The doctor set foot on the ladder without hesitation. Presumably, his captors were above, and wanted him to leave the room in which he was imprisoned. In this wish he concurred heartily; he was too hungry to object affectively, anyway. He made his way up the ladder to the corridor, forcing his shoulders through the narrow opening. The human voices were still audible, but they faded into the background of his attention as he examined the beings grouped around the hatch.
There were five of them. They bore some resemblance to the nonhumans of Tau Ceti's first planet, having evidently evolved from a radially symmetric, star-fishlike form to a somewhat more specialized type with differentiated locomotive and prehensile appendages. They were five-limbed and headless, with a spread of about eight feet. The bodies were nearly spherical; and if the arms had been only a little thicker at the base it would have been impossible to tell where body left off and arm began. The tube feet of the Terrestrial starfish were represented by a cluster of pencil-thick tendrils near the tip of each arm and leg—the distinction between these evidently lying in the fact that three of the appendages were slightly thicker and much blunter at the tips than the two which served as arms. The tendrils on the "legs" were shorter and stubbier, as well. The bodies, and the appendages nearly to their tips, were covered with a mat of spines, each several inches in length, lying for the most part nearly flat against the skin. These either grew naturally, or had been combed away from the central mouth and the five double-pupiled eyes situated between the limb junctions.
The beings wore metal mesh belts twined into the spines on their legs, and these supported cases for what were probably tools and weapons. Their "hands" were empty; evidently they did not fear an attempted escape or attack on the doctor's part. They made no sound except for the dry rustle of their spiny armor as they moved. In silence they closed in around Little, while one waved his flexible arms toward one end of the passageway. A gentle shove from behind, as the doctor faced in the indicated direction, transmitted the necessary command, and the group marched toward the bow. Two of the silent things stalked in front, two brought up the rear; and at the first opportunity, the other swarmed up one of the radial ladders and continued his journey directly over Little's head, swinging along by the handholds on the central beam.
As they advanced, the voices from ahead grew slowly louder. Occasional words were now distinguishable. The speakers, however, were much farther away than the sound of their voices suggested, since the metal-walled corridor carried the sounds well if not faithfully. Nearly three hundred yards from Little's cell, a vertical shaft of the same dimensions as the corridor interrupted the latter. The voices were coming from below. Without hesitation, the escort swung over the lip of the shaft and started down the ladder which took up is full width; Little followed. On the way, he got some idea of the size of the ship he was in. Looking up, he saw the mouths of two other corridors entering the shaft above the one he had traversed; at the level of the second, another hallway joined it from the side. Evidently he was not near the center line of the craft; there were at least two, and possibly three, tiers of longitudinal corridors. He had already seen along one of those corridors; the ship must be over fifteen hundred feet in length. Four vessels the size of the Gomeisa could have used the immense hull for a hangar, and left plenty of elbow room for the servicing crews.
Below him, the shaft debouched into a chamber whose walls were not visible from Little's position. His eyes, however, which had become exceedingly tired of the endless orange radiance which formed the ship's only illumination, were gladdened at the sight of what was unquestionably daylight leaking up from the room. As he descended, two of the walls became visible—the shaft opened near one corner—and in one of them he finally saw an air lock, with both valves open. He went hastily down the remaining few feet and stopped as he touched the floor. His gaze took in on the instant the twenty-yard square chamber, which seemed to occupy a slight outcrop of the hull, and stopped at the corner farthest from the air lock. Penned in that corner by a line of the starfish were thirty-eight beings; and Little needed no second glance to identify the crew of the Gomeisa. They recognized him simultaneously; the chatter stopped, to be replaced by a moment's silence and then a shout of "Doc!" from nearly two score throats. Little stared, then strode forward and through the line of guards, which opened for him. A moment later he was undergoing a process of handshaking and back-slapping that made him wonder. He didn't think he had been that popular.
Young Captain Albee was the first to speak coherently.
"It's good to see you again, sir. Everyone but you was accounted for, and we'd begun to think they must have filed you away in formaldehyde for future reference. Where were you?"
"You mean I was the only one favored with solitary confinement?" asked Little. "I woke up in a cell upstairs, about two thirds of the way back, with less company than Jonah. I could see several other sets of bars from my stateroom door, but there was nothing behind any of them. I haven't seen or heard any living creature but myself since then. I can't even remember leaving, or being removed from the Gomeisa. Does anyone know what happened?"