"Thought the mixer was going for a bit," he gasped. "A forward jet went kafoo. Boulder maybe blocking off that last blast."
Orth told Horn what Neilson had said. The big man unzipped his safety harness and came over to his side, his big capable hand on Orth's shoulder.
"Don't worry about getting home," he said, taking up the thread of conversation the explosion had disrupted. "In three million years all the secrets of time and matter will have been discovered. We'll return with the shield."
He released the young scientist's bruised shoulder and slapped a great paw of a hand on his back, pushing him down toward the airlock.
"Better replace that jet tip, Devin," he said. "Can't tell but we may have to take off in a hurry. This future civilization might be unfriendly and," he paused thoughtfully, "even non-humanoid."
Orth checked the gauges at the lock and found the outer atmosphere to be a heady oxygen-rich mixture. Horn had gone down to help Neilson in the power compartment and he was alone. He stuffed the jet tip into his bag of tools and pushed through the inner port into the airlock. There he snapped on the invisible, but oddly tingling, radiations that would destroy any alien spores of deadly growth that might find their way into the ship.
He swung open the thick oval outer door and dropped the short grounding ladder to the blast-blackened turf. Down the eight rigid metal rungs of the ladder he went to the ground. He stumbled awkwardly and almost fell. The unaccustomed gravity, after the past twelve days in space—twelve days that had actually been thirty thousand centuries—had tricked him.
A moment later his muscles had quickly remedied this unbalance and he found the fused jet that had blown back. As Neilson had guessed, the Time Bubble had grazed a boulder in landing and the expanding rocket gases' escape had been blocked off.
It was good to feel the spring of turf underfoot. Even the feeble warmth of the ancient sun was pleasant on his bared flesh. He had not realized how homesick he had grown for Earth until now.
He put down his tools and headed toward a clump of oddly-shaped trees near the forest's rim. As he neared them he whistled. The temperature of the Lakes region must have changed. They were palms!