“What—what happened?” The words were slurred. “You hurt?”
Travis drew the back of his hand across mouth and chin, brought it away clotted with blood. He must look as bad as Ross.
“Can’t walk.” He introduced the foremost problem of the moment. “Just—float . . .”
“Float?” repeated the technician, then he struggled up, unfastened his belt. “Then we are through—out of earth’s gravity! We’re in space!”
Jumbled fragments of articles he had read arose out of Travis’ memory. Free of gravity—no up, down—no weight— He was nauseated, his head spinning badly, but keeping hold of the board he worked his way past the technician to Ross. Murdock was already stirring, and as Travis laid his hand on his seat he moaned, his fingers sweeping aimlessly across his chest as if to soothe some hurt there. Travis gently caught the other’s bloody chin, shaking his head slowly from side to side as the gray eyes opened.
” . . . and that’s it, we’re out!” Case Renfry, the technician, shook his head at the flood of questions from the time scouts. “Listen, fellas, I was loaned to this project to help with the breakdown appraisal. I can’t fly any ship, let alone this one—so it must be on automatic controls.”
“Set by the dead pilot. Then it should go back to his base,” Travis suggested gloomily.
“You are forgetting one thing.” Ross sat up with care, keeping firm hold on his mooring with both hands. “That pilot’s base is twelve thousand years or so in the past. They warped us through time before we took off—”
“And we can’t go home?” Travis demanded again of the technician.
“I wouldn’t try meddling with any key on that board,” Renfry said, shaking his head. “If we’re flying on automatic controls, the best thing is to keep on to the destination and then see what we can do.”
“Only there are a few other things to consider—such as food, water, air supplies,” Travis pointed out.
“Yes—air,” Ross underlined with chilling soberness. “How long might we be on the way?”
Renfry grinned weakly. “Your guess is as good as mine. The air supply is all right—I think. They had a recycling plant in the ship and Stefferds said it was in perfect working order. Something like algae in a sealed section keeps it fresh. You can look in at it but you can’t contaminate the place. And they breathed about the same mixture as we do. But as to food and water—we’d better look around. Three of us to feed . . .”
“Four! There’s Ashe!” Ross, forgetting where he was, tried to jump free of his seat. He swam forward in a tangle of flailing legs and arms until Renfry drew him down.
“Take it easy, mighty easy, fella. Hit the wrong button while you’re thrashing that way and we could be worse off than we are. Who’s Ashe?”
“Our section chief. We stowed him in a cabin down below, he had had a bad knock on the head.”
Travis aimed for the well leading to the center section of the globe. He overshot, bounced back, and was thankful when his fingers closed on the bar of its cover. They got it open and made their way clumsily in a direction Travis still thought of—in spite of the evidence of his eyes—as “down.”
To descend into the heart of the ship required an agility that tormented their bruised and aching bodies. But when they at last reached the cabin they found Ashe still safely stowed in the bunk, far better tended against the force of the take-off than they had been. For only his peaceful face showed above a thick mass of a jelly substance which filled the interior of the bunk-hammock.
“He’ll be all right. That’s the stuff they keep in their lifeboats to patch up the injured—saved my life once,” Ross identified. “A regular cure for anything.”
“How do you know so much?” Renfry began, and then, he eyes wonderingly on Ross, he added, “why—you must be the guy who was with the Russians on that ship they were stripping!”
“Yes. But I’d like to know a little more about this one. Food—water . . .”
They went exploring in Renfry’s wake, discovering adaptation to weightlessness a hard job, but determined to learn what they could about the best, and the worst, of their predicament. The technician had been all through the ship and now he displayed to them the air-renewal unit, the engine room, and the crew’s quarters. They made a detailed examination of what could only be a mess cabin combined with kitchen. It was a cramped space in which no more than four men—or man-like beings—could fit at one time.
Travis frowned at the rows of sealed containers racked in the cupboards. He extracted one, shook it near his ear, and was rewarded by a gurgle which made him run a dry tongue over his blood-stained lips. There must be liquid of a sort inside, and he could not remember now when he had had a really satisfying drink.
“This is water—if you want a drink.” Renfry brought a Terran canteen out of a corner. “We had four of these on board, used ’em while we were working.”
Travis reached for the metal bottle, but did not uncap it after all. “Still have all four?” Perhaps more than any of the rest on board he knew the value of water, the disaster of not having it.
Renfry brought them out, shaking each. “Three sound full. This one’s about half—maybe a little less.”
“We’ll have to go on rations.”
“Sure,” the technician agreed. “Think there’re some concentrate food bars here, too. You fellas have any of those?”
“Ashe still had his supply bag with him, didn’t he?” Travis asked Ross.
“Yes. And we’d better see how many of the bars we can find.”
Travis looked at the alien container which had gurgled. At the moment he would have given a great deal to be able to force the lid, to drink its contents and ease both thirst and hunger.
“We may have to come to trying these.” Renfry took the container from the scout, fitted it back into the holder space.
“I’d guess we’ll have to try a lot of things before this trip is over—if it ever is. Right now I’d like to try a bath, or at least a wash.” Ross surveyed his own scratched, half-naked, and very dirty body with disfavor.
“That you can have. Come on.”
Again Renfry played guide, bringing them to a small cubbyhole beyond the mess cabin. “You stand on that—maybe you can hold yourself in place with those.” He pointed to some rods set in the wall. “But get your feet down on that round plate and then press the circle in the wall.”
“Then what happens? You roast or broil?” Travis inquired suspiciously.
“No—this really works. We tried it on a guinea pig yesterday. Then Harvey Bush used it after he upset a can of oil all over him. It’s rather like a shower.”
Ross jerked at the ties of his disreputable kilt and kicked off his sandals, his movements sending him skidding from wall to wall. “All right. I’m willing to try.” He got his feet on the plate, holding himself in position by the rods, and then pressed the circle. Mist curled from under the edge of the floor plate, enveloped his legs, rose steadily. Renfry pushed shut the door.
“Hey!” protested Travis, “he’s being gassed!”
“It’s okay!” Ross’s disembodied voice came from beyond. “In fact—it’s better than okay!”
When he came out of the fogged cubby a few minutes later, the grime and much of the stain were gone from his body. Moreover, scratches that had been raw and red were now only faint pinkish lines. Ross was smiling.
“All the comforts of home. I don’t know what that stuff is, but it peels you right down to your second layer of hide and makes you like it. The first good thing we’ve found in this mousetrap.”
Travis shucked his kilt a little more slowly. He didn’t relish being shut into that box, but neither did he enjoy the present state of his person. Gingerly he stepped onto the floor disk, got his feet flattened on its surface, and pressed the circle. He held his breath as the gassy substance puffed up to enfold him.
The stuff was not altogether a gas, he discovered, for it was thicker than any vapor. It was as if he were immersed in a flood of frothy bubbles that rubbed and slicked across his skin with the effect of vigorous toweling. Grinning, he relaxed and, closing his eyes, ducked his head under the surface. He felt the smooth swish across his face, drawing the sting out of scratches and the ache out of his bruises and bumps.
When the bubbles ebbed and Travis stepped out of the cubby, he was met by a changed Ross. The latter was just hitching up over his broad shoulders the upper part of a tight, blue-green suit. It clung to his body, modeling every muscle as he moved. Made all in one piece, its feet were soled with a thick sponge that cushioned each step. Ross picked another bundle of blue-green from the floor and tossed it to the Apache.