones inside their helmets. He jammed the plug into Simms' helmet and then into his own. Simms' eyes lit up with surprise as he heard....
"...This is a general emergency announcement from Solar Guard headquarters. Squadrons A and B of the Marsopolis garrison will proceed to space quadrants W, sections forty-one to fifty. It is believed that Gus Wallace and Luther Simms are in that vicinity. Approach with caution, they are armed with atomic blasters and are believed to be psychologically unable to surrender. It is believed they will resist arrest...."
The voice repeated the announcement and added a general call for the men, if they were listening, to surrender. Wallace pulled out the two plugs and grinned at Simms.
"Picked it up on the teleceiver inside the ship. Thought you might like to know how safe we are here."
Simms grinned back, "And how far off the track they are. Where is that space quadrant they think we're in?"
"Out past Saturn," said Wallace with a grin. "With the Mars garrison chasing us at one end of the system, we'll hit them on the other and be gone before they know what happened!"
Simms patted the barrel of the nearest atomic blaster. "And, spaceman, we're going to hit them hard!"
The rasping voice on the audioceiver was sharp. A command to be obeyed.
Tom turned away from the control board and looked at Strong who was already reaching for the ship's intercom.
"Full braking rocket thrust, Astro," he yelled into the microphone, "and make it quick or we'll all be blasted into protons!"
Tom and the captain gripped their chairs tightly as the ship bucked against the deceleration force of the powerful braking rockets. Gradually the freighter _Dog Star_ slowed and came to a dead stop in space.
"Hey!" yelled Astro over the intercom from the power deck. "What's going on up there?"
"We've just entered the outer circle of defense on the prison asteroid, Astro," replied Strong. "We have to stop so they can sweep us with their radar and identify the ship."
"But I sent them a message in Solar Guard code that we were coming," interjected Roger who was listening from the radar bridge.