But it was Les and Tansie Lee that they saw, and they stopped. Then Les and Tansie were in their ship, and Les was at the control board.
The other crowd boiled in, behind them, the fight forgotten, momentarily. They wanted Les Ackerman above all, for he was in a position to nullify any of their acts, regardless of which side won. He was not going to elude them again; they would continue this battle in Ackerman's presence so that the winner would be able to overpower the physicist.
Ackerman nudged the automatic controls. The "time-space" vehicle started forward in space and backwards in "time".
Behind him the two factions eyed one another suspiciously, and moved warily to get into fighting-position.
Les turned briefly, and shook his head. Getting into that battle himself would be no good. Let them fight! he said to himself. Give me "time". Ackerman could best win by removing the cause.
He flipped the top-hatch open and groped out of the moving ship with his gloved hand—the temperon-coated glove—hoping to locate by sheer luck the cyclotron target and the temperon sample. By luck aided with a good memory of where it was. He thought for a moment that he, himself, was not far from here in both "time" and "space". He was separated in space by the radiation-proof barrier, and in "time" only by the few instants of temporal fission.
Then he saw it! Vaguely, dimly, distorted by the gray-green haze that enveloped the ship in motion.
The ship stalled. It could not penetrate the barrier of "time" to head into the "past" which would have been previous to the fission of "time". So Ackerman nudged the power up higher and the temporal drive of the ship strained against the barrier like an automobile straining against an immobile wall.
Ackerman reached for the temperon.