The drive of the Lancaster dropped from four gravities to about one, and Farradyne could hear, dimly, the clumpings of heavy feet coming in through the rooms above him. Then the drive diminished again, remaining at about a quarter-gravity or maybe less, and there were sounds of feet above his head. He tensed and he tasted the acid in his mouth; he found his heavy automatic and clutched it clumsily in the heavy space-glove. Capture might be preferable to death, except that Farradyne was fairly well convinced that the enemy could not permit him to stay alive with what he knew about them, even though it was precious little and unsupported.
The cubby he was hiding in was angularly shaped; to one side was space beyond the hull-plates. Inside was the water-jacket that cooled the throat of the reaction motor. Farradyne moved quietly around the central pillar until he was on the opposite side from the inspection hatch and settled down again.
On the plates above his head there were footsteps and the scraping of something heavy being hauled across the deck.
He heard the sound of triple-tongued voices barking musical and discordant sounds, distorted and muffled by the deck and the helmet he wore. One fiddled with the inspection hatch and Farradyne found the scuttlebutt and valved the air out into space knowing the enemy would have a hard time cracking the hatch against the pressure of one atmosphere. They gave up after a moment; then came the sound of drilling on the deckplates above him. A cloud of whitish vapor spurted downward and the sound of alien voices rose sharply as the drill came through. Three more spurts of escaping air blasted downward and skirred around the room to go in a fading draw toward the scuttlebutt.
Plugs filled the four holes and Farradyne turned his head torch on them. They were heavy self-tapping bolts being turned in from above.
The maneuver was repeated three times, ninety degrees apart. Then there was a softer sound of scraping and gradually the clumping of feet and the sound of men at work faded away.
Farradyne took a deep breath and realized that his skin was itching from the cold perspiration of fear that bathed him. The taste in his mouth was brackish and his heart was pounding, his breath shallow and rapid. He opened his mouth to gasp and discovered that he had been clenching his teeth so hard that his jaw ached and his molars hurt.
He closed the scuttlebutt, but did not valve any air into his hiding place. He put the top of his helmet against the deckplate above him and listened. Far above he could hear them, still at work but they were going higher and higher in the ship. He relaxed, waiting....
Three more hours passed, as nerve-wracking a three hours as Farradyne had ever spent. Then, with absolutely no warning the drive went off completely. He floated from the deck and scrabbled around to grab a stanchion. He held on, finally getting his magnetic shoes against a girder where they held him at an odd angle.
The drive went on to a full one gravity and hurled Farradyne flat against the bottom of the cubby, wrenching his ankles slightly. The drive went off again, on and finally off. This time it stayed off.