"Don't blame it on me! Those circuits are supposed to be X-rayed, heat-treated, fluoroscoped—you just can't trust machinery!"
At last Watkins believed that engineering axiom.
"How are we on fuel?" Captain Somers asked.
"Not enough left to push a kiddy car down Main Street," Watkins said gloomily. "If I could get my hands on that factory inspector ..."
Captain Somers turned to Rajcik, who was seated at the navigator's desk, hunched over his charts. "How does this affect our course?"
Rajcik finished the computation he was working on and gnawed thoughtfully at his pencil.
"It kills us. We're going to cross the orbit of Mars before Mars gets there."
"How long before?"
"Too long. Captain, we're flying out of the Solar System like the proverbial bat out of hell."