Authentic Science Fiction Monthly No. 44 — page 63: what you’re looking at

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

AUTHENTIC SCIENCE FICTION grasp the rail before his body began to float away from the wall. “This says you land it. My way.” “Carry on.” Curry put his hands behind his head and leaned back. “Shoot.” He shut his eyes. ““Onlyremember,” headded, the words flat and dry in the tiny cabin, “‘you’ll never get back to Earth. Just go on drifting out into space. Or fall into the sun. So go on and shoot —and be damned!” “Thats where you're wrong, Curry.” Steve’s voice was soft and slapped back in sibilant echoes from the metal walls. “I’m not foolish enough to kill you. All right, I know I can’t pilot this ship, that I need you for the figuring. Remember, that’s what you went to school for. My school- ing was slightly different.” “Three R’s?”’ Curry asked, lazily, feeling the mastery of the situation sliding into his hands. “If you don’t land this ship on the moon the way I say, ll put a bullet into your kneecap. That would be most unpleasant, wise guy. And if you still played dumb, well, you've always got another knee.” Curry shifted his body 62 round stiffly, opened his eyes, stared levelly at Steve, cling- ing, limpet-like, to the rail. ® He said, bitingly: “You don’t think this first trip to the moon is a sure-fire bet, do you? For all the work and planning that have gone into the project it’s still a mighty thin chance, We worked as a team—something you wouldn’t understand. All of us back on Earth and on the station, fighting the stupid prejudices of clots like you, fighting the emptiness of space, fighting ourselves when our courage ran low in the cold, small seconds of count-off. We all wanted to be the first man on the moon, all of us who had seen the dream built piece by piece. Why do you think I was chosen ?”’ Steve jerked the gun as though to ward off what was coming. “They chose me, wise guy, because I’m a human wreck, because I’m just a brain and a heart and lungs and silver wire.” Curry jerked up the legs of his coveralls and Steve re- coiled as the leather and plastic and metal of Curry’s legs hung nakedly over the chair. “Shoot my kneecaps,” connicloooks.comn