“Are you burned much?” Ken asked.
“Not enough to worry about,” Sandy assured him.
“Well, here goes,” he said a moment later. He drew his right knee up beneath him and, using that knee and his right shoulder and elbow as points of leverage, he shoved himself up to his knees, keeping them wide apart so that he could balance against the roll of the barge. Then he dragged his left foot forward and put it flat on the floor, so that he was resting on one knee and one foot.
He tried pushing against that foot, to bring himself erect, but the ankle gave way as soon as he put any weight on it.
“Ouch!” he muttered, and rested a minute, wriggling his foot to bring the painful muscles back to life.
He tried it twice more. And then suddenly he was on his feet. He had to lean against the table in order to stay upright, but the grime-streaked face beneath the red hair looked grimly jubilant.
“Look at me,” he said. “I’m standing! Never thought it would feel like such an achievement.”
Ken grinned. “No hands, too. Now let’s see if you can walk over to that cupboard and find a knife.”
Unsteadily, and wincing at every step from the pains shooting up his legs, Sandy made it to the cupboard wall. He waited there a moment, until the barge was on a comparatively even keel, and then he clamped his teeth on the knob of the first door and jerked his head back. The door flew open, almost knocking him backward, and a shower of objects came tumbling out, bouncing from Sandy’s chest to the floor.
Sandy looked down at them. “Nothing but food,” he muttered disgustedly. “Flour, peanut butter, noodles....”