Star Light

Dondragmer and his companion were unhurt. To beings who regarded two hundred Earth gravities as normal and six hundred as a most minor inconvenience, that sort of acceleration meant nothing. They had not even lost their grips, and were still at their posts. The captain was not worried about direct injuries to his crew. His first words showed that he was considering matters much further ahead.

“By stations, report!” he bellowed into the speaking tubes. “Check hull soundness at all points, and report all cracks, open breaks, dents, and other evidence for leaks. Lab perso

Apparently the speaking tubes were intact, at least. Hoots of response began to return immediately As the reports accumulated, Beetchermarlf began to relax. He had not really expected the shell which protected him from Dhrawn’s poisonous air to withstand anything like such a shock and his respect for alien engineering went up several grades. He had regarded artificial structures of any sort as normally inferior in strength and durability to any living body He had, of course, excellent reason for such an attitude. Nevertheless, it appeared when all the reports were finally in, that there were no major structural failures or even visible cracks. Whether the normal leaks, unavoidable in a structure which had to have entrances for perso

Power was still on, which surprised no one. The twenty-five independent hydrogen converters, identical modules which could be moved from any energy-using site in the Kwembly to any other, were solid-state devices with no moving parts larger than the molecules of gaseous fuel which were fed into them. They could have been placed under the hammer of a power forge without damage.

Most of the outside lights were gone, or at least inoperative, though these could be replaced. Some were still working, however, and from the submerged end of the bridge it was possible to see out. Fog still blocked the view from the upper end. Dondragmer made his way very gingerly to the low end and took a brief look at the conglomeration of rounded rocks with diameters from half his own length to twenty times that, into which his craft had managed to wedge itself. Then he climbed carefully back to his station, energized the sound system of his radio and transmitted the report which Barle

“Beetch, stand by here in case the men have anything to say I’m going to make a complete check myself, especially of the air locks. With all there is to be said for our design, we didn’t have this much of a roll in mind when we settled on it. We may only be able to use the small emergency locks, since the main one seems to be underneath us at the moment. It may be blocked on the outside even if we can open the i

Dondragmer made the habitual, but now rather futile, gesture of rapping on the hatch for clearance; then he opened it and disappeared, leaving Beetchermarlf alone.

The helmsman had no urge at the moment for idle talk with the station above. His captain had left him with too much to think about.

He was not exactly delighted at being left in charge of the bridge, under the circumstances. He was not even too concerned about the main air lock’s being blocked; the smaller ones were adequate, though not for life-support equipment, he suddenly remembered. Well, at the moment the desirability of going out seemed very small but if the Kwembly were permanently disabled that need would have to be faced.

The real question, in that event, was just what good going outside would do. The twelve thousand miles or so, which Beetchermarlf thought of as nearly fourteen million cables, was a long, long walk, especially with a load of life-support equipment. Without that apparatus it was not to be thought of. Mesklinites were amazingly tough organisms mechanically and had a temperature tolerance range which was still disbelieved by many human biologists, but oxygen was another matter. Its partial pressure outside at the moment was presumably about fifty pounds per square inch, quite enough to kill any member of the Kwembly’s crew in seconds.

The most desirable thing at the moment was to get the big machine back on her treads. How, and whether, this could be done’ would depend largely on the stream of liquid flowing past the stranded hull. Working outside in that current might not be impossible, but it was going to be difficult and dangerous. The air suited Mesklinites would have to be heavily ballasted to stay put at any task and life-lines would complicate the details.

The stream might not, of course, be permanent. It had apparently just come into existence with the change in weather and it might cease flowing as suddenly However, as Beetchermarlf well knew, there is a difference between weather and climate. If the river were seasonal, its “temporary” nature might still turn out to be too long for the Mesklinites; Dhrawn’s year was some eight times as long as that of Earth and over one and a half times that of Mesklin.

This was an area where human information might be useful. The aliens had been observing Dhrawn carefully for nearly half of one of its years and casually for much longer. They should have some idea of its seasons. The helmsman wondered whether it would be out of order for him to put such a question to someone in the orbiting station, since the captain had not. Of course, the captain had said he could use the radio for chatter and had made no mention of what might or might not be said.

The idea that there was anything except the Esket incident which should not be discussed with the human sponsors of the Dhrawn expedition had not gone down the chain of command as far as Beetchermarlf. The young helmsman had almost made up his mind to initiate a call to the station when the radio beside him spoke. It spoke, furthermore, in his own language, though the accent was not above reproach.

“Dondragmer. I know you must be busy but if you can’t talk now I’d be glad if someone else could. I am Benjamin Hoffman, an assistant in the aerology lab here at the station, and I’d like two kinds of help if anyone can find time to give it.

“For myself, I’d like practice in language; it must be obvious that I need it. For the lab, we’re in a very embarrassing position. Twice in a row we’ve worked out weather predictions for your part of the planet which have been way, way off We just don’t have enough detailed information to do the job properly The observations we can make from here don’t resolve enough and there aren’t anywhere near enough reporting stations down there. You and the others have planted a lot of automatics on your trips, but they still don’t cover much of the planet, as you know. Since good predictions will be as useful to you as they will be to us, I thought maybe I could talk things out in real detail with some of your scientists and maybe work out the weather patterns where you know enough to supplement the background calculations and really get good forecasts, at least right in your neighborhood.”

The helmsman replied eagerly.

“The captain is not on the bridge, Benjaminhoffman. I am Beetchermarlf, one of the helmsmen, now on watch. Speaking for myself, I should be very glad to exchange language practice when duties permit, as now. I am afraid the scientists will be pretty busy for a while; I may be myself, most of the time. We are having some trouble, though you may not know all the details. The captain did not have time for the full story in the report I heard him send up a few minutes ago. I will give you as complete a picture as I can of the situation and some thoughts which have occurred to me since the captain left the bridge. You might record the information for your people and comment on my ideas if you wish. If you don’t think they’re worth mentioning to the captain, I won’t. He’ll be busy enough without them anyway I’ll wait until you tell me you’re ready to record, or that you don’t want to, before I start.” Beetchermarlf paused, not entirely for the reason he had just given. He suddenly wondered whether he should bother one of these alien beings with his own ideas which began to seem crude and poorly worked out to him.