"Somehow I must have got turned around," admitted Braun ruefully. "I can understand that, but the lifeboat was set on automatic pilot. I thought I came straight across, and with the robot pilot I should have. What do you think happened?"
Topping was sober. "There are several possible explanations. I don't like any of them. Maybe there's a flaw in space here. It could act like a mirror, reflecting back our own mass and the beam of our own light. Who knows? There may not even be an alien ship out there."
"But there's nothing material out there," objected Braun. "I was there, and our instruments would show anything above the size of a speck of dust. For that matter, we can see the thing in our telescopes, and there's nothing we know that can distort the gravity-effect of mass let alone turn it around like light reflected from a mirror. Who ever heard of—"
"Who ever heard of nine men sealed in an oversized can and set down halfway between home galaxy and M31?" reproved Topping. "Light and gravity may not be functions only of our space-time continuum but of others adjacent too and even overlapping ours. We know very little about the nature of either, and some of our unexplained phenomena may be the result of actions and reactions outside our continuum."
"That's getting too deep for me," said Braun. "I'm willing to try again ... if only to prove I didn't funk out the first time. And this time I'll go across with the lights blazing. I want you to use radar and visual scanners on me all the way."
Charters shook his head. "We're up against something we don't understand. I'm not sure I should permit—"
"What's the harm?" pleaded Braun. "I came through without a scratch before. The worst that can happen is a repeat of the same farce. Besides, I've just had a brainstorm. Suppose this is not the same ship I left. Suppose there really are two ships exactly alike, even to the people on board. Suppose that there are two civilizations that developed identically—"
"Maybe you'd better go," laughed Charters. "If you keep on in that vein, you'll give us all nightmares."
Braun's second try followed the same routine as the first. The difference was in Braun himself. Before, he had been mildly excited, calm but overstrained, expecting almost anything. There was a grimness about his second venture. He felt moody and more depressed than before. This time, there was no boredom.
Before leaving, he took a good look around, fixing the faces of his companions into his memory, engraving the ship and endless details of its structure and decoration into his brain. He felt as if he were leaving all of it behind him forever.