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WE DIDN'T DO ANYTHING WRONG, HARDLY
By ROGER KUYKENDALL
Illustrated by Freas
[Transcriber's Note: This etext was produced from Astounding ScienceFiction May 1959. Extensive research did not uncover any evidence thatthe U.S. copyright on this publication was renewed.]
_After all--they only borrowed it a little while, just to fix it--_
I mean, it isn't like we swiped anything. We maybe borrowed a couple ofthings, like. But, gee, we put everything back like we found it, prettynear.
Even like the compressor we got from Stinky Brinker that his old manwasn't using and I traded my outboard motor for, my old m ... my fathermade me trade back. But it was like Skinny said ... You know, Skinny.Skinny Thompson. He's the one you guys keep calling the boy genius, butshucks, he's no ...
Well, yeah, it's like Skinny said, we didn't need an outboard motor, andwe did need a compressor. You've got to have a compressor on aspaceship, everybody knows that. And that old compression chamber thatold man ... I mean _Mr._ Fields let us use didn't have a compressor.
Sure he said we could use it. Anyway he said we could play with it, andSkinny said we were going to make a spaceship out of it, and he said goahead.
Well, no, he didn't say it exactly like that. I mean, well, like hedidn't take it serious, sort of.
Anyway, it made a swell spaceship. It had four portholes on it and anair lock and real bunks in it and lots of room for all that stuff thatSkinny put in there. But it didn't have a compressor and that's why ...
What stuff? Oh, you know, the stuff that Skinny put in there. Like theradar he made out of a TV set and the antigravity and the atomic powerplant he invented to run it all with.
He's awful smart, Skinny is, but he's not like what you think of agenius. You know, he's not all the time using big words, and he doesn'tlook like a genius. I mean, we call him Skinny 'cause he used tobe--Skinny.
But he isn't now, I mean he's maybe small for his age, anyway he'ssmaller than me, and I'm the same age as he is. 'Course, I'm big for myage, so that doesn't mean much, does it?
Well, I guess Stinker Brinker started it. He's always riding Skinnyabout one thing or another, but Skinny never gets mad and it's a goodthing for Stinker, too. I saw Skinny clean up on a bunch of ninthgraders ... Well, a couple of them anyway. They were saying ... Well, Iguess I won't tell you what they were saying. Anyway, Skinny used judo,I guess, because there wasn't much of a fight.
Anyway, Stinker said something about how he was going to be a rocketpilot when he grew up, and I told him that Skinny had told me that therewouldn't be any rockets, and that antigravity would be the thing as soonas it was invented. So Stinker said it never would be invented, and Isaid it would so, and he said it would not, and I said ...
Well, if you're going to keep interrupting me, how can I ...
All right. Anyway, Skinny broke into the argument and said that he couldprove mathematically that antigravity was possible, and Stinky saidsuure he could, and Skinny said sure he could, and Stinky said suuure hecould, like that. Honestly, is that any way to argue? I mean it soundslike two people agreeing, only Stinky keeps going suuure, like that, youknow? And Stinky, what does he know about mathematics? He's had to takeRemedial Arithmetic ever since ...
* * * * *
No, I don't understand how the antigravity works. Skinny told me, but itwas something about meson flow and stuff like that that I didn'tunderstand. The atomic power plant made more sense.
Where did we get what uranium? Gee, no, we couldn't afford uranium, soSkinny invented a hydrogen fusion plant. Anyone can make hydrogen. Youjust take zinc and sulfuric acid and ...
Deuterium? You mean like heavy hydrogen? No, Skinny said it wouldprobably work better, but like I said, we couldn't afford anythingfancy. As it was, Skinny had to pay five or six dollars for that specialsquare tubing in the antigravity, and the plastic space helmets we hadcost us ninety-eight cents each. And it cost a dollar and a half forthe special tube that Skinny needed to make the TV set into a radar.
You see, we didn't steal anything, really. It was mostly stuff that wasjust lying around. Like the TV set was up in my attic, and the oldrefrigerator that Skinny used the parts to make the atomic power plantout of from. And then, a lot of the stuff we already had. Like the skindiving suits we made into spacesuits and the vacuum pump that Skinny hadalready and the generator.
Sure, we did a lot of skin diving, but that was last summer. That's howwe knew about old man Brinker's compressor that Stinky said was his andI traded my outboard motor for and had to trade back. And that's how weknew about Mr. Fields' old compression chamber, and all like that.
The rocket? Well, it works on the same principle as the atomic powerplant, only it doesn't work except in a vacuum, hardly. Course you don'tneed much of a rocket when you have antigravity. Everyone knows that.
Well, anyway, that's how we built the spaceship, and believe me, itwasn't easy. I mean with Stinky all the time bothering us and laughingat us. And I had to do a lot of lawn mowing to get money for the squaretubing for the antigravity and the special tube for the radar, and myspace helmet.
Stinky called the space helmets kid stuff. He was always saying thingslike say hello to the folks on Mars for me, and bring back a bottle ofcanal number five, and all like that, you know. Course, they did looklike kid stuff, I guess. We bought them at the five-and-dime, and theywere meant for kids. Of course when Skinny got through with them, theyworked fine.
We tested them in the air lock of the compression chamber when we gotthe compressor in. They tested out pretty good for a half-hour, then wetried them on in there. Well, it wasn't a complete vacuum, justtwenty-seven inches of mercury, but that was O.K. for a test.
So anyway, we got ready to take off. Stinky was there to watch, ofcourse. He was saying things like, farewell, O brave pioneers, and stufflike that. I mean it was enough to make you sick.
He was standing there laughing and singing something like up in the airjunior birdmen, but when we closed the air-lock door, we couldn't hearhim. Skinny started up the atomic power plant, and we could see Stinkylaughing fit to kill. It takes a couple of minutes for it to warm up,you know. So Stinky started throwing rocks to attract our attention, andSkinny was scared that he'd crack a porthole or something, so he threwthe switch and we took off.
Boy, you should of seen Stinky's face. I mean you really should of seenit. One minute he was laughing you know, and the next minute he lookedlike a goldfish. I guess he always did look like a goldfish, but I meaneven more like, then. And he was getting smaller and smaller, because wehad taken off.
* * * * *
We were gone pretty near six hours, and it's a good thing my Mom made metake a lunch. Sure, I told her where we were going. Well ... anyway Itold her we were maybe going to fly around the world in Skinny and myspaceship, or maybe go down to Carson's pond. And she made me take alunch and made me promise I wouldn't go swimming alone, and I suredidn't.
But we did go around the world three or four times. I lost count. Anywaythat's when we saw the satellite--on radar. So Skinny pulled thespaceship over to it and we got out and looked at it. The spacesuitsworked fine, too.
Gosh no, we didn't steal it or anything. Like Skinny said, it was just amenace to navigation, and the batteries were dead, and it wasn't workingright anyway. So we tied it onto the spaceship and took it home. No, wehad to tie it on top, it was too big to take inside with the antennassticking out. Cour
se, we found out how to fold them later.
Well, anyway the next day, the Russians started squawking about acapitalist plot, and someone had swiped their satellite. Gee, I meanwith all the satellites up there, who'd miss just one?
So I got worried that they'd find out that we took it. Course, I didn'tneed to worry, because Stinky told them all right, just like atattletale.
So anyway, after Skinny got the batteries recharged, we put it back. Andthen when we landed there were hundreds of people standing around, andMr. Anderson from the State Department. I guess you know the rest.
Except maybe Mr. Anderson started laughing when we told him, and he saidit was the best joke on the Russians he ever heard.
I guess it is when you think about it. I mean, the Russians complainingabout somebody swiping their satellite and then the State Departmentanswering a couple of kids borrowed it, but they put it back.
One thing that bothers me though, we didn't put it back exactly the waywe found it. But I guess it doesn't matter. You see, when we put itback, we goofed a little. I mean, we put it back in the same orbit, moreor less, but we got it going in the wrong direction.
THE END