I replaced the paper and closed the chest. I waited for meteors to strike, and wondered if any would damage the ship. But I knew the only sound I would hear would be when one struck the ship. The greater the sound, the larger the meteor.
I put my head to the floor. I was wearing my helmet, of course, but the vibrations of striking meteors would be transmitted to the helmet and I would hear them. We had often talked to each other this way without using our helmet radios.
For several minutes I waited and heard nothing. Then came a sound.
Ping.
It was faint, but I knew a meteor had made that sound as it hit the craft.
Then ping, ping, crump!
Two small, one much larger. But there had been no holes made in the ship. At least, there was no alarm from Dr. Spartan who would know from the air gauges if any compartment had been punctured.
The ringing sounds, singly and in twos and threes, continued. This was a dense cloud, although we were striking them only a dozen or so to a minute. That is density in space. Then I heard a loud thud. A tiny bump raised itself in the metal floor not two feet from my helmet. A large meteor had pierced the outer hide of our ship and dented the inside wall before vaporizing. But the fluid in the walls was now closing the hole and we had lost no air.
Another thud. I didn't know where this one had hit.
The ship's acceleration, which had increased when Dr. Spartan started the emergency motors, suddenly seemed to decrease. Spartan's gruff voice came through my helmet radio. "A motor has been hit."