stare after the disappearing watch officer, the figure was illuminated
by the dim light from the entrance hall. He was a young man wearing the
royal-blue uniform of a Space Cadet. Tall and wiry, with square features
topped by a shock of close-cropped blond hair, he stood poised on the
balls of his feet, ready to move quickly should another watch officer
appear.

After a quick glance at his wrist chronometer, the young cadet darted
across the slidewalk toward the transparent crystal portal of the
dormitory. Hesitating only long enough to make certain that the inner
hallway was clear, he slid the portal open, ducked inside, and sprinted
down the hall toward a large black panel on the wall near the foot of
the slidestairs. On the panel, in five long columns, were the name
plates of every cadet quartered in the dormitory and beside each plate
were two words, IN and OUT, with a small tab that fitted over one of the
words.

Out of the one hundred and fifty cadets in the dormitory, one hundred
and forty-nine were marked IN. The slender, blond-haired cadet quickly
made it unanimous, reaching up to the tab next to the name of Roger
Manning and sliding it over to cover the word OUT. With a last final
look around, he raced up the slidestairs, smiling in secret triumph.

In Room 512 on the fifth floor of the dormitory, Tom Corbett and Astro,
the two other cadets who, with Roger Manning, made up the famed
_Polaris_ unit of the Space Cadet Corps, were deep in their studies.
Though the lights-out order had been given over the dormitory
loud-speaker system, the desk lamp burned brightly and there was a
blanket thrown over the window. The boys of the _Polaris_ unit weren't
alone in their disobedience. All over the dormitory, lights were on and