"No, most of the trouble in the back was due to being hit by slowly moving objects of high inertia. They're mostly annoyed, back there. The front system got it, though, what with flying spots of molten metal, electrical discharges that convulsed muscles, and burns from the alphatrons when they went load-free. A few of the boys got hurt when the mechano-gravitic generators collected the full load of the power sources and let them have anything from 10 to 15-G until the gravity-switches cut out. That did more than haul the men to the floor; it also hauled a lot of what would have been light stuff down on top of them at weights from ten to fifteen times normal. That's what hurt the most of them."
"What fell, mostly?"
"Light fixtures, and ceiling equipment. The busbar hangers on 7 gave way and dropped a bus line on one fellow, breaking both legs. Eleven's mechano-gravitic generator misfocused and hauled everything slaunchwise into a corner of every room. The men picked themselves out of a pile of material; everything from loose generators to odds and ends of wire. The latter didn't hurt, but the heavy machinery did."
"Fine business, Doc. Keep 'em patched!"
"That's my business," said Caldwell. McBride could hear him muttering as the doctor hung up.
McBride's flitter landed at 10, and inside of the lock, he was met by a picturesque red-headed woman of extreme beauty. There was green fire in her eyes, and her anger possibly made her more beautiful. McBride took everything from her expensively-shod feet to her exquisitely coiffed hair in one sweeping glance and decided immediately that it was a shame that a woman like Sandra Drake should have been a stinker.
"Mr. McBride, I assume?" she said in that contralto voice.
"Dr. McBride," he corrected, standing upon his dignity for the first time in seven years.
"Doctor?" said Sandra scornfully. "Doctor of what?"