Kerry Blane growled unintelligibly, batted the injector lever with a calloused hand. His grizzled hair was a stiff wiry mop on his small head, and his oversize jaw was thrust belligerently forward. But deep within his eyes, where he hoped it was hidden, was a friendly twinkle that gave the lie to his speech.
"You're a squirt!" he snapped disagreeably. "You're not dry behind the ears, yet. You're like the rest of these kids who call themselves pilots—only more so! And why the hell the chief had to sic you on me, on an exploration trip this important—well, I'll never understand."
Splinter rolled his six foot three of lanky body into a more comfortable position on the air-bunk. He yawned tremendously, fumbled a small box from his shirt pocket, and removed a marble-like capsule.
"Better take one of these," he warned. "You're liable to get the space bends at any moment."
Old Kerry Blane snorted, batted the box aside impatiently, scowled moodily at the capsules that bounced for a moment against the pilot room's walls before hanging motionless in the air.
"Mister Wood," he said icily, "I was flying a space ship while they were changing your pants twenty times a day. When I want advice on how to fly a ship, how to cure space bends, how to handle a Zelta ray, or how to spit—I'll ask you! Until then, you and your bloody marbles can go plumb straight to the devil!"
"Tsk! Tsk! Tsk!" Splinter reached out lazily, plucked the capsules from the air, one by one.
Kerry Blane lit one of the five allotted cigarettes of the day.
"Don't 'tsk' me, you young squirt," he grunted around a mouthful of fragrant smoke. "I know all the arguments you can put up; ain't that all I been hearing for a week? You take your vitamins A, B, C, D, all you want, but you leave me alone—or I'll stuff your head down your throat, P.D.Q.!"
"All right, all right!" Splinter tucked the capsule box back into his pocket, grinned mockingly. "But don't say I didn't warn you. With this shielded ship, and with no sunlight reaching Venus' surface, you're gonna be begging for some of my vitamin, super-concentrated pills before we get back to Earth."