Here he was riding to the Moon with a tinkering idiot who couldn't fix a kitchen faucet or locate a blown fuse in the basement. Streams of moisture were trickling down the wall. The metal felt cold, like the window of the car on a day when you needed the heater and defroster. Was something going wrong?
Maybe they were out of oxygen. He listened to Harold snoring. Once Harold took a quick breath, and strangled, and turned his head restlessly. His glasses were slipping off.
Orville looked at his watch. He couldn't believe that just five minutes had gone by since he'd looked at it last. He could hear Harold's two-dollar watch ticking away, almost as loud as his own. His was gaining on Harold's and then they were ticking together so that the combined pounding sent echoes through the ship. He tried to crawl.
He couldn't move.
"Harold!" The ticking of the watches drowned out his voice. "We're in trouble! We're out of oxygen! Help!"
It was like a bad dream. Then something woke him: Harold, stumbling across his legs, turning on the scope and waiting, breathing hard, for it to come to life.
Harold saw that he was awake. "You went to sleep! You shoulda woke me. It's been six hours!"
Orville said nothing.
"We may be clear past the Moon by now," Harold grumbled.