"Well, let's get some weapons and be ready. I'm no hero, understand. But I agree with you that there's no sense in just waiting."
The pilot said: "There are no hand weapons on the ship. Our only possible course of action would be to hide." His emphasis conveyed to the others how much he disliked the thought.
"But where?" Gloria asked. "If they make a thorough search—"
"We can't hide in the ship," George said, with absolute conviction. "Our reports indicate that they examine every square foot inside a bombed vessel. We'll have to conceal ourselves outside."
"Outside?"
"We can use the magnetic shoes on our spacesuits to walk on the ship's hull. If luck favors us they may never even think of searching the forward section of the hull."
Emmett shrugged his shoulders, not realizing that in the faint light no one could see the gesture. Gloria said, "It's better than making no attempt at all to save ourselves."
George led the way from the control room, and across a passenger compartment that was filled with the crumpled, lifeless forms of almost a hundred men and women.
"There were no spacesuits in this room," he explained simply.
They operated the air lock by utilizing the emergency manual controls, and were soon standing on the hull of the ship. For several seconds they remained motionless and silent, grimly surveying their awesome surroundings. The billions of stars above were terrifyingly vivid against the dark emptiness of space. The ship's hull was fantastically twisted and pitted, and the enemy ship—it hovered a few miles distant—had been transformed into a brilliantly burning star by the reflected sunlight.