colored pencil

"Fishing once more? "colored pencil colored penciltcolored pencile 128 .In using this system, absentee voters werecolored pencil instructed to mark their ballots with number two pencils. The optical scanner rejected ballots which were marked withcolored pencil instruments other than number two pencil. 2006, Barbara Slater Stern, curriculum and teaching dialogue: V. 8, page 33."Mrs. Landry, I forgot to bring my number two pencils! Does that mean I flunk this test?" Big tears filled Joey's eyes. A standard, ordinary number 2 pencil, one which is not colored or mechanical or colo
DISCOVERY

To the sightseers, cameramen, and commentators aboard Space Station One, it was hard to tell that the ship was actually moving. There was, of course, none of the thunder and fury of a takeoff from earth as Discovery pulled out of her parking orbit; the only sign of acceleration was the unbearable, blue-white radiance of the plasma jets blasting out their streams of ionized gas at hundreds of miles a second.

Even aboard the ship, the only sound produced by the drive units was a faint, far-off hissing, and their thrust was so low that weight was almost negligible. But they could maintain that thrust for hour after hour, as they spewed out their jets of star-stuff, hotter than the face of the sun. When they finally closed down, Discovery would be hurtling starward at almost thirty miles a second.

There was little for Bowman and Kaminski-colored pencilacting as co-pilot-to do except to monitor all systems, and to be prepared to make decisions if a situation arose outside the computer's experience or programming. But Athena was working perfectly, measuring the ship's mounting speed and checking it second by second with the radars back on earth. From time to time she made minute corrections utterly imperceptible to the men aboard, to bring Discovery back onto the precomputed path.

Less than an hour after departure, she announced the uneventful passing of the voyage's first milestone. The announcement was for the benefit of the waiting earth, for the crew knew it already from their instruments, nevertheless, that cool, soprano voice filled them with many conflicting emotions:

"We have now attained escape velocity. I repeat: We have now attained escape velocity."

Here, already receding behind them, was what had once seemed the ultimate goal of rocket engineering. Whatever happenedcolored pencil, Earth could never call them back. Though power might fail in the next second, theirs would still be the freedom of space, to circle the sun forever on an independent planetary orbit.

There were still hours of acceleration ahead, but this was the psychological break-off point. Even though the cloud-girdled globe of Earth still filled the sky, she had lost them. Her backward- tugging gravity could now merely reduce their speed; it was no longer able to cancel and reverse it.

No man, however many times he went into space, could fail to react to this moment. His feelings depended on what he had left behind; for most, it was an instant of ineffable sadness, like the last sight of home to a seafarer who knows he will never return. For this was a parting that no men had ever experienced before this generation-a parting from the world more final than any earlier death, for Earth could not even reclaim their bones.

Soon afterward, the first booster unit was discarded. The acceleration ebbed to zero as the last precious drops of propellant were drained from the tank, and Discovery floated inert against the stars. Then the explosive bolts separated cleanly, and there was a gentle nudge as small solid rockets eased the two stages apart.

It was strange to see another manmade object hangingcolored pencil there in space, where a moment ago there had been only Earth, Sun, and stars. As the jets began to thrust again, the booster slowly dwindled astern; it seemed to be falling back to earth, but that of course was an illusion. It was now a satellite of the Sun, never to return to the world that had built it.

Three hours later, for the first time in the history of manned flight, Discovery passed another milestone.

"We have now attained solar escape," said Athena. "I repeat: we have now attained solar escape velocity."

At their control panels Bowman and Kaminski looked at each other with a mingling of pride and awe. Now they had not merely escaped from Earth, they had loosened the grip of the Sun itself. Unless they slowed themselves deliberately, they could now go sailing out past all the planets-gradually losing speed, but never falling back into the Solar System. In a few years they would pass the orbit of Pluto and go drifting onward, slowly but inevitably, toward the stars. It might take them a million years to reach the very nearest; but they would get there.

And still the speed mounted, minute by minute, through eight full hours of gentle acceleration. Earth was now a brilliant, waning crescent three hundred thousand miles sunward; though it was still a mere stone's throw away, astronomically speaking, it already seemed more distant than Jupiter. To Discovery's crew, it lay in their past, and they might never return to it. Jupiter lay in their future- and nothing, except the incredibly rare chance of a direct collision with a large meteorite or an asteroid, could prevent them from reaching it. For the ship was easing itself, with exquisite precision, into the final orbit.

"One minute from injection," said Athena. "Cutting main drive in ten seconds."

Par away, the barely audible hissing of the jets died into silence. With their passing went also the last sensation of weight, except for occasional ghostly pats and nudges as the low-powered vernier jets made infinitesimal adjustments to the orbit. Soon even these were finished; and Athena announced: "On course for Jupiter. Estimated transit time two hundred nineteen days five hours."

THE LONG SLEEP

Every day the Sun was two colored pencilmillion miles farther away, and the Earth was no more than the most brilliant ofcolored pencil the stars. Discovery was hurtling effortlessly out into the night, her drive units quiescent, but all her other systems functioning at full efficiency.

This was the final shakedown period, when the crew would acquire the skills that could never be learned on Earth, or even in free orbit. One by one they crosschecked each other's performances, studied all that was known or suspected about their still-distant goal, and reacted to simulated disasters.

Of these, the most feared were fire and meteorites. Even more than a ship of the sea, a ship of space is vulnerable to fire. It contains great stores of concentrated energy-chemical, mechanical, electrical, nuclear-any of which may be accidentally unleashed. Every other day, at unexpected times, Bowman would hold a fire-control exercise, and all the heat-sensing alarms were tested with almost fanatical regularity.

As for meteorites, one could only hope for the best and put one's faith in statistics. Complete safety was impossible; every day, many thousands of dust particles would bombard the ship, but the vast majority would be so tiny that the mark they made on the outer skin could be seen only through a microscope. The few that did penetrate would be stopped by the inner hull.

If everything went completely according to plan, there would be no need for even a single member of the crew to stay out of hibernation until Jupiter was reached, Athena could attend to all the running of the ship. On a seven month voyage, however, the unexpected was bound to happen; hence it was wise to have a man available at a moment's notice.

And any man, no matter how stable and well balanced, needed a back-up at least as badly as did Athena. Otherwise, the sense of isolation might overpower him, and he would move into that realm of inhuman detachment that had in the early days of astronautics, caused so many accidents.

The psychocolored pencillogists disliked the term "break-off," because it gave the impression of abruptness; but the name had stuck. The first men to fly alone in high-altitude balloons, and the pioneer explorers of the underwater world, had experienced the phenomenon as long ago as the 1950's. It was a sense of remoteness, and of total separation from everyday life, which was not in the least unpleasant. Indeed, it could be positively exhilarating-and that was its greatest danger; for in extreme cases, it could lead to delusions of omnipotence. Divers had been known to swim from deep bases without their breathing gear; astronauts had ignored the plain warnings of their instruments. Some had escaped the consequences of their rashness; many had not.

The cause of break-off was usually sensory deprivation; robbed of the normal flow of messagescolored pencil from all its inputs the ever-active brain started to build its own world, which seldom coincided with reality. The cure was simple; if a man was kept busy on assigned tasks, and was in continual communication with his colleagues, he was in little danger.

So Bowman had to have a deputy, and the obvious choice was Peter.

Whitehead sometimes called himself "Engineer in charge of everything else." Another of Whitehead's favorite sayings was that every problem had a technical solution-it was just a matter of choosing the best. His genius for trouble-shooting was probably another aspect of his highpowered imagination, for he seemed able to identify himself with recalcitrant machinery. There were some who claimed that he had paranormal powers, for whereas most engineers had to kick their black boxes when they misbehaved, Whitehead merely had to glare at them.

On the tenth day, at last satisfied that the ship was running flawlessly, Bowman called a final crew conference. Anyone looking at the six men gathered on the control deck could have divided them at once into two categories. Bowman and Whitehead were in good physical shape, whereas the other four were sleek and plump. There had been many jokes about condemned men eating hearty breakfasts, and cattle being fattened for the slaughter. But the low-residue, high-calorie diet was an essential preparation for the long sleep; some fuel was necessary, even at the low metabolic level of hibernation. When they awoke in little over half a year, most of this fat would be gone.

And so would Earth, that brilliant star now dominating the sky. The next time the four sleepers opened their eyes, their home planet would be lost against the glare of the Sun; and Jupiter would be lord of the heavens.

It was a solemn moment, this parting of the ways; no one felt like making any of the usual wisecracks, for all kcolored pencilnew that they might not meet again. And the men who were about to hibernate, though they had been through this before, and thoroughly understood its necessity, were reluctant to go. Any one of them would have changed places with Bowman or Whitehead.

"This is for the record," said Bowman, a little self-consciously, glancing out of the corner of his eye at the TV camera which surveyed the Control Center, and which continually reported the situation to Earth. At this close range it was still operating in real time; out at Jupiter, it would be sending only one frame a second-but that was quite adequate for monitoring purposes.

"All the scheduled checkouts have been completed; there have been no unexpected problems. We are now at Day 10, which is the time planned for hibernation to commence. It is my opinion that we should continue according to program. If any of you disagree, please say so now."

There was a rather restless silence. Everyone seemed waiting for someone else to speak, but no one did. And no one knew that Dr. Poole, who had secret orders of his own, was carefully watching both Bowman and Whitehead for any signs of disturbance. He was satisfied by what he saw.

"Very well," continued Bowman. "You all know what to do. As soon as you're ready, please call Doc."

It was all very crisp and impersonal and bcolored pencilusinesslike, but the individual good-byes would not take place under the gaze of the TV camera. One by one, Kimball and Hunter and Kaminski and Poole drifted back to their cabins in the carousel, and put their few belongings in order. And presently each one spoke privately over a radio circuit to Earth, and for the only time on the voyage the ship's recorders were shut off, while verbal farewells were transmitted. To most of them this was an ordeal they would have preferred to avoid, and they were secretly glad that there could be no direct reply. By this time, the round-trip radio delay was over two minutes, and a conversation with Earth was impossible.

At the last moment, Poole made the final tests of the men he would soon be following into sleep. To each, Bowman delivered appropriate versions of the same rather forced jest: "You lucky bastard! Pete and I will be working like dogs for seven months, while you take it easy." Then the electronarcosis currents started to pulse, and Discovery's operational crew diminished to five, to four, to three....

"That's it," said Dr. Poole. "All sleeping like babies." He looked at Bowman with a serious, thoughtful expression; they were alone together, while Whitehead stood watch on the control deck. "How do you feel?" he asked.

"A little tired, but very glad it's gone so smoothly. Don't worry about us, Kel. The first time we cut our fingers, or feel colds coming on, we'll wake you up."

Poole chuckled. "You make me feel like an old-time country doctor, wondering whether the telephone will let him have an undisturbed night. O.K.-do your stuff."

Bowman adjusted the biosensor straps around Poole's chest and right arm, checked the head bands carefully, and triggered the high-pressure hypodermic. There was a brief hiss as the drugs were forced into Poole's bloodstream.

"Happy dreams, Doc," said Bowman.

"Be seeing you," answered Poole. He started counting: "One ... Two ... Three...." but got no further.

For a moment, Bowman stood looking at his sleeping friend, half envious of his freedom from responsibility. Then, with quite unnecessary quietness, he tiptoed away and went to join Whitehead at Control.

He found his shipmate staring, with undisguised fascination, at the four little panels on the situation display board marked KAMINSKI, KIMBALL, POOLE, HUNTER. Each showed a small constellation of green lights, indicating that all was well.

And on each was a tiny screen, acrcolored penciloss which three sets of lines traced leisurely rhythms, so hypnotic that Bowman also found it hard to tear away his eyes. One line showed respiration, another pulse, another EEG.

But the panels marked BOWMAN and WHITEHEAD were blank and lifeless. Their time would come a year from now, out at the orbit ofcolored pencil Jupiter.

RUNAWAY

To Bowman, the first intimation of trouble was a quiet voice saying over the open radio circuit. "Dave-I'm having control problems." Whitehead sounded slightly annoyed, but not in the least alarmed.

Before Bowman could answer, he saw the pod emerge from the shadow of the ship, only twenty feet beneath the main observation window. It was under full power, heading roughly along the line of Discovery's orbit.

"What's the trouble?" he called. For a few seconds there was no answer, and the pod was already a hundred feet away before Whitehead replied.

"Throttle jammed at full thrust," he said, quite calmly "I'm building up a little distance before I try anything."

That made sense, a runaway pod needed plenty of space to maneuver. And there was still no cause for real worry; Bowman was quite sure that Whitehead would soon fix the trouble, as he had always done in the past.

The seconds ticked slowly by; the pod was still gaining speed-and now it was so far away that it was barely recognizable. Though Whitehead would have no difficulty in homing on the ship from a distance of many miles, he had better not leave matters until too late for his main drive would empty the propellant tanks in a very few minutes.

The pod was now a tiny spot, its distance impossible to judge by the eye. Bowman locked the navigation radar on it, and was surprised to find that it was still only two miles away. But, far more serious, it was already traveling at a hundred and ninety miles an hour.

"Peter!" cried Bowman. "What the hell's happening? Can't you fix it?"

For the first time, there was a note of alarm in Whitehead's voice.

"Controls won't respond," he said. colored pencil"I'm pulling the main fuse to cut off power. Call you back."

A second later, his radio went dead. While waiting, Bowman searched for the pod with a telescope, and found it quickly enough. With a sinking heart, he saw the little cloud of mist flaring from the rocket nozzle, and knew that the capsule was still accelerating.

Whitehead was back on the air almost at once.

colored pencil

"No use," he said abruptly. "Trying to turn with auxiliaries."

It was a tricky maneuver, but the obvious next step. Even if he could not turn off the main drive, he should be able to spin the pod around so that he reversed the direction in which it was building up its uncontrollable velocity. Then the runaway would eventually be brought to rest, and presently it would start coming back again.

Tense and pale, with a dreadful feeling of helplessness, Bowman stared through the telescope. In its field of view, the pod seemed only a few feet away, and he could see every detail of its construction. Then, to his enormous relief, little spurts appeared from the attitude-control nozzles, and the capsule began to turn slowly on its axis.

The treacherous main drive swung out of sight, still firing, next he had a broadside view-then he was looking straight into the bay window at the seated figure of his friend. He could have seen Whitehead's expression, if it had not been for the glare of reflected sunlight on the transparent panels.

"You've done it!" he cried. "Thank God!"

colored pencil

The capsule was still racing away at over two hundred miles an hour-but at least it was now losing speed, no longer gaining it, as its jet acted as a brake.

"Looks like it," said Whitehead, his voice showing his immense relief. "I knew Betty wouldn't let me down, if I treated her properly."

Though it seemed ages, it was less than a minute before Bowman could tell, even without the aid of radar, that Whitehead was on the way back. Presently the capsule began to grow in the field of the telescope-slowly at first-then rapidly-then too rapidly.

"Still can't cut the damn thing," said Whitehead. "Hate to waste all this fuel, but I'll just have to swing to and fro until I run out of gas."

It seemed to Bowman that the capsule was now heading straight toward the ship; they were out of the frying pan and into the fire. The risk of losing Whitehead had now been replaced by an even more serious danger.

"Watch your track," he called anxiously. "I think you're on a collision course."

"I know," said Whitehead breathlessly. "Trying to flip her around again."

He was too late. For one hideous moment, the capsule seemed to be heading straight for the observation windows of the Control Deck. Then, barely in time, the steering jets opened up, and the runaway vehicle skimmed above the curving hull of the ship and behind Bowman's field of view.

"Sorry about that," said Wcolored pencilhitehead. "Give you a wider berth next-"

The sound of the crash came simultaneously over the radio and through the fabric of the ship. Bowman half rose from his seat, waiting for the alarms to go and for the damage signals to start flashing. But nothing happened; it must have been a glancing impact-no real harm done. To Discovery, at least; but what about the capsule?

"Peter!" he called. "Are you all right? Do you read me?"

There was no reply. Bowman turned the gain of the radio full up, and listened intently. The carrier wave was still coming in, but that proved very little. He had hoped to hear the sound of Whitehead's breathing, even if he had been knocked unconscious. If the capsule had been cracked, of course, there would be no breathing-and no sound, except for the muffled roar of the jet drive, as loud as ever through the metal framework of the runaway.

That roar was still audible over the radio, but there was nothing else. Bowman called again, and again, Whitehead did not repcolored pencilly. At the same time, he swiftly ran through the pictures on the rear- view monitors, and after a quick search located the capsule a few hundred yards away.

To his great relief, it appeared intact-but it was still under power. Whether he was dead or alive, it was carrying Whitehead inexorably away from the ship; and there was nothing whatsoever he could do about it.

"Peter!" he called. "Peter! Can you hear me?"

Still no answer-only that maddening jet roar. It seemed to last forever; and then, suddenly, it stopped. The capsule had at last used up its fuel.

Once more, Bowman strained to detect the sound of breathing over the hiss of the carrier wave. The microphone was only a few inches from Whitehead's mouth; if the space pod still contained air, he should hear something....

He did, and with a sigh of relief he resumed his own breathing. First there were some soft bangings, then a mumbled exclamation like a drunken man talking in his sleep. That was followed by a short blast of well-organized profanity; Whitehead was wholly conscious again.

"Hello, Dave," he said, even before Bowman could call him. "I'm O.K. now-just a bruise on my forehead-no other damage. Will you get a fix?"

A quick glance at the radar showed Bowman that the capsule was still less than five miles away. That was a perfectly trivial distance-but it was increasing rapidly. For despite its periods of braking, the pod was now racing away from Discovery at three hundred and sixty miles an hour.

Every minute it would increase its distance by six miles- and so on, hour after hour, day after day. But before long, of course, this would be of no practical interest to Peter Whitehead.

Bowman reported the facts; then he asked quickly: "What's your oxygen reserve, Pete?"

"About . . . five hours."

"Only five?"

colored pencil

"Yes. It was a single-tank job-so I thought."

Bowman did not say what had flashed through his mind, but he was sure that it had already occurred to Whitehead. No matter how much oxygen the pod carried, it might make no difference now.

For several seconds there was no sound over the radio circuit; then Whitehead said, with a kind of resigned sadness: "Well, I guess that's it, Dave."

"I'm damned if it is. I'm coming out to catch you. Hold on."

There was another pause, before Whitehead replied: "You can't do that-not enough safety time, anyhow. You know you can't leave the ship."

"I bloody well can; Athena can handle things. I'm coming."

"Let's not fool ourselves. What was that velocity vector?"

"Five hundred thirty feet a second."

"Give that sum to Athena, if you like. I know the answer already." So, in his heart, did Bowman. If he risked abandoning the ship and his four sleeping companions, he could eventually catch up with Whitehead. But then they would both be several hundred miles from Discovery-and still moving away from her at that deadly five hundred thirty feet a second. The rescue pod would first have to cancel that speed, and not until then could it start on the return journey. With that extra payload, it could never make it home.

Nevertheless, Bowman fed the figures to Athena. The answer came back instantly: IMPOSSIBLE.

Just for a moment, before his years of training asserted themselves, he was overcome by a sense of blind rage, and wanted to hammer his fists against the cold display panels of the computer. But that would be no help to Whitehead or to himself. It was impossible to argue with the laws of mathematics, and stupid to feel anger at them. If one chose to live by the implacable equations of the Universe, then when the time came one must also die by them.

But he refused to admit defeat; men did not give up as easily as this. He remembered Whitehead's own favorite saying: "Every problem has a technical solution." There must be a solution for this problem, if only he could think of it.

The situation was so absurd, so utterly ironic. Here he was in a ship that could cross half a billion miles of space and travel at thousands of miles an hour-and he could not save a friend drifting slowly to his death a mere ten miles away. If he returned to Earth, who would ever understand his terrible dilemma? Always there would be the unspoken question: "But surely you could have done something?''

But this was no TV space opera, where thecolored pencil hero conjured some brilliant answer out of his hat. This was a problem for which there was no solution.

"Dave," said the loudspeaker suddenly. "Can the ship do anything?"

Though Whitehead was not a propulsion expert, he certainly knew better than this. The very fact that he had asked such a question indicated some loss of self-control, but Bowman could hardly blame him. A desperate man would clutch at any straw.

"I'm sorry, Peter," he answered gently and patiently. "You know the main reactor has been shut down and the thrusters hacolored pencilve all been mothballed. It takes over a day to test them and run them up."

And even then, he might have added, it would not have helped. The ship's acceleration was so low that it could never overtake the pod before the five hours were up.

That was going to be the longest five hours in Bowman's life.

FIRST MAN TO JUPITER

And then while Bowman was still considering his next move, Whitehead asked an extraordinary question.

"Dave," he said, in a curiously flat voice, "Are there any asteroids close to us?"

"Not according to the Ephemeris. Why?"

"Unless I'm crazy, there's something else out here- only a few miles away."

Bowman's first reaction was one of surprised disappointment. He had not expected Peter to start cracking up so soon, but perhaps that blow on the head had produced aftereffects. Not for a moment did he credit the report; space was so inconceivably empty that a close passage by any other object was almost a mathematical impossibility. Whitehead could only be suffering from hallucinations; it would be best to humor him.

But that thought had already occurred to Whitehead himself.

"No-I'm not seeing things," he said, almost as if he was reading Bowman's mind. "There it is agaicolored penciln-it's flashing every ten or fifteen seconds. And it's definitely moving against the star background-it can't be more than five or ten miles away."

ure, 2b pencil made of finger joint slats, colored pencilpencils showing horoscopes, cosmetic pencils, carpenters pencils, pencils made of recycled material (not wood), plastic pencils, surface treated pencils, printed pattern pencils, a variety of transfer film pencils etc. For the holidays, year round gifts or as incentives, pencils are a perfect teacher gift. Quality no 2 pencil, plus erasers that erase! Any 1-line message, up to 36 letters and spaces will be stamped in gold with your name, slogan or special imprint. "The rewards help students remember colored pencilthe d 2b pencil often as well." colored pencil