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I got my voice going again. "I'm going to destroy the Mancji ship," I said. "Take me to the lift and leave
me there." I tried to add a few more words, but had to stop and work on breathing again for a while.
Kramer disappeared.
I realized I was not fully in command of my senses. I was clamped in a padded paw. I wanted to roll
over. I tried hard, and made it. I could hear Kramer talking, others answering, but it seemed too great an
effort to listen to the words.
I was lying on my face now, my head almost against the wall. There was a black line in front of me, a
door. My head cleared a bit. It must have been Kramer's shot working on me. I turned my head and saw
Kramer standing now with half a dozen others, all talking at once. Apparently Kramer's display of
uncontrolled temper had the others worried. They wanted me alive. Kramer didn't like anyone criticizing
him. The argument was pretty violent. There was scuffling and shouts.
I saw that I lay about twenty feet from the lift; too far. The door before me, if I remembered the ship's
layout, was a utility compartment, small and containing nothing but a waste disposal hopper. But it did
have a bolt on the inside, like every other compartment on the ship.
I didn't stop to think about it; I started trying to get up. If I'd thought, I would have known that at the first
move from me all seven of them would land on me at once. I concentrated on getting my hands under
me, to push up. I heard a shout, and turning my head, saw Kramer swinging at someone. I went on with
my project.
Hands under my chest, I raised myself a little, and got a knee up. I felt broken rib ends grating, but felt
no pain, just the padded claw. Then I was weaving on all fours. I looked up, spotted the latch on the
door, and put everything I had into lunging at it. My finger hit it, the door swung in, and I fell on my face;
but I was half in. Another lunge and I was past the door, kicking it shut as I lay on the floor, reaching for
the lock control. Just as I flipped it with an extended finger, someone hit the door from outside, a second
too late.
It was dark, and I lay on my back on the floor, and felt strange short-circuited stabs of what would have
been agonizing pain running through my chest and arm. I had a few minutes to rest now, before they
blasted the door open.
I hated to lose like this, not because we were beaten, but because we were giving up. My poor world,
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no longer fair and green, had found the strength to send us out as her last hope. But somewhere out here
in the loneliness and distance we had lost our courage. Success was at our fingertips, if we could have
found it; instead, in panic and madness, we were destroying ourselves.
My mind wandered; I imagined myself on the Bridge, half-believed I was there. I was resting on the OD
bunk, and Clay was standing there beside me. A long time seemed to pass . . . Then I remembered I was
on the floor, bleeding internally, in a tiny room that would soon lose its door. But there was someone
standing beside me.
I didn't feel too disappointed at being beaten; I hadn't hoped for much more than a breather, anyway. I
wondered why this fellow had abandoned his action station to hide here. The door was still shut. He must
have been there all along, but I hadn't seen him when I came in. He stood over me, wearing greasy
overalls, and grinned down at me. He raised his hand. I was getting pretty indifferent to blows; I couldn't
feel them.
The hand went up, the man straightened and held a fairly snappy salute. "Sir," he said. "Space'n First
Class Thomas."
I didn't feel like laughing or cheering or anything else; I just took it as it came.
"At ease, Thomas," I managed to say. "Why aren't you at your duty station?" I went spinning off
somewhere after that oration.
Thomas was squatting beside me now. "Cap'n, you're hurt, ain't you? I was wonderin' why you was
down here layin' in my 'sposal station."
"A scratch," I said. I thought about my chest. This was Thomas's disposal station. Thomas owned it. I
wondered if a fellow could make a living with such a small place way out here, with just an occasional
tourist coming by. I wondered why I didn't send one of them for help; I needed help for some
reason . . .
"Cap'n, I been overhaulin' my converter units, I jist come in. How long you been in here, Cap'n?"
Thomas was worried about something.
I tried hard to think. I hadn't been here very long; just a few minutes. I had come here to rest . . . then
suddenly I was thinking clearly again.
Whatever Thomas was, he was apparently on my side, or at least neutral. He didn't seem to be aware of
the mutiny. I realized that he had bound my chest tightly with strips of shirt; it felt better.
"What are you doing in here, Thomas?" I asked. "Don't you know we're in action against a hostile ship?"
Thomas looked surprised. "This here's my action station, Cap'n," he said. "I'm a Waste Recovery [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]