I tongued it on and said, “Jeff. Oh, Jeff. I’m out here. You forgot me.”
I was going to say some more, but just then he broke in, angry and so loud it made my helmet ring, with, “Joseph! Did you hear anything then?” A pause, then, “Well, clean the wax out of your ears, stupid, because I did! I think we got an enemy out there!”
Another and longer pause, while my blood curdled a bit thicker, then, “Well, okay, Joseph, I’ll go along with you this time. But if I hear the enemy once more, I’m going to suit up and take a rifle and sit in the airlock door until I’ve potted him.”
I tongued the radio off quick, fearful I’d sneeze or something. I had only one faint consolation: Joseph seemed to be a bit on my side, or maybe he was just lazy.
I thought some more, a mite frantic-like now, and after a while I said to myself, Been going five minutes now, so I’m doing about a quarter of a mile a second—that’s fifteen miles a minute, wow!—but out here velocities are purely relative. My suit does a little better than a quarter G full on. Okay. I’ll jet to the ship.
No sooner said than acted on—I was beginning to rely too much on impulse now. The suit jet killed my false weight at once and I was off, mighty careful to aim myself along my line or a little outside it, so as not to wander over into the beam.
Pretty soon the tail and Trompled Love were getting noticeably bigger.
Then a lot bigger.
Then my suit fuel ran out.