Subspace Survivors | Page 8

means. Merely very good."
"And how many metric tons of apparatus have you got in the hold?"
Deston asked.
"Less than six. Just what I must have in order to----"
"Babe!" Jones' voice cut in. "Course change. Stay on alpha eighteen.
Shift beta to forty-four and gamma to two sixty-five."
* * * * *
Rendezvous was made. Both lifecraft hung motionless relative to the
Procyon's hulk. No other lifecraft had escaped. A conference was held.
Weeks of work would be necessary before Deston and Jones could
learn even approximately what the damage to the Procyon had been.
Decontamination was automatic, of course, but there would be literally
hundreds of hot spots, each of which would have to be sought out and
neutralized by hand. The passengers' effects would have to be listed

and stored in the proper cabins. Each body would have to be given
velocity away from the ship. And so on. Every survivor would have to
work, and work hard.
The two girls wanted to be together. The two officers almost had to be
together, to discuss matters at unhampered length and to make
decisions. Each was, of course, almost as well versed in engineering as
he was in his own specialty. All ships' officers from First to Fifth had to
be. And, as long as they lived or until the Procyon made port, all
responsibility rested: First, upon First Officer Deston; and second, upon
Second Officer Jones. Therefore Theodore and Bernice Jones came
aboard Lifecraft Two, and Deston asked Newman to flit across to
Lifecraft Three.
"Not me; I like the scenery here better." Newman's eyes raked Bernice's
five-feet-eight of scantily-clad sheer beauty from ankles to coiffure. "If
you're too crowded--I know a lifecraft carries only fifty people--go
yourself."
"As a crew-chief, you know the law." Deston spoke quietly--too quietly,
as the other man should have known. "I am in command."
"You ain't in command of me, pretty boy!" Newman sneered. "You can
play God when you're on sked, with a ship-full of trained dogs to bite
for you, but out here where nobody has ever come back from I make
my own law--with this!" He patted his side pocket.
"Draw it, then!" Deston's voice now had all the top-deck rasp of his
rank. "Or crawl!"
The First Officer had not moved; his right hand still hung quietly at his
side. Newman glanced at the girls, both of whom were frozen; at Jones,
who smiled at him pityingly; at Adams, who was merely interested. "I ...
my ... yours is right where you can get at it," he faltered.
"You should have thought of that sooner. But, this once, I won't move a
finger until your hand is in your pocket."

"Just wing him, Babe," Jones said then. "He looks strong enough,
except for his head. We can use him to shovel out the gunkum and
clean up."
"Uh-uh. I'll have to kill him sometime, and the sooner the better.
Square between the eyes. Do you want a hundred limit at ten bucks a
millimeter on how far the hole is off dead center?"
The two girls gasped; stared at each other and at the two officers in
horror; but Jones said calmly, without losing any part of his smile: "I
don't want a dime's worth of that. I've lost too much money that way
already." At which outrageous statement both girls knew what was
going on and smiled in relief.
And Newman misinterpreted those smiles completely; especially
Bernice's. The words came hard, but he managed to say then. "I crawl."
"Crawl, what?"
"I crawl, sir. You'll want my gun----"
"Keep it. There's a lot more difference than that between us. How close
can you count seconds?"
"Plus or minus five per cent, sir."
"Close enough. Your first job will be to build some kind of a
brute-force, belt-or-gear thing to act as a clock. You will really work.
Any more insubordination or any malingering at all and I'll put you into
a lifecraft and launch you into space, where you can make your own
laws and be monarch of all you survey. Dismissed! Now--flit!"
* * * * *
Newman flitted--fast--and Barbara, turning to her husband, opened her
mouth to speak and shut it. No, he would have killed the man; he would
have had to. He still might have to. Wherefore she said instead: "Why'd
you let him keep his pistol? The ... the slime! And after you actually

saved his life, too!"
"With some people what's past doesn't count. The other was just a
gesture. Psychology. It'll slow him down, I think. Besides, he'd have
another one as soon as we get back into the Procyon."
"But you can lock up all their guns, can't you?" Bernice asked.
"I'm afraid not. How about the other three,