Well, if he didn't, he doesn't have a problem anymore. Too bad I couldn't help him.

Look on the positive side. They didn't hurt. They never knew what hit them.

Nothing to do now but wait for Rescue. Wait and wonder if we'll ever hear their approach signal.

Going to find an empty hammock. Probably won't sleep, but I need a change. Need to get away.

Chatter down below. "Think they'll throw anything else?" That's Cannon. "We're sitting ducks."

"Don't worry your pointy head, Patriot," Nicastro says. "We won't know it when it hits us." The

Chief refuses to believe there's a tomorrow.

"How long we got to wait?" Berberian asks.

"Throdahl? Anything?"

"Sorry, Chief."

"As long as we have to, Berberian."

Berberian says, "Thro, get on the horn and tell them to get their asses out here."

"I did, Berberian. What the fuck more you want?"

"Pussy. Pussy and more pussy. Whole platooons of pussy. Just line them up and I'll lay them down."

I was right. Can't sleep. I roll,. Jown through the tangle.

The Commander is seated near Westhause, writing something. He rises, struggles up to his cabin.

Even in free-fall he finds the climb hard work. He's burned out. Nothing left.

You got us home, old friend. Hang on to that.

"Let's get on it here," the First Watch Officer snaps. "We're supposed to conserve power." His

tone is relaxed, confident. The tone of a Commander. He's come along. "Carmon, secure the tank.

Mr. Westhause, Chief Canzoneri, lock your memory banks and close up shop. You too, Junghaus.

Berberian, Throdahl, stay warm. Might need to help Rescue. Laramie, secure the cooler and atmosphere scrubber. Going to get cold anyway. Give us a spritz of oxygen while you're at it.

Chief Nicastro, secure some lights. If you don't have something to do, crap out."

Men lying still use fewer calories and perspire less. The First Watch Officer is gentling us into

the starvation leg of our journey.

"Hope to fuck they hurry," Throdahl grumbles. He keeps tinkering, trying to find something on the Rescue band. "I'm hungry, thirsty, horny, and filthy. Not necessarily in that order."

"I'll buy that," Rose says.

"What the hell does that mean?"

"That you're filthy, Thro. Right down to the stinking core."

The pace picks up. Laramie joins in. Berberian contributes the occasional quip. They're feeling

better.

For me the waiting is intolerable. We're too near home.

Laramie moans something about he's going to perish if he don't get some pussy in the next twenty-

four hours.

"You'll last," Fisherman snarls. The men look at nun, mouths open. No. He's not joining the game.

The cut-low session recesses. Junghaus's shipmates aren't insensitive.

"At least you had water," the usually silent Scarlatella grumbles. I roll slightly, peer through

the tangled piping. Lubomir Scarlatella is a strange one. He's Electronic Technician for Chief Canzoneri. I don't think he's said a hundred words all patrol. Silent, proficient, imperturbable.

You hardly notice him. Now hysteria edges his voice.

"Until it was a choice between using power to recycle it or to heat the ship." A sublime calm

visibly overtakes Junghaus. In a gentle voice he begins quoting scripture. Nobody shuts him up.

I slept. I don't believe it. Twelve hours. Might have gone longer if Zia hadn't wanted the hammock. Clambered down to my old seat. Listened to the halfhearted murmur of the men. Mostly it was speculation about what's happened to our friends in the other compartments.

Hour fourteen. Thro lets out a whoop. "Here they are!"

"Here who are?" Mr. Westhause asks. He has the watch, such as it is.

"Rescue... goddamned. They're going after Weapons. The bastards." He slugs his console angrily.

'Take it easy. We'll get our turn."

The sons of bitches!

You don't know how selfish you can be till you're in a survival situation seeing someone else

being saved first. Forty-two minutes, every one spent hating and cursing Piniaz's cutthroats.

Now our turn. With Rescue cursing us as heartily as we cursed Weapons. It takes them three hours to get the spin off the compartment.

"Not going to tow us," Throdahl announces. "They're going to take us out right here. Going to scab

a tube to the top hatch."

A chung echoes through the compartment. More delicate sounds follow it. Someone is walking around on the roof.

Yanevich waves me over, beckons Mr. Westhause. "Let's get up by that hatch. We'll have to keep

order."

"What do you mean?"

"You'll see."

I do. We have to threaten violence when the fresh water comes through. Some people seem willing to

kill for a drink. We're lucky they're really too weak to riot.

"Take it easy!" I snap at Zia. "Drink too much and you'll make yourself sick."

Yanevich says, "Throdahl, get back to the radio. They'll tell us when to open the hatch."

The stench of bile assails my nostrils. Zia has puked his stomach empty. "I told you-----" Never

mind. He had to learn.

"Undog the hatch," Throdahl yells. "They've got the tube on."

Yanevich checks the telltales on our side, unlocks the hatch. Several men surge up behind him.

A pair of Marines squat outside the hatch. "Get back," one says. They're wearing combat suits.

"You don't get out yet." They slither in, station themselves beside the opening.

A med team follows them. A doctor and two medical corps-men in white plague suits. What is this?

Are we carriers of the Black Death?

The men crowd round our visitors, touching, murmuring with the awe of primitives. They can't

really believe they're saved.