But it sounded empty, even as he said it.
Larry fidgeted on the bridge for about a minute longer, then said, “I’m going up to that airlock. Relay any calls for me to that location.”
He got there as the guard was being carried off to the infirmary on a stretcher. Campbell was standing inside the airlock, filling its cramped metal space with his formidable bulk. He had his hands on his hips.
Larry pushed past a dozen men and stepped through the airlock’s inner hatch to squeeze in next to Campbell.
“Well, now we know where he is,” Campbell said.
“What happened?”
Campbell jerked a thumb at the rack of pressure suits hanging outside the airlock, in the corridor. “He slugged the guard, took one of the suits, and went outside.”
“What? You’re sure?”
Nodding, Campbell answered, “Yep. Just checking the hatch here. It was open when we arrived a few minutes ago.”
“He’s outside?”
“He’s committing suicide.”
Larry thought it over for a few moments. “No. He’s moving to a part of the ship where he wants to be… My god! He can cut open bulkheads anywhere he wants to and blow whole sections of the ship into vacuum. If he does that in the living quarters…”
Even Campbell’s normal calm seemed shaken. “We’d better get all the living quarters on disaster alert. All hatches sealed…”
Larry nodded. “And guards on every airlock.”
“Right. Anything else?”
“Yes. Get a squad of volunteers together. We’ve got to go outside after him. And I’m going with you.”
16
It was a strange, eerie feeling.
Larry had been outside the ship before, but never since they had taken up orbit around the planet. Its massive curving bulk hung over him, it seemed, close and beckoning yet somehow menacing. He felt almost as if it was going to fall on him and crush him.
He shook his head inside the suit’s helmet. You’ve got a job to do. No time for sightseeing.
A dozen men had floated out of the airlock in search of Dan. A dozen men to cover the thousands of possible places where he might be lurking.
They worked with a plan in mind. They came out of one airlock at the first level, the largest of the ship’s seven wheels. They spread out around the periphery of that wheel. The plan was for each man to search the area between connecting tubes. Then, if none of them found Dan, they would work their way simultaneously up each of the connector tubes to the next ring, search there, then on to the third ring. And so on, right up to the hub.
We could use a hundred men, Larry thought. Only twelve men qualified for outside work had volunteered. Most of the people aboard the ship had never been outside it.
Larry watched the man nearest him disappear over the curve of the ship’s ring-like structure. He was alone now, standing on the ring’s metal skin with magnetically gripping boots, looking down a connector tube, past the seven rings to the bulging plastiglass blisters of the. hub.
The stars formed a solemn, unblinking backdrop, like millions of eyes watching him. And behind him, Larry could feel rather than see the immense ponderous presence of the planet.
Campbell’s voice crackled in his earphones. “Everybody ready?”
One by one, the eleven others answered by the numbers that had been hastily sprayed onto their suits.
“All right, everybody work to his left. Keep your guns loose.”
Larry fingered the laser tool-turned-weapon at his waist. Sonic stunners wouldn’t work in vacuum. If there was any shooting, somebody was going to die.
He began walking in a spiral around the big main wheel, his footsteps tacky in the magnetic boots. Around and around, spiraling like an electron in a strong magnetic field, curving from one connector tube to the next. There was practically no place for a man to hide here; the main level’s outer wall was almost perfectly smooth, broken only by an occasional viewport.
Larry carefully avoided stepping on the viewports. Being plastiglass, they’d provide no grip for his magnetic boots. Larry didn’t feel like slipping off the ship’s surface. There were steering jets on his belt, but he preferred to stay in contact with the ship rather than try zooming through empty space.
At last he came to the next connector tube. He found that he was breathing hard, sweating, but feeling relieved. No sign of Dan. And that somehow made him almost happy.
At least I didn’t have to shoot it out with him.
“Not yet,” he heard himself mutter.
The others began reporting in. None of them had seen Dan.
“All right,” Campbell said. “Every man goes along the tube he’s at now. Stop at level two-and report in.”
It was taking too long, Larry realized. More than an hour had passed since they had first come outside. It would easily take another hour or more by the time they had checked out level two. It wasn’t going to work. They’d have to go inside long before they could inspect level three. If Dan didn’t show up soon, they’d have to call off the whole idea of searching outside for him. Unless they could get more people outside to help.
Larry always felt hot inside the suits. There was a radiator on the back of his lifepack, but it never seemed to get rid of his body heat fast enough. The air blowers whirred noisily, but he still found himself drenched with sweat before he was halfway up the tube to level two.
Around and around. Down was up, and then it was down again. He saw the planet swing by as he stolidly plodded along the metal skin of the tube. Stars and planets, turning, turning, turning Keep your eyes searching for Dan! he warned himself. But where? He could be crouched behind that antenna; Larry checked it out carefully. No. He could be hovering no more than a hundred meters from the ship, and he’d be virtually invisible against the backdrop of stars. We’d never see him…you’d have to be lucky enough to look in exactly the right place at the right time…
And then Larry began to get the uncanny feeling that Dan was walking along behind him, following his footsteps, tiptoeing the way children sometimes do behind someone they’re trying to surprise.
He knew it was silly, irrational. But the feeling grew. He felt a cold shudder go through him. If he is behind me…
Larry whirled around. It was a clumsy move in the pressure suit, and his boots left contact with the ship. No one! Then he realized he was drifting away. He slapped at the control unit on his belt, and the microjets puffed briefly and slammed him hard back onto the tube. His knees buckled momentarily, but he stayed erect.
You’re getting spooked, he raged at himself.
He glanced at the oxygen gauge on his wrist. Still in the green, but a sliver of yellow was showing. When the yellow went to red, he’d have to either go inside or get a fresh tank.
His earphones buzzed. “Mr. Chairman?”
“Here.”
“Just a moment, sir…”
Then Valery’s voice said, “Larry? I think Dr. Hsai might have come up with something.”
“What?”
“Wait… I’ll put him on.”
Larry kept plodding on, kept his eyes searching.
“Mr. Chairman,” the psychotech said formally.
“Doctor,” Larry responded automatically.
“I’ve been reviewing my records of Dan Christopher’s case.”
“And?”
“I believe I may have found something significant.”
Larry fumed inside his helmet. “Well, what is it?”
But there was no hurrying Hsai. “Do you recall when Mr. Christopher was first placed under my care…just after his father died?”