"I ... uh—" The Guesser hardly knew what to say. He was in a totally alien environment, a completely unknown situation. "I'm fine," he said at last.
She nodded. "You get plenty sleep, all right. Like dead, except when you talk to yourself."
Then he had spoken in delirium. "How ... how long was I out?"
"Three days," she said flatly. "Almost four." She paused. "You ship leave."
"Leave?" The Guesser said blankly. "The Naipor? Gone?" It seemed as if the world had dropped away from his feet, leaving him to fall endlessly through nothingness. It was true, of course. It didn't take more than twenty-four hours to unload the ship's holds, and, since there had been no intention of reloading, there was no need to stay. He had long overstayed the scheduled take-off time.
It created a vacuum in his mind, a hole in his very being that could never be filled by anything else. The ship was his whole life—his home, his work, his security.