"That's what the test is for, Senator." Jennings felt his voice becoming icy. "We don't know if space will permit human life. We don't know what's out there."
"Best way to find out is for a man to go out there and see," the senator commented shortly. "I want to find out something, I go look at it myself. I don't depend on charts and graphs, and folderol."
The major did not even hunch his broad shoulders, a characteristic gesture, to show that he had heard, to show that he wished the senator was out there in untested space.
"What about him? He's not even in uniform!"
"Professor Stein maintains sight contact on the scope and transmits the IFF pulse."
The senator's eyes flashed again beneath heavy brows. His lips indicated what he thought of professors and projects who used them.
"What's IFF?" he asked.
The colonel looked at him incredulously. It was on the tip of his tongue to ask where the man had been during the war. He decided he'd better not ask it. He might learn.
"It stands for Identification—Friend or Foe, Senator. It's army jargon."
"Beep, seven."