"Who's she?" growled Rick Norton, Third Mate. His eyes were puffy; he squinted and glared at the bright lights of the control turret. "Hell's howling acres, I'm tired! I just about got to sleep when—Oh, well. Log in order?"
"Directly." Mallory shot a curious glance at Norton. "Just got to sleep? How come? What were you doing up so late?"
"It wasn't official business," answered the junior officer curtly, "so it's none of yours. Let's have your log sheet." He slumped into the control chair, squinted through the perilens and made a few tiny course corrections. Across the room, Bud Chandler's shoulders shrugged a reply to Dan's swift lift of the eyebrows. The Second Mate's lips formed a word. "Sore-head!" Mallory nodded. Norton was a surly son-of-a-spacewrangler.
But that wasn't any skin off his nose. He went to the chart table. Footsteps clattered up the Jacob's ladder, the door flew open and the Old Man stomped onto the bridge. He snapped, "'Zuwere!" and glowered over Mallory's shoulder, shrewd, space-faded eyes reading sense into the senior lieutenant's neat, precise columns. He jabbed a horny finger at one line of figures. "Sure o' that, Mallory? Velocity that high?"
Mallory said respectfully, "Yes, sir. All figures have been checked and double checked. We're point oh-oh-one on course. Forced speed, point thirty-nine above normal."
"Checked and double checked," said Captain Algase, "is good enough most of the time. But this trip is special. And vitally important. Forty thousand innocent lives depend on our reaching Io damn soon! Remember that, Mallory. All of you remember that."
The stern lines of his face eased a trifle. "It's been a hard shuttle, I know. A brutal, punishing trip. And we've all been under a terrific strain. But our difficulties are nothing compared to those of the garrison and the honest colonists of New Fresno. They're looking to us for aid, and we're bringing them aid.
"That is, someone aboard this ship is. I honestly don't know who that person is. No one knows except the man himself, the commander of the SSP Intelligence Department on Earth, and maybe someone at New Fresno. But he is on board, either an officer, sailor or passenger, and he is carrying to Io the plans for the new ray weapon recently perfected by the SSP Ordnance Bureau.
"Those plans will enable our New Fresno garrison to subdue this mysterious uprising on Io. That's why the Libra is traveling at forced speed. That's why we must redouble every normal precaution to insure our reaching the Io colony. That's why, too, we must keep our eyes open; watch even each other. What's the matter with you, Norton?"