There wasn't much water in the trough. What there was was brackish and greasy. MacVickers drank and splashed some on his face and body. He saw that he was already stained with the mud. It wouldn't wash off.
The dying Earthman whispered, "There is food also."
MacVickers looked at the basket of spongy synthetic food, and shook his head.
The floor dipped and swung. There was a frightening, playful violence about it, like the first soft taps of a tiger's paw. Loris looked up at the glass roof with the black shapes beyond.
"They get the pure air," he said. "Our ventilator pipes are only a few inches wide, lest we crawl up through them."
Pendleton said, rather loudly, "The swine breathe through the skin, you know. All their sense organs, sight and hearing...."
"Shut up," snarled Janu. "Stop talking for time."
The sprawled men on the bunks drew themselves slowly tight, breathing hard and deep in anticipation. And Birek rose.
MacVickers faced them, Birek and the rest. There was no lift in his heart. He was cold and sodden, like a chuted ox watching the pole-axe fall. He said, with a bitter, savage quiet,
"You're a lot of bloody cowards. You, Birek. You're scared of the death creeping over you, and the only way you can forget the fear is to make someone else suffer.