Just beyond Orbit Luna, Pell gradually swung the nose of the ship toward the nadir of the solar elliptic and the ship streaked out of the system. Turning up the detectors to full sensitivity, Pell tried to relax and sleep—because sleep was actually the only thing to do under tremendous accelerations.
Painfully Pell awoke. He let his eyes flicker over the instruments and nodded with satisfaction as he saw that the ship's velocity had reached 400 miles per second. Stiffly he cut the converter to one G and locked in the robot controls. Instantly the tremendous weight was removed from his body. He shrugged out of his shock suit with every bone in his body aching in discord.
When he had clambered through the narrow passage-way to the waist he saw that Gret was likewise divesting herself of the cumbersome garment.
"We're pushing 400 a second now," he reported. "In another 20 hours we can drop into hyper-space. How's it going back here?"
Gret indicated Heintz who seemed to be asleep. But the ragged gasps of his breathing belied this; Pell knew he was unconscious.
"He's been like this since blast-off—his heart, I believe," she stated matter-of-factly.
Pell frowned. "I was afraid of that. We'd better give him some amytal."
He rummaged around in the medical kit and brought out a hypo. He jabbed Heintz and eased him back into his harness. The fat man's breath became more relaxed and even. Then a question occurred to Pell.
"By the way, why didn't you let me know over the inter-com that Heintz was in this shape?" he asked her.