He considered the situation carefully. So long as his batting average stayed at one thousand percent he was in fine shape. The ship ran itself; there was nothing to watch; and so the crew did what all spacemen do: sleep. If he could catch them one by one—
He opened Stateroom One. It was empty.
That put a different light on things. Maybe this was not a fully-loaded transport. Maybe it was just like the average cargo-haul with only a couple of passengers.
He opened Stateroom Two and found it empty.
That sort of proved it. He opened Stateroom Three and found a man asleep in the bunk. He was stirring as Farradyne scanned the room, and he moved just as Farradyne launched himself across the cabin. Haste ruined his aim and his down-slashing hand clipped the enemy on the skull instead of hitting him alongside the ear. The man grunted and swung out blindly, hitting Farradyne and moving him up and away. Farradyne caught the upright of the bunk and stayed his free flight, levered himself around and swung again.
The enemy parried the blow and then let out a triple-tone roar. Farradyne pulled himself down and around, then kicked out with both feet, catching the enemy in the face and chest. The force drove the enemy deep into the mattress, from which he rebounded to fold up over the hold-down strap and flop up and down, limp, an inert mass caught between two springs. The same force drove Farradyne toward the open door.
His aim was still bad; his outsweeping hand caught the leading edge of the door and he and it swung on the hinges until he came flat against the wall behind the door. Then he fought his body around and came out of the stateroom feet first.
He caught at the handrail and stabilized his flight, then took notice of his surroundings.
A door down the hall opened and a man came sailing out. He caught sight of Farradyne and launched himself down the hall at the spaceman. Farradyne met him with a slash, which was parried by a block of the man's forearm against Farradyne's wrist. It stopped the enemy's flight, and tore Farradyne's hold loose.
Farradyne let the enemy peer down the barrel of his gun. "Hold it," he snapped.