But he was given no time to think, because Berryman was coming back and
shouting at them from the other end of the corridor.
"Doctor! Doctor! Walters says the generator blisters are beginning to glow
-- all of them that he can see from P-Two! He says the Ship is leaving!"
chapter fifteen
For the first few seconds McCullough's feeling was one of outrage rather
than fear. This was going too far, he thought; being marooned on the
Ship, running short of water, under nearly constant attack by aliens,
the deaths of Colonel Morrison and Drew. This was piling on the agony
and taking misfortune to ridiculous extremes. The Ship
couldn't
be leaving!
But Berryman kept babbling on about Walters and the glow enamating from
the interior of the transparent generator blisters and the interference
which was being picked up by P-Two's radio, all of which indicated a
steady build-up of power within the Ship. Then there was the constant
gabbling of the Twos, the chiming, the alien voices and moaning sound
pouring out of the wall speaker. If the Ship was leaving, McCullough
would be expected to do something about it, react in some fashion,
make decisions, give orders
now
.
He couldn't.
The problem was too big and complicated for quick decisions and inspired
leadership -- at least, so far as he was concerned. He had to put it
into some sort of order in his mind, take time to consider the events in
consecutive fashion and break the problem down, even though they might
have no time at all. He must go back past Berryman's arrival to the time
when Drew was alive and only the alien voices . . .
McCullough's mind came to a sudden halt at that point and ground into
reverse. Drew might very well be still alive. Now that he had time to
think about it, the more likely it became. He pointed at the mesh and
at Drew and tried to speak.
What he wanted to say was that the mesh was electrified and they should
stay clear of it, and that Drew's weapon had touched it while the haft
was in contact with the floor, so that the flash had been a short along
the shaft of the spear. He wanted to tell them that in his opinion the
mesh was not too highly charged -- the way he saw it there should be
just enough kick in it to keep the captive animals under control --
and in any case Drew had been wearing his suit gauntlets which would
give added protection. Considering the gauntlets and the fact that the
discharge had gone through the weapon and not by way of Drew's body, he
tried to say, there was a good chance that prompt resuscitation measures
would save him. But all he could do was stammer and point. He could not
make them understand or even hold their attention.
Hollis shouted something at him but a chime from the speaker a few inches
from McCullough's ear kept him from hearing what the physicist had said.
But Berryman was closer to Hollis and replied. Hollis pulled Drew's weapon
out of the air and added it to the one already in his hand, shouted
something at McCullough, then launched himself back in the direction
from which they had just come. Berryman looked from the physicist's
fast-disappearing feet to McCullough and back again, waved and bellowed.
It had been impossible to hear what either of them had been saying over
the cacophony of chimes, moaning, squabbling Twos and the alien duet.
McCullough could understand Hollis running away. The physicist was wearing
one of the two remaining undamaged spacesuits and there was a chance that
he could make it to the airlock and to the P-ships in time. But why was
the pilot running away? Surely Berryman did not think that he could take
Hollis' suit away from him, after fighting him for it and knocking him
unconscious? The only result of such a fight would be another ruptured
spacesuit.
Not knowing what to think and feeling bitterly disappointed in both of
them, McCullough opened his visor and dived slowly toward Drew. In the
weightless condition and with an electrified mesh just a few feet away,
there was only one method of resuscitation possible. McCullough did his
best to ignore the alien voices rattling at him from the speaker, the
gobbles and wheezing sounds coming from the Twos and the all-pervading
moaning and chiming, and concentrated instead on administering the Kiss
of Life to the dead or unconscious Drew.
But finding Drew's mouth was like ducking for apples in a tub of water at
Halloween. The pilot's head kept bobbing away and rolling flabbily about
inside his helmet. Finally, by sliding one hand carefully into the helmet
and supporting the back of Drew's neck with his fingers, McCullough was
able to press the other's face forward into the visor opening.
Results came quickly after that.
Gasping and choking and struggling like a drowning man, Drew began
to come to. He flung one arm around McCullough's neck so tightly that
the doctor thought his helmet would come off and possibly his head as
well. He was able to hold Drew clear of the electrified mesh until the
pilot settled down, then he detached the arm from around his neck.
For some reason McCullough was feeling unusually well-disposed toward the
pilot. Possibly this was because he might have been instrumental in saving
the other's life and this made him feel a vaguely godlike possessiveness
and concern for this life he might have saved. As well, there was the
fact that Drew would be the only company available if the other two did
not come back. And after everything the pilot had been through he did not
want to add to Drew's troubles by telling him that the Ship was leaving,
even though every instinct he possessed seemed to be urging him to get
to the nearest airlock and jump for the P-ships while he had the chance.
Drew was mumbling something at him, looking very awkward and embarrassed.
Obviously the chimes and alien voices were some kind of pre-takeoff warning.
While they continued, there was still a chance for him to leave the Ship.
"I can't hear you," he said hurriedly to the pilot. "But there's no need
to thank me -- you probably wouldn't have died anyway . . ."
"You mustn't think I meant it personally," Drew broke in, speaking loudly
but with his awkwardness still very much in evidence. "It was just that
your hand and your mouth . . . I mean, there was a girl at home who --
who . . . For a minute I thought . . . Dammit, Doc, I don't want you
thinking I'm some kind of pervert or anything!"
Get out of here!
screamed a voice in McCullough's mind, while
another pointed out the ridiculous, almost insane humor of the situation
and urged him to laugh while yet another voice, calmer and more clinical,
reminded him that so far as Drew was concerned this was a very serious
matter and he should avoid hurting the pilot's feelings.
"The thought," said McCullough with the ring of absolute truth and
sincerity in his voice, "never entered my mind. But if you look in the
enclosure you'll see the Twos are beginning to lose interest in their
feeding. We had better leave before they see us."
"What happened to my spear?" said Drew. "Where are Hollis and Berryman?
It is very bad tactics to split up our force like this, sir . . ."
Drew was his old self again, obviously, and McCullough felt less hesitation
about passing on the bad news of the Ship leaving and the desertion of
Hollis and Berryman. But he was saved the trouble. Berryman was with
them again, hanging onto the wall net and trying to talk and catch his
breath at the same time.
He was giving Drew a startled, I-didn't-expect-to-see-you-alive-again sort
of look while he spoke to McCullough. He said, "Sorry for leaving you --
without permission -- just now. I got excited and took off -- without
thinking. When you gave Captain Hollis the idea for -- for shorting the
generator with the metal spears -- he told me he needed help. He still
does, inside the blister. You have the only other working spacesuit,
sir. We haven't much time . . ."
Until then McCullough had not been aware that he had given an idea to
anyone, but he realized at once what Hollis was trying to do because they
had discussed just this eventuality several times. In general, that was
-- he would have to wait until they reached the generator blister to see
what particular form of sabotage the physicist had been able to devise.
On the way they surprised a not quite fully grown Two at an intersection.
Being unarmed, Drew and Berryman grabbed two tentacles each, twisted their
feet into the wall net, and swung it hard and repeatedly against a projecting
bracket until its carapace split and it stopped moving. Berryman looked
slightly sick and Drew, who had devised this particular method of unarmed
combat, muttered something about neatness and dispatch.
McCullough wondered why such complimentary terms were used to describe
such a vicious and despicable act. But with every wall speaker erupting
chimes and a continuous alien gabble bounding their ears; with the
knowledge that all around them the generators which could whisk them
away to some alien solar system were building up to full power, it was
impossible to behave in an ethical and moral manner. It was impossible,
Mccullough thought cynically, because so very few human beings were
capable of such behavior in the present circumstances, and if enough
people considered it impossible, then it was impossible.
For four frightened astronauts, read fifty million Frenchmen who could not
be wrong, and for fifty million Frenchmen, read the whole human race . . .
For a moment the thought came to him of traveling an unguessable number
of light-years to another solar system, of seeing an alien world and its
culture and having contact with true, extraterrestrial intelligences --
even if only briefly as an animal they might consider of too little
interest or importance to keep alive. The idea of not helping the physicist,
of ordering Hollis to cease attempting to sabotage the generator, came
and was hurriedly rejected. The sudden, awful wonder of his original
thought was quickly overwhelmed by fear.
They passed quickly through the lock chamber and the interhull space
where their first major brush with the Twos had occurred, and on to the
lock which gave access to the generator blister. Hollis' legs showed in
the transparent panel of the inner seal.
As McCullough was joining him, Berryman placed his antenna against
the bulkhead and said, "Walters is pulling away under steering power,
Doctor. Hollis says there are likely to be gravitational side-effects if
the Ship generators reach full power. He says the P-ships might be sucked
in and suggested that Walters move out to at least five miles so that
someone would be able to tell Earth what happened to the rest of us . . ."
Listening to him, McCullough wondered if the sabotage attempt was
unsuccessful, and if he wasn't killed by it and if he could get to an
airlock in time, would he be able to launch himself toward Walters and
the P-ships even if the alien vessel was already moving away. Angrily,
he wondered why he had not simply broken away from Drew and Berryman on
the way here and used a lock chamber to leave the Ship. He had thought
about it but had not seriously considered doing it.
There was no shame attached to admitting that one was a coward, he thought
cynically, just as long as one did not prove it.
Inside the blister it was deathly quiet. The interference in their suit
radios was so bad that they had to switch off and communicate by touching
helmets. Hollis' voice came to him with a booming, indistinct quality
about it, but McCullough could make it out without too much difficulty.
The physicist said, "I'm assuming that for faster-than-light travel all
of the Ship's generators must be in balanced operation, and that one
malfunctioning generator will cause the others to cut out and immobilize
the vessel. I know enough about the power supply lines -- which inside the
blister are not insulated, as you can see -- to blow this generator. But
the result might be catastrophic for the Ship and would certainly be
fatal for anyone in the immediate vicinity, which is us.
"So instead of shorting the main power supply," Hollis went on, "I propose
grounding the relatively much lower control and input balancing system --
those lopsided, figure-of-eight thingummies with the blue ceramic end
pieces which are, I'm fairly sure, somewhat analogous to the grid of
an old-fashioned radio valve. There is one of the things attached to
every major piece of equipment in the blister, and I've picked out what
I think are two of the most vital sections of the generator. This is
what we must do . . ."
A lopsided, figure-of-eight thingummy,
thought McCullough, and
wondered whatever had become of the precise and rarified language of
science in which Hollis was usually so bewilderingly fluent. He would
pull the physicist's leg about it afterward, if there was an afterward.
They planned a simultaneous, double act of sabotage. The generators had
been building up to their full operating potential for nearly twenty
minutes, and there could not be very much time left to do something. The
visual effects from some of the gadgetry around him were becoming quite
flamboyant. As McCullough crawled toward his assigned position, sheets
of slow pink lightning curled and rippled silently all around him. His
spear acquired a pale blue corona and his hair kept rising and discharging
against the inside of his helmet. Every few yards magnetic eddies tugged
at his weapon or the metal parts of his suit, seeking to dislodge him
from the insulated catwalk and draw him into a premature act of sabotage
that would certainly kill him and quite possibly wreck the whole Ship.