Somewhere in the void was a planet with a new
element that could transform men into supermen.
It was Boone's job to find that world—if he survived—

The Terror Out Of Space

By Dwight V. Swain

[Transcriber's Note: This etext was produced from
Imagination Stories of Science and Fantasy
July 1954
Extensive research did not uncover any evidence that
the U.S. copyright on this publication was renewed.]

It was a good proposition, the way the lean, grey man from Associated Independents told it. He ticked off the points on his fingers:

"Ten thousand credits an Earth year, Boone, win or lose. Full command of the field force. Five per cent cut on the profits if you get a mekronal processing unit in production on one of the unassigned satellites ahead of the Cartel."

"Sorry, Terral." Again, Boone glanced at his chronox. "It's like I said. Any other time I might be interested. But right now I've got something else on my mind."

"Fifteen thousand, then. And ten per cent if you spot in more than one satellite." Terral leaned forward. "Hell, man, that's more than you can hope to make as a GX if you stay with the Cartel!"

Boone grinned, after a fashion. "Sorry."

The lean man pushed back abruptly and gulped down his drink. "Then it is the woman!" he accused. A spark of pale fire lighted behind the grey eyes. Even in the dimness of the thil-shop, Boone couldn't miss the tension. "Krobis shoves her in ahead of you, but you'd still throw away your future—"

Boone brought his own glass down on the tanach table top, just hard enough so that it clicked a curt, sharp period to the other's sentence. "And what makes that your business?"

For the moment Terral's narrow jaws seemed to widen at the hinges. His lips peeled back, as if he were about to say something raw and cutting. Then, reconsidering, he breathed in deep instead and slumped loose in his seat. The thin lips drew together in a crooked smile. "My business—? Nothing, Boone. Nothing at all."

"That's the way I see it, too." Boone got up. "Good night, Terral."

He strode on out, not bothering to shake hands or look back.

The night closed in upon him—the night, and the narrow street; the alien sounds and smells and stir of Gandor City. A cadet from the Federation fleet pushed past him, a moss-furred Callistan crustach perched on his shoulder. Behind the cadet came two spask-masked berlon prospectors, up from the Hertzog fields, leading their lumbering flipper-tentacled coddob by a chain run through its gill-slits. The throb of the atmosphere compressors pressed in like a giant heartbeat, punctuated by the rattle of surface carriers, the shrill wail of tricol pipes. A sweetish, slightly nauseous scent of thes-wood flares and Martian paggod eddied from the doorway of a greasy-looking grill that placarded "Genuine Earth Meats—No Synthetics, No Alien Substitutes!"

Once more, Boone checked his chronox.

It was less than an hour till the end of the cycle now.

In spite of himself, Boone's belly tightened. Turning at the first intersection, he headed for the carrier station.

The IC flight was already on the line and waiting. He found a seat next to a dour-faced tech whose eye-whites showed green with mekronal infusion.

The carrier wheeled slowly forward into the lock that sealed off Gandor City's precious, bubble-pressured air supply from the bleak world outside. A moment later the lock's outer hatch opened. Climbing on its anti-gravitational beam—slowly, at first; then faster and faster—the carrier lanced out across the star-spangled black velvet of the Ganymedan sky.

The minutes dragged. Crags and peaks came and went below; then the dull grey wash of a cliff-bound sea of liquid gas. Off to the left, the sky took on a scarlet-purple tint, reflection of Jupiter's great Red Spot.

Down again, then. Down through another hatch, into another lock.

Its inner seal opened. The carrier swept into the bubble proper, settling onto the clean-swept ramp with its glaring forspark lights and the sign that said:

INTERPLANETARY CARTELS UNLIMITED
MEKRONAL PROCESSING DIVISION
GANYMEDAN ADVANCE BASE

Boone passed through the scanner unit; bared his ID plate for the guard.

"Back early, aren't you, Mister Boone?" The guard grinned. "Guess it makes a difference when you go alone. Though I will say that new job's a nice break for Miss Rey."

Boone nodded, not speaking.

"She goes out tonight, doesn't she?" The guard's face grew sober. "Hope she makes it o.k. That Titan run is no picnic—not with this monster business hitting half the ships. Bucking that kind of thing ain't my idea of a woman's job, no matter how high it rates nor how much it pays."

"She'll make it, all right."

"Sure." The guard's eyes shifted away from Boone's. "Sure, Mister Boone. She'll make it."

Boone passed on.

Inside the personnel compound, he looked at his chronox again.

Only half an hour now till Eileen was scheduled to grav-off.

Barely time for the job he had to do....

Turning in at his own quarters, he strode down the empty, echoing corridor to his room; closed the door behind him.

The nerve-gun lay in the top drawer, as always—sleek, grim, coldly lethal. Stiff-fingered, Boone checked the charge, then slid the weapon beneath his blouse and turned to go.

But Eileen's picture on the corner stand caught him ... held him.

Her picture, and the memories that went with it.

He picked it up; stared at it.

She was wearing her first uniform, with its student stripes, the silver comet Cartel insignia shining against the dark blue of the lapels. But even official tailoring and close-combed regulation hair-do couldn't hide her radiance. The blue eyes laughed with sheer love of living. Her lips showed soft and smiling, better styled for kisses than commands.

That was the Eileen Rey whom he remembered ... the Eileen of his own student unit days, the girl who'd climbed rank after rank beside him through Interplanetary Cartels' service.

Till now....

He cursed Krobis under his breath, slapped the picture back, face down on the cabinet.

There was another guard at the gate to the Titan ramp. Boone bared his ID plate.

But the man made no move to step aside. "Sorry, Mister Boone."

"What—?"

"Mister Krobis' orders, sir. You are barred from the ramp till after the ship gravs off."

"Oh." For a long, long moment Boone stood very still. And then: "I see."

"He might still be at his office, sir. Maybe if you was to talk to him...."

"Thanks." Stiffly, Boone turned and walked back the way he'd come, past silent warehouses and noisy shops and rattling, rumbling surface carrier units.

Then he was in front of the blank-faced central administration building.

For the fraction of a second only, he hesitated. Then, turning in, he strode through the deserted passageways.

Krobis' office. Another guard. "Mister Krobis is busy, sir. He left orders that he wasn't to be disturbed till after the Titan ship gravs off."

Again, a long, long, moment of decision. Then, very gently, Boone repeated, "I want to see Krobis."

"I'm sorry, sir—"

Boone brought out the nerve-gun in one swift motion, leveled it at the man's belly. "Maybe you didn't understand."

The guard's eyes flicked from his face to the nerve-gun. "You're making a mistake, sir."

Boone kept the nerve-gun steady, ready. "You're probably right. But anyone who tries to stop me is going to get hurt."

"If that's the way you want it, sir...." The guard shrugged and stepped aside.

"No." Boone shook his head. "You're going in with me, friend. Ahead of me."

Wordless, the guard shrugged again and, turning, walked through the anteroom towards Krobis' door.

Boone spun the nerve-gun's impact dial down to the temporary paralysis level and fired.

The guard crumpled. Stepping across him, Boone tried the door handle.

It was locked.

Sucking in a quick breath, Boone kicked for the bolt with all his might.

The door burst open. He lunged into the office beyond.

It was a big room, with the desk set at the far end so that visitors would have plenty of time to lose self-confidence while they walked its length.

Martin Krobis specialized in tricks like that.

He leaped up as Boone came through the door—face stiff, nostrils flaring.

Then: "Boone—!"

"That's right." Boone heeled the door shut behind him. "You're a hard man to see these days, Krobis. This time I couldn't wait."

Krobis straightened slowly, a small, sharp-featured man with too-short legs. Twin spots of color came to mark his cheekbones, and his black eyes grew hard and shiny. "I don't believe I understand you, Boone."

Boone laughed, harsh and bitter. "You understand, all right." He strode forward. "That's why you gave orders to the guards to keep me away from you and off the ramp."

"So—?" This out of a thin-lipped, mask-like face.

"So Eileen Rey doesn't take the Titan run." Boone gestured with the gun. "Let's go, Krobis."

"You realize what you're doing, of course, Boone?" A raw, raging edge crept into Krobis' voice. "You know that this finishes you with IC? That as soon as my report goes in, it's the end of your career?"

Deliberately, Boone spun the nerve-gun's dial to the lethal output point. "Time's too short for talk, Krobis. We're going out to the ramp. You and me, together."

Again, Krobis' nostrils flared. His shoulders drew in. His head thrust a fraction forward.

Boone tightened his finger on the nerve-gun's trigger. "Try it, Krobis. Just try it."

Silence. Long, aching seconds of silence.

Then, slowly, Krobis' head came up. He made a business of smoothing his sleek black hair and came around the desk, walking with the peculiar, waddling stride that came of trying to stretch his too-short legs farther than they were meant to go.

He hadn't done quite a good enough job on his hairline, either, Boone noted. Tiny beads of sweat still showed at the roots.

"Well, Boone?" Krobis carved the words out of ice.

Stripping a coat from the rack, Boone draped it over his arm to hide the gun, then fell in at Krobis' left, not quite abreast him. In silence, they went through the anteroom where the stunned guard lay and on out of the administration building.

Again, the ramp gate loomed.

Low-voiced, Boone said, "I'm going aboard that Titan ship, Krobis. See that I get there if you want to live."

Krobis didn't answer. But his curt nod took them past the guard.

Ahead, the great sphere that was the Titan ship glinted under the forspark lights. The cargo hatches were already sealed. The last of the surface carriers shuttled in and out like rumbling beetles through the shadows cast by the stubby tripod legs.

Boone herded Krobis to the loading shaft, into the lift; threw a tight grin at the man on duty. "How long?"

"Seven minutes, sir. We're right on schedule."

"Good enough."

The lift ground upward ... halted, finally, deep in the heart of the ship.

Boone prodded Krobis down the narrow, duroid corridor that led to the tech quarters. The card on the last door to the right said, "Miss Rey."

Boone knocked. The tension was almost unbearable now. His palms were slick. His belly quivered.

A latch-click. The door opened part way, framing Eileen's face.

Shoving Krobis ahead of him, Boone crowded her back into the cabin and shouldered shut the door.

She stared. "What—?"

Krobis spoke rapidly, caustically: "Boone's jealous of your new assignment, my dear. He doesn't want to let you go to Titan."

Eileen caught her breath. Her eyes flicked to Boone. "Fred—"

"You can believe that if you want to, Eileen." Boone quit trying to keep the anger, the tension, out of his own voice. "The main thing is, you're not going."

He could see the storm flare in her eyes. "Fred, you can't stop me!"

"Can't I?" Boone tossed the coat from his arm, baring the nerve-gun. "I've watched Krobis run through this big-boss act before, Eileen. He specializes in putting people under obligation. In your case, he knows how much your work means to you, so he'd like to maneuver things around to where you'll feel indebted to him for letting you prove your professional competency at the top level. Only this gun,"—he gestured with it—"says he's not going to get away with it."

The curves of Eileen's face changed to planes and hollows. A thin white anger-line drew about her mouth. "Fred, this is utterly absurd!"

And from Krobis: "Miss Rey happens to be one of the Cartel's best extraterrestrial biologists—"

Boone slashed in on him: "—And also, at the moment, she's a woman you want." He laughed—savagely, explosively. "A nice co-incidence, isn't it? You'd gamble her life on it—send her into a chunk of void where monsters materialize out of nowhere and two ships in three never come back. If she lives and cracks the nut, figures out how those nightmares get aboard our ships and why, mekronal production and your rating—with Eileen and IC both—go sky-high. If she dies, you chalk up another score for yourself as an ironclad Cartel man so set on his job that he doesn't know what sentiment means. Either way, Martin Krobis wins."

"Then you'd let this ship go out without a biologist?" Eileen's breath came fast and shallow. "You'd let the crew face the monsters with not even a fighting chance to win?"

Boone clipped his words: "Don't worry. There'll be a biologist aboard." And then: "You see—I'm going in your place."

"So—!" Face alight, Krobis turned to Eileen. "I was right, my dear! Boone's jealous, that's all—jealous of you, your ability, the chance I've given you to solve this problem!"

A tremor ran through Eileen. For an instant she swayed, her pale face a mask of mixed emotions.

Then, heedless of the nerve-gun, she clawed at Boone.

He stepped back fast; clubbed his left fist upward.

It caught her squarely on the point of the jaw. Her teeth clicked; her head snapped back. Already sagging, she reeled against the wall, then slid unconscious to the floor.

Krobis started to spin about.

Boone said tightly, "Come ahead, Krobis! Eileen I wouldn't burn. But you—it'd be a pleasure!"

Krobis froze in his tracks.

Boone shot a quick glance at his chronox. "Less than four minutes till grav-off. We'll have to hurry." He gestured with the nerve-gun barrel. "Get her up!"

"And if I won't?"

"Get her up I said!" Boone's voice rang savage with menace.

Krobis' eyes wavered. Squatting, he dragged Eileen's limp body round till he could slide an arm beneath her and heave her up onto his shoulder.

Boone closed in to help support her. "You know what to tell the man at the lift, Krobis: Miss Rey's suddenly been taken ill, so you're relieving her from duty and assigning me to take her place."

Black eyes asmoulder, Krobis nodded.

"And in case you've got any sharp ideas—just remember no man alive can outrun a nerve charge...." Sliding his hand up under Eileen's service blouse to conceal his weapon, Boone jerked open the cabin door. In seconds, they had Eileen into the lift.

Then they were past the guard ... out on the ramp again ... into the black shadows on the far side of an emptied cargo carrier.

Boone stepped back while Krobis awkwardly lowered Eileen to the ramp. She moaned a little; that was all.

Barely two minutes till grav-time now, the chronox said.

Krobis straightened. "You'll never get away with this, Boone!" His voice was thick with hate.

"Because you'll stop the grav-off, you mean?" Boone spun the nerve-gun's dial back to the temporary paralysis level. "I've thought of that, too, Krobis."

He squeezed the trigger.

The other's eyes went blank and glassy. He slumped beside Eileen on the ramp.

Pivoting, Boone strode back to the ship.

The hatchmen were already gathering with their sealers. The hum of the converters rose in an all-pervasive drone.

Up in the tech quarters once more, Boone wryly slipped the card bearing Eileen's name from its bracket on the door and substituted his own. Then, going on into the cabin, he threw himself down at full length on the foamex bunk. He was tired, more tired than he could remember ever having been, with the utter weariness that comes of too much strain and tension.

A moment later the signal light above the door flashed red. Then a momentary shifting said that the sphere was off the ground and rising, riding its great beam of anti-gravitational force up from Ganymede's bleak surface.

So it was done. Eileen was safe at last and he, Fred Boone, was on his way to Titan.

Of course, there'd be charges waiting for him when he got back.

If he got back.

Only that could wait. That was still far off in the future.

He fell asleep that way ... a troubled sleep, full of mad, distorted dreams of Eileen and Krobis, and of monsters.

Then, all at once, he was awake again, sitting bolt upright in the bunk—sweat-drenched, fists clenched.

Dimly, confusedly, he sensed that some sound must have roused him.

In the same instant the sound came again—a knock, echoing over-loud in the cabin's stillness.

Stumbling from the bunk, Boone jerked open the door.

Eileen stood in the corridor outside, flanked by two guards with nerve-guns at the ready. A cold-eyed ship's officer waited behind them.

Boone stared—unable to speak, still not quite believing.

"I believe these are my quarters, Mister Boone," Eileen said. She was a picture of chill self-possession. Only a faint trace of color marked the place along her jaw where he had struck her.

"Eileen—!" he choked. "Eileen...."

"You're surprised, you mean?" Her voice stayed icy. "I thought you might be. It's just that you didn't hit me quite as hard as you thought you did. I was conscious again before you ever carried me out of this cabin. But you had a gun, so I let you take me off, then came back on again just behind you."

"I see," Boone nodded slowly. Of a sudden there was a churning weakness in his middle. "Then—Eileen—"

"Miss Rey," she corrected, voice still icy. And then: "You'll understand, of course, that I had no choice but to take this whole thing to the captain."

Again, Boone nodded. "Yes."

"To return to Ganymede once the locks were closed behind us would be an expensive undertaking. So we'll both go on to Titan. I'll serve as biologist for the run, in accordance with my orders. As for you"—she shrugged—"your status should be obvious."

"To you, maybe. Not to me."

"Then I'll clarify it." All at once her eyes, her face, mirrored bitter triumph. "You'll make the trip, Mister Boone, but you'll do it as a prisoner—under guard and confined to your quarters!"

CHAPTER TWO

The captain was a broad-bodied, heavy-shouldered man with the veined red nose and cheeks of a heavy drinker. The cold-eyed way he looked at Boone, low-lidded, told how he felt.

"Don't think I've turned you loose because I like you, Boone," he clipped. "I don't. But we're coming into Saturn's orbit, and that means we need a biologist on duty. Prisoner or not, you qualify, so you're elected."

Boone stared. "Miss Rey—"

"Her temperature hit 104 an hour ago."

A chill ran through Boone. "You mean—"

"That's right. Titan fever."

Boone caught his breath as the door swung open to admit a thin-faced young ensign. "Another down, Captain," the man reported grimly. "Verdov, converter crew."

"That makes four. Thank the good Lord we've got plenty of chandak extract." The captain hunched forward, his thick forearms heavy on the desk. "You see where it puts us, Boone. From here on in it's monster country; we'll pass Japetus any minute. So the quicker you check the ship, the better."

"Right." Dry-lipped, Boone pivoted and strode towards the door, gesturing to the ensign. "Come on."

The other nodded and fell in beside him. "Where do you want to start?"

"Top live cargo section."

Together they rode the lift to the highest level, then walked to the end of the "A" passage.

Boone kicked the hatch of the first bunker. "Open it up."

"Open it—?" The ensign's eyes widened. "You mean you're going to check inside, too?"

Boone nodded curtly. "That's right."

"Well, if you say so...." Frowning, the ensign broke the seal; swung back the hatch.

Cold air washed over them. Light glinted on the seven-foot synthice slabs stacked floor to ceiling, each casing a contract worker stiff in frozen sleep.

Narrow-eyed, Boone probed each nook and crevice with his light-rod, then stepped back. "All right. Let's have the next one."

The ensign slammed shut the hatch. He studied Boone curiously. "Just what are you looking for?"

Boone shrugged. "Monsters don't come out of nowhere; not really. My bet is that they get aboard our ships at the Titan base—in embryo, maybe, or as a virus. If we can spot one before it's grown to a full-scale nightmare, it may give us a hint as to how to beat them."

"But they say they're human, sometimes—"

"Maybe. But no man I know can appear and disappear at will, and so far we're the only humanoid race we've found anywhere in the system. Till I see more proof, I'll put my money on alien life-forms plus optical illusion."

"Oh." The ensign's brows drew together. He opened the next hatch.

Another blank.

It went on like that, section after section. They checked supply storage, power receptors, converters.

Still nothing.

In the control room, when they got there, Japetus was already fading from the visiscreen. Hyperion loomed ahead, a bead-like dot hovering in the shadow of the Rings.

Beyond it, dim and distant, lay Titan.

Titan, greatest satellite of Saturn, nearly half the size of Earth itself. Titan, that had given Man mekronal, the precious, mysterious catalyst that cut loose the human race from the need for the oxygen-nitrogen atmosphere of its homeland.

Titan, world of lost sphere-ships and phantasmic monsters.

Bleakly, Boone wondered if he'd ever reach it.

Or even if he did, would Eileen Rey live to see it with him? What were the odds against a woman struck down by Titan fever?

Those were questions without answers.

Weary, tight-lipped, he turned from the screen. "Nothing here. Let's try the crew quarters."

"Good enough." Once again, the ensign fell in beside him.

Overhead, the alarm bell clanged.

Boone went rigid; spun about as the com-box crackled, raw and ragged: "Top level calling! There's something in "A" passage—something awful! Get the biologist—Oh, my God—!"

A scream: the scream of a soul in torment.

The com-box went dead.

The ensign at his heels, Boone raced for the lift-shaft.

The top level, "A" passage. The lights at the far end were out.

Boone snatched the ensign's nerve-gun. Cat-footed, he moved forward.

Ahead, something shifted in the shadows. He became aware of a vague, phosphorescent glow.

A whisper of sound. A floundering wallow of movement.

Raw-nerved, Boone flicked on his light-rod.

Its beam sprayed out across a creature like nothing ever seen before in earth or heaven. A bulbous thing, a nightmare of pseudopodal horror.

But before he could fire, it began to change.

First it drew together, a bubbling mass like green calf-slobber shot with blood. A rank stench of musty death curled to him from it.

Then, while he watched, a shape began to rise out of the slime; a shape—

He caught his breath. His blood froze.

It was a woman!

Now she stood erect and naked, shrouded from the hips down in the slime-mass. Her hands caressed her high, proud breasts. She laughed and stretched her arms out toward Boone.

In spite of himself, he took a dragging step forward. Then another, and another.

As from afar, the ensign's shout dinned in his ears. He half turned.

As one, woman and slime-mass lunged towards him. And now, incredibly, Boone saw that there were fangs beneath the laughing lips; that, like Medusa, the woman was crowned not with rippling hair, but writhing serpents.

He screamed as the voice on the com-box had screamed; blazed point-blank at the naked belly with his nerve-gun.

The soft flesh shimmered, darkened. Great scales took form. The smooth body distorted into the plated, cartilaginous torso of a dragon.

Boone hurled himself aside as its great horned head lanced forward. With all his might, he threw the nerve-gun into the yawning mouth.

The mighty jaws clamped down. The metal crumpled.

Behind Boone, thunder crashed in the passage. A fire-bolt from a blaster smashed into the monster.

Dragon and slime-mass alike exploded into spattering fragments. Half-stunned, Boone felt the ensign's fingers dig into his shoulders and drag him back towards the lift-shaft.

But he shook them off. "No. I've got to see—" Even as he spoke, he knew that the words were coming out an incoherent mumble.

He staggered back anyhow ... clawed amid the smoke and debris.

His hands came up green and stinking with viscous slime.

Numbly, he stared down at them. "Then—it was real—no optical illusion—"

"Real? Of course it was real!" This from the half-hysterical ensign. "I saw it all—the woman, the dragon! If I'd been two seconds later with the blaster, it would have got you!"

Boone slumped against the wall. "That thing—"

A muffled crash of sound from the lift-shaft cut in on him. Red lights flashed on the call-board.

"Third level—!" The ensign's voice rang raw with tension.

"Come on!" Boone lunged for the lift.

Together they plummeted downward ... stumbled out into a murky, smoke-eddying third level passage.

More slime, purple this time, and a man with a blaster.

Only he hadn't fired quite quick enough. He sprawled dead on the floor-plates, his chest torn wide open as if by talons.

Red lights were flashing all over the call-board now. Alarm bells jangled wildly.

The captain's voice rasped from the com-box: "All hands! Make for your closest emergency carrier and stand by to abandon ship! Central Control will blow all carriers clear in three minutes! Repeat, Central Control will blow all carriers clear in three minutes, so get aboard fast! All hands...."

Stiff-lipped, Boone stared up at the call-board. "Seven levels signalling! It's an attack in force, then...."

The ensign clutched his arm. "Let's go! There's a carrier at the end of the passage!"

Boone started to turn, then stopped short. "Eileen—!"

"What?"

"The other biologist—the girl with Titan fever."

"Let the medmen worry about her! They'll take her off if she's not too sick to move!"

"No!" Spasmodically, Boone jerked free. "We can't leave her!"

"But there's no time!"

"I can't help that." Boone shoved the other away. "You go ahead...."

The ensign threw him one last taut, frustrated glance, then wheeled and ran off down the passage towards the carrier lock. A score of steps he ran....

Only then, out of the murk, a primordial horror rose before him—a thing of tentacles and feelers massed about a hideous white skull-face.

It happened too fast for shouts or screaming. The ensign's head jerked back and sidewise. He tried to veer.

Too late. With a sound that came straight from hell, the skull-thing lurched forward. The tentacles engulfed him.

Convulsively, Boone clawed the blaster from the dead hands of the man beside the lift-shaft ... lanced a fire-bolt into the monster's leering face.

Face and monster vanished in a blaze of ear-shattering sound and blue-white flame.

Then the echoes died and Boone was alone again—shaking, retching. Of the ensign, no trace remained.

Numbly, Boone stumbled back into the lift and dropped it fullspeed down the shaft to the tenth level, the very heart of the great sphere-ship.

There was another monster waiting for him when he came out—a creature that looked for all the world like a huge, iridescent coffin whose lid came up to bare rows of razor-edged shark-teeth.

Raw-nerved, he blasted it to atoms; then, belly churning, waded through stench and putrescent fragments towards the tech quarters where Eileen lay.

As he did so, the ship rocked sharply.

For an instant Boone went rigid, then cursed aloud. That jolt—it could have been only the impact of the carriers' departure.

Now, truly, he was alone—alone in the void on a sphere of death, where nightmare monsters roamed lusting for his blood.

Alone with Eileen, perhaps. If she were still alive.

If....

He quickened his pace, moving along the corridor cold-eyed and wary, his finger taut on the blaster's trigger.

The last door to the right. A card that said, "Miss Rey."

Palm slick with sweat, Boone tried the handle.

The door was unlocked. He opened it a fraction.

A voice rose high and incoherent, ranting. The voice of delirium.

Boone stepped inside; flicked on the light.

Eileen lay in the bunk, held there by the broad straps of a safety pack. A flush-faced Eileen with wild, fever-blinded eyes. Her lips moved in ceaseless, garbled speech. Thin fingers tugged and twisted at the sheets as if it were not in them to be still.

A knot drew tight in Boone's midriff. Grimly, he studied the chart on the stand, then glanced at his chronox.

Time for more chandak extract.

Stiff-fingered, he prepared the aerojet; sprayed the precious drops into Eileen's jugular vein. Then, barring the door against invading monsters, he settled down to wait and hope.

The hours dragged by till he lost track, a blur of time broken only by the routine with the aerojet. Once he thought Eileen recognized him. Twice he fell asleep. A dozen times, in his mind's eye, the monsters came, only to fade away again as he fought his way up from the depths of his fatigue. Hunger, thirst—they were words only....

Then, the crash.

It threw him clear across the cabin, to land with stunning force against the farthest wall. The whole room hung tilted at a thirty-degree angle.

Dragging himself up, he clambered to the bunk.

Eileen's eyes were closed, her tongue and fingers still at last. To Boone, it seemed as if her forehead were less feverish—as if she might even be asleep.

But again, she might have slipped into a coma. In his own state, he couldn't be sure.

As for the crash, the room—Blinking, he looked around.

The cabin's angle was still the same. Thirty degrees, at least.

Only the room couldn't stay this way, tilted. Not with the sphere floating free in space. That was what the orientational gyroscopes were designed to prevent.

In the same instant, he caught the first faint whiff of ammonia.

A chill ran through him. Scrambling erect, he snatched up the blaster, fumbled open the door, and peered out into the corridor.

No monsters—but something worse. For here the ammonia-smell hung even stronger.

Dragging the door shut behind him, Boone half-ran, half-fell along the crazily-tilted passage to the administrative center at the ship's core.

The door to the medical office was locked. Cursing savagely, Boone drew back and to one side and fired a glancing bolt.

The door swung wide, the lock and half the panel shattered.

Inside, Boone pawed the supply chest into chaos, then turned to the wall cabinets.

A case of mekronal ampules stood on the first shelf.

Coughing as a new eddy of ammonia fumes curled round him, Boone snatched down the carton and an extra aerojet injector, then ran from the room and back along the passage to Eileen's cabin.

The air inside was a little better. Slamming shut the door, he tossed down the ampules and began wadding the first of Eileen's garments to come to hand into the wall vent.

A faint voice whispered, "Fred...."

Boone spun around. "Eileen—!"

She smiled, the pale wraith of a smile. But her eyes had lost their fever-wildness. Her cheeks were no longer quite so flushed.