For a moment, the incipient madness of many days on this hellish satellite engulfed Hugh in a wave of nausea. He remembered the gravity-screen tearing from its pivots, and the space-ship caught in the tremendous pull of Jupiter; the last desperate try at the controls, and then the tiny dark bulk of Europa curving up to met them headlong. There had been cheerless days of biting cold when the tiny satellite faced the distant pallid sun. There had been nights that were like a canto out of Dante, as they were bathed in Jupiter's red cold-glow. More recently, and for more reason, Hugh remembered the dwindling food supply which had now quite vanished.
"Yes, food," Hugh echoed Jim's words in a hoarse whisper. He grasped the soft warm body in his hands with gentle firmness. The creature did not try to escape, it lay limp and inert with its eyes closed. "But—but food doesn't quite solve our problem. Unless we can find some oxide crystal to alloy in the portable smelter, we're sunk. Jim, that jagged hole in the prow isn't going to repair itself!"
Jim's ordinarily red face grew redder with anger, until there was no distinguishing between the color of his hair and that of his face. "All right," he snarled, "so we need the oxide! For days we've been searching all over this cold hell for some, and where are we? I still maintain our immediate problem is food!"
"Yes, yes, food," Hugh murmured. Why, he wondered vaguely, was he so reluctant to talk about it while he held this limp warm creature in his arms? He looked down at it again, and was startled to find himself staring into its extraordinary eyes. Limpid, brilliant, full of a semi-human intelligence now, they were scarcely a foot from Hugh's own eyes—and for a single instant Hugh had the crazy idea that they were filled with a strange fixity of purpose, almost as if it were trying to convey something to him there in the appalling silence of Europa.
A sudden cold came over Hugh that was not the cold of Europa. It took quite an effort for him to tear his own eyes away, then he laughed and whispered inquiringly of himself, "Am I going crazy? Maybe this place is beginning to get me at last. For a moment I thought...."
He shrugged uneasily.
"What are you mumbling?" Jim demanded irritably, his huge form bulking against the bizarre jagged landscape. "I'd have slit that thing's throat and skinned it already? Here, give it——"
"Wait, you fool!" Hugh's ordinarily thoughtful, hazel eyes were bright now and hard, as he drew back from Jim's grasping hand. "We're the first to find life on Europa, the only ones to see what inhabits it; and all you can think of is your damned stomach. You can't be starved, you ate this morning!"
"Yes, and that was the last of it," Jim snarled. His face was ugly now and purposeful. "Well, I'm hungry again, and now that I've found these Europan kangaroos I aim to be fed and kept warm. Notice how fine that pelt is?"