“I don’t understand that remark you made about the spacesuit,” she said, putting shirts into Mike’s gear locker. “You said you’d put your life in his hands or something like that. What did you do, exactly?”
“Purposely abraded the sleeve of my suit so that he would be in a position to repair it, as Maintenance Officer. He fixed it, all right. I’d’ve been a dead man if I’d worn it out on the surface of Eisberg.”
“What did he do to it?” she asked. “Fix it so it would leak?”
“Yes—but not in an obvious way,” Mike said. “I’ll give him credit; he’s clever.
“What he did was use the wrong patching material. A Number Three suit is as near hydrogen-proof as any flexible material can be, but, even so, it can’t be worn for long periods—several days, I mean. But the stuff Vaneski used to patch my suit is a polymer that leaks hydrogen very easily. Ammonia and methane would be blocked, but my suit would have slowly gotten more and more hydrogen in it.”
“Is that bad? Hydrogen isn’t poisonous.”
“No. But it is sure as hell explosive when mixed with air. Naturally, something has to touch it off. Vaneski got real cute there. He drilled a hole in the power pack, which is supposed to be sealed off. All I’d have had to do would be to switch frequencies on my phone, and the spark would do the job—blooie!
“But that’s exactly the sort of thing I was looking for. With his self-centered juvenile mind, he never thought anyone would try to outsmart him and succeed. He’d gotten away with it that far; there was no reason why he shouldn’t get away with it again. He must have thought I was incredibly stupid.”
“I don’t believe he—” Leda started. But she was cut off when Snookums rolled in the open door.
“Leda, I desire data.”