"Its air-system didn't," said Holmes. "It hadn't used up its emergency air-supply. We're breathing it!"
"Anyhow we could try to find even a broken-down transposer," said Sandy.
"You try," said Burke. "Keller's been looking for something for me in the cubes. I'll stay here and help him look."
Sandy examined the weapon he'd given her.
"Pam says she's smelled fresh air, down below where there can't be any. Mr. Keller thought he saw movements in the inside vision-plates, where there can't be any. I still believe I saw something alive in the gravity-machine room, where such a thing is impossible. We're going to look, Pam and I."
Holmes lumbered to his feet.
"I'll come, too. And I'll guarantee to defend you against anything that has survived the ten thousand years or so that this place was without air. My head's tired, after all those cubes."
He led the way. Burke watched as the two girls followed him and closed the door behind them.
"What have you found, Keller?"
"A cube about globes," said Keller. "Very interesting."