“Why the Braille, then?” Conway asked. But Fletcher did not answer because it was becoming increasingly obvious on closer examination that the rough spots on the panels and actuators were not there simply to furnish traction-each one was as individual as a fingerprint.
Like the exterior of the ship, the lock interior was unpainted metal. The lock chamber itself was large enough for them to stand upright, but the two actuator disks visible below the inner and outer seals were only a few inches above deck level. There were also a number of short, bright scratches and a few shallow dents in evidence, as though something heavy with sharp edges had been loaded or unloaded fairly recently.
“Physiologically,” said Murchison, “this life-form could be a weirdie. Is it a large being whose manipulatory appendages are at ground level? Or are they a small species whose ship was designed to be visited or used by a much more massive race? If the latter, then the rescue should not be complicated by xenophobic reactions on the part of the survivors, since they already know that there are other intelligent life-forms and that the possibility exists that an other-species group might rescue them.”
“It is much more likely to be a cargo lock, ma’am,” said the Captain apologetically, “and it is the cargo, rather than their extraterrestrial friends, if any, that was massive. Are we ready to go in?”
Without replying, Murchison switched her helmet spotlight to wide beam. The Captain and Conway did the same.
Fletcher had already checked that he could maintain two-way communication with Haslam and Chen outside the ship and with Dodds on the Rhabwar by touching the helmet antenna to the metal of the hull, in effect making the ship’s structure an extension of his antenna. He knelt down and depressed the actuator, which was positioned just above deck level inside the outer seal. The hatch swung closed, and he repeated the operation on a similarly positioned actuator below the inner seal.
For a few seconds nothing happened. Then they heard the hiss of atmosphere entering the lock chamber, and they felt their suits becoming less inflated as air pressure built up around them. As the inner seal opened to reveal a stretch of dark, apparently empty corridor, Murchison was busy tapping buttons on her analyzer.
“What do they breathe?” Conway asked.
“Just a moment, I’m double-checking,” Murchison replied. Suddenly she opened her visor and grinned. “Does that answer your question?”
When he opened his own helmet, Conway felt his ears pop at the slight difference in air pressure. “So, the survivors are warmblooded oxygen-breathers with roughly Earth-normal atmosphericpressure requirements. This simplifies the job of preparing ward accommodation.”
Fletcher hesitated for a moment, then he, too, opened his visor. “Let’s find them first.”
They stepped into a metal-walled corridor, featureless except for a large number of dents and scratches on the ceiling and walls, which extended for about thirty meters toward the center of the ship. At the end of the corridor, lying on the deck, was an indistinct something that looked like a tangle of metal bars projecting from a darker mass. Murchison’s foot magnets made loud scraping sounds as she hurried towards it.
“Careful, ma’am,” said the Captain. “If the doctor’s theory is correct, all controls, actuators, instruction or warning tags will have tactile indicators, and there is still power available within the ship; otherwise, the airlock mechanism would not have worked for us. If the crew live and work in complete darkness, you will have to think with your fingers and feet and not touch anything that looks like a patch of corrosion.”
“I’ll be careful, Captain,” Murchison promised.
To Conway, Fletcher said: “The inner seal has an actuator just like the others under its lower rim.” He directed his helmet light at the area in question, then indicated a smaller circle a few inches to the right of the actuator switch. “Before we go any farther I would like to know what this one does.”
“Well,” Conway said, “about the only thing we know for sure is that it isn’t a light switch.” He laughed as Fletcher depressed one side of the disk.
Murchison gave an unladylike grunt of surprise as bright yellow light flooded the corridor from an unseen source at the other end.
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