Astounding Science Fiction (British edition) — page 31: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

PIONEER the proper places. A quick test of the guidance system before he locked it into the autopilot. This was the real thing now. Months of testing and practice, and now the pay-off. But he could still back out. The ship was on the ground yet. He wondered if it was worth getting killed for what he wanted. Well, if he backed out, no money; life wouldn’t be worth living then. He wasn’t so sure it was anyway. “One minute.” The Nomad was ready. “Project Control, Nomad secure for lift,” he addressed the mike. **Forty seconds!” He started the pumps and activated automatic circuits. Lights winked on and off on the Christmas tree. “Thirty seconds!” The ground power plug dropped free, leaving the ship running on its own. Dick poised his finger over the auto-pilot switch, ready to turn it on if it failed to do so on the trigger pulse from the blockhouse. The Nomad, silent a few minutes before, was now alive and humming, whirring noises. “Fifteen!” The Nomad was suddenly a being bent on killing him. It was too late to run; he had to stay and fight. “Ten ...nine... eight... seven 2. . SIX—” The autopilot came on. He braced himself for the take-off. PERree 50s TWO Sn FIRE!” one ... It hit him. Incredible noise beat against his ears and shook his body. A tremendous shudder went through the ship. The push which flattened him into the couch was not the sudden jar of the familiar transocean rockets, but an increasing force which tightened the skin across his face and tried to shove the breath from his chest. He had the sensation the ceiling was falling on him; he wanted to hide, but 29 didn’t know where. The noise was no longer sound; it was pain. He fought back. He’d live in spite o1 what the Nomad tried to do—if the _ gyros didn’t fail. They had to track— had to! The earsplitting roar died as the ship rammed past the speed of sound. The radar screen showed she was be- ginning to tilt to the east on orders from the programmed autopilot. There was a sudden push of acceler- ation. Step One was separating. He watched it fall behind on the radar- scope. Dead weight now, its fuel ex- pended, it would rise another hundred miles on its own momentum. Where it would fall was no concern of his. He watched the ship being tilted ever more to the eastward. The incredible heaviness persisted. Dick kept his eyes glued on the Christ- mas tree, watching the gyro indicators, his hand over the manual cut-off switch. There were still minutes left where the ship could go haywire. She could still kill him in very nasty ways. His only chance was to be able to move and think fast if something did happen. A red light winked. He tensed, but it was only the warning for second separation. He felt the concussion as the nose of Step Two blew into two sections, and he knew that Step Three, the sleek, rocket-powered flying boat in which he was riding, had roared out of the ungainly, bulky mass of titanium and aluminum of Step Two like a moth emerging from its cocoon. He would have liked to have seen a sight like that. Lights across the board were solid green again, with the first spaceship on its own. Radar showed Step Two receding, and it was less than a minute to final cut-off. The autopilot was now shaping the round-the-world course. The red hand crept slowly around the face of the chronometer. Thirty connicloooks.c© inn