The name of the game is Thrust. That is what you have to do to excel your space craft up in to the atmosphere up to the mother ship. Its not that easy though because you have to maneuver away from poisonous orbs, and dip and sway around obstacles. To Thrust, hold both the left and right buttons down. To increase your Thrust potential, collect as many blue thrust orbs as possible. All the while, you must do so as quickly as possible, because the world below is burning up and you dont want to be caught in the fire from below.
Complete the four progressively difficult stages to unlock the Bonus stage. This stage never ends, unless the wrath of the fire catches you.