That third day was shooting pains, a chest that protested with every step, legs that could not be felt but somehow magically functioned. Many times Leeda was ready to quit. She began to stagger and weave erratically across the sand. The only thing that kept her going was the obsession of revenge that seemed to provide a limitless source of power whenever she seemed weakest. And Rick was getting bad; he seemed about finished. How he managed to keep moving, Leeda could not imagine. He fell repeatedly; but pulled himself doggedly back to his feet and stumbled after her.
When she flopped to the sand toward nightfall, he gestured her to her feet. And when she failed to get up, he came over and dragged her roughly erect. "Can't stop—never get up—gotta keep moving—until we die—or get there. Move!"
But the Martian night accomplished what she could not. Landmarks became indistinguishable; they soon would have been lost.
Lying down, Leeda adjusted her head-bubble so that it became opaque; conserving the warmth that leaked off so rapidly from a transparent object.
At long intervals she tried to move away from Rick who had settled right beside her. But each time his hand grabbed her firmly, forcing her back to the sand. He apparently intended to stay awake all night so she wouldn't sneak off.
When the morning of the fourth day arrived, they rose and once more moved stiffly, without a word for one another, across the wastes on the route that Leeda had selected.
Without quite knowing how it had happened, Leeda twice found herself on her knees on the sand. She knew she had been staggering; that her strength had long past left her; yet she was still amazed that her legs would not do the bidding of her mind. Each time she fell, Rick jerked her roughly to her feet and supported her until her legs moved automatically again.
His eyes were red-rimmed; his lips a ghastly slash of scabs and sores. About mid-morning he began to mumble incoherently, as though his voice alone could keep him sane. The only recognizable word that slid through his lips was, "Water! Water!"
It beat like the tone of a bass Callisto Satan Temple drum on Leeda's strained mind until she began to vision waterfalls and huge cakes of ice on the desert before her. Reality and imagination became mixed until she wondered if there was a place called Mars and if the past few days were real.