“I don’t know if I can,” Naguib repeated. “My legs…”
Jamie saw that Patel had released Naguib’s arm and was stepping slowly, almost furtively, toward the edge of the crevasse. Mironov was sharing his air with the injured man. Jamie dropped the winch and came up on the Egyptian’s other side. He took Naguib’s free arm and lifted it across his own shoulders.
Softly he said, “You got us into this situation; you’ll have to help us get out of it.”
Patel began to object, but he heard Naguib chuckle deep in his throat. “True. Too true, James. I will do my best.”
Jamie smiled inside his helmet. “Good. It shouldn’t be any trouble. Come on, Alex, let’s back up a bit and get a running start.”
Patel leaped across first, without a word. Then Jamie and Mironov tried to carry Naguib across the fissure. Their first attempt was nearly a disaster. Naguib’s strides did not match theirs, and the three of them nearly fell down trying to put on the brakes before they reached the edge. Jamie heard Mironov whispering curses to himself and the frightened panting of Naguib. The Russian’s air hose popped out of Naguib’s collar, so Jamie plugged his own in.
Vaguely Jamie recalled a myth about birds helping a Navaho hero to cross some impassable gulf. Or did he walk along a rainbow? We could use some help now, he said to himself.
Precious little daylight remained. The cold of night was seeping into Jamie, and he knew that Naguib must be even stiffer, colder.
They backed off again, with Mironov telling them to start on the left foot and keep pace. “I will count cadence,” he said.
“Ahdyeen… dvah… tree… chyeetireh,” Mironov counted off. “Ahdyeen… dvah…”
The three of them soared over the crevasse like a trio of armor-plated hippos and landed in a scuffing, skidding cloud of red dust on the other side. They managed to stay on their feet, just barely.
“Better than the Bolshoi Ballet!” Mironov beamed as they headed toward the rover, still propping up Naguib on either side.
“Too bad we didn’t get it on tape,” Jamie joked.
Naguib said nothing. Patel was up ahead, his helmet lamp on, a pool of light thrown against the dark ground as he headed for the safety of the rover.
Once through the airlock they sat Naguib down on one of the benches and helped him out of his hard suit, then Jamie cleaned up the Egyptian’s bloodied face while Patel vacuumed the suits and Mironov went up to the cockpit to report to base.
“I don’t think your nose is broken,” Jamie said. “It’s not even bleeding anymore.”
“I banged it on my visor when I fell,” Naguib said.
“You could have been killed,” said Patel, his big eyes somber.
Naguib smiled weakly. “I was never much good at field work.”
Mironov came back, unsmiling, grim faced. “Reed wants to speak with you,” he said to the Egyptian. “He will prescribe medication.”
Jamie offered to help him to the cockpit, but Naguib got shakily to his own feet. “I can make it,” he said. “I think you are right- nothing broken.”
Wordlessly Patel went to the galley and pulled out a dinner tray for himself. Mironov scowled after him.
“Nothing to be sore about, Alex,” Jamie said to the cosmonaut. “Abdul’s okay. Just a bloody nose, that’s all.”
Mironov snorted and glared at Patel.
Reed confirmed that Naguib’s nose was probably not broken, and the four men pulled out the folding table and sat down for dinner.
“We have only two replacement backpacks in the stores,” Mironov growled as they ate. “Please be more careful tomorrow.”
“I thought there might be a vein of uranium exposed down at the bottom of that fissure,” said Naguib, explaining and apologizing at once. “My scintillation meter registered high levels of radiation.”
“Uranium?” Patel snatched at the idea. “If we could get a uranium-lead ratio we could date the lava field with great firmness.”
Jamie said, “We haven’t found any usable levels of radioactives anywhere else.”
“Something is there, at the bottom of that ravine,” said Naguib.
“Then we’ll have to go back there tomorrow and get some samples,” Jamie said.