“Yes,” said Conway. “Prilicla, is there anything else, anything at all, you can tell me about the condition of the survivors?”
He was already on the way back to the distressed ship with the Captain slightly ahead of him, and the little empath had attached itself magnetically to the marked area of hull.
“My data is largely negative, friend Conway,” said Prilicla, “and comprises supposition rather than fact. Neither being is registering pain, but both share feelings suggesting starvation, asphyxiation and the need of something that is vital to the continuance of life. One of the beings is trying very hard to stay alive while the other appears merely to be angry. The emotional radiation is so tenuous that I cannot state with certainty that the beings are intelligent life-forms, but the indications are that the angry one is probably a nonintelligent lab animal or ship’s pet. These are little more than guesses, friend Conway, and I could be completely wrong.”
“I doubt that,” said Conway. “But those feelings oUstarvation and strangulation puzzle me. The ship is undamaged, so food and air supplies should be available.”
“Perhaps, friend Conway,” Prilicla replied timidly, “they are in the terminal stages of a respiratory disease, rather than suffering from gross physical injury.”
“In which case,” said Murchison, joining the conversation from the Rhabwar, “I will be expected to brew up something efficacious against a dose of extraterrestrial pneumonia. Thank you, Doctor Prilicla!”
The portable airlock-a fat, lightweight metal cylinder swathed in the folds of transparent plastic that would form its antechamber-was positioned close to the alien ship. While Prilicla remained as physically close as possible to the survivors, Chen and Haslam joined the Captain and Conway in a final search for a fine line on the rim plating that might enclose an entry port.
He tried to be thorough without wasting time, because Prilicla did not think there was any time to waste as far as the two survivors were concerned. But the ship was close to eighty meters in diameter and they had an awful lot of rim to search in half an hour. Still, there had to be a way in, and their main problem was that, despite the many rough and incrusted patches, the ship’s structure represented an incredibly fine piece of precision engineering.
“Is it possible,” Conway asked suddenly, “that the reason for the ship’s distress is these rough patches?” The side of his helmet was close to the hull as he directed his spotlight at an acute angle onto the area that Fletcher was scanning for joins. “Perhaps the troubles of the survivors are a secondary effect. Maybe the unnaturally tight fit of the plating and panels is meant as a protection against attack by some kind of galloping corrosion native to the survivors’ home planet.”
There was a lengthy silence, then Fletcher said, “That is a very disquieting idea, Doctor, especially since your galloping corrosion might infect our ship. But I don’t think so. The incrusted patches appear to be made of the same material as the underlying metal and not a coating of corrosion. As well, they appear to avoid rather than attack the joins.
Conway did not reply. At the back of his mind an idea had begun to stir and take shape, but it dissolved abruptly as Chen’s voice sounded excitedly in his phones.
“Sir, over here!”
Chen and Haslam had found what seemed to be a large, circular hatch or section of plating approximately a meter in diameter, and they were already spraying the circumference with marker paint when Fletcher, Prilicla and Conway arrived. There were no rough patches inside the circular line or outside it except for two tiny rough spots set side by side just beyond the lower edge of the circle. Closer examination showed a five-inch-diameter circle enclosing the two rough patches.
“That,” said Chen, trying hard to control his excitement, “could be some kind of actuator control for the hatch.”
“You’re probably right,” said the Captain. “Good work, both of you. Now, set up the portable lock around this hatch. Quickly.” He placed his sensor plate against the metal. “There is a large empty space behind this hatch, so it is almost certainly an entry lock. If we can’t open it manually we’ll cut our way in.”
“Prilicla?” called Conway.
“Nothing, friend Conway,” said the empath. “The survivors’ radiation is much too faint to be detectable above the other sources in the area.”
“Casualty Deck,” Conway said. When Murchison responded, he went on quickly: “Considering the condition of the survivors, would you mind coming over here with the portable analyzer? Atmosphere samples will be available shortly. It would save some time if we didn’t have to send them to you for analysis, and shorten the time needed to prepare the litter for the casualties.”
“I was expecting you to think of that,” Murchison replied briskly. “Ten minutes.”
Conway and the Captain ignored the loose folds of transparent fabric and the light-alloy seal that bumped weightlessly against their backs while Haslam and Chen drew the material into position round the entry lock and attached it to the hull with instant sealant. Fletcher concentrated on the lock-actuator mechanism-he insisted that the disk could be nothing but a lock-and described everything he thought and did for the benefit of Dodds, who was recording on the Rhabwar.
“The two rough areas inside the disk appear not to be corrosion,” he said, “but in my opinion are patches of artificially roughened metal designed to give traction to the space-gauntleted mandibles or manipulatory appendages of the ship’s crew- “I’m not so sure of that,” said Conway. The idea he had had at
the back of his mind was taking shape again.
“—to ease the operation of the actuator, this disk, that is,” Fletcher continued, ignoring him. “Now, the disk may be turned clockwise or counterclockwise, screwed in or out on threads in either direction, pulled outwards, or pressed inwards and turned one way or the other into a locking position …
The Captain performed the various twisting and pressing movements as he described them, but with no effect. He increased the power on his foot and wrist magnets so as to hold himself more firmly against the hull, placed his gauntleted thumb and forefinger on the two rough spots and twisted even harder. His hand slipped, so that momentarily all of the pressure was on his thumb and one rough area. That half of the disk tilted inwards while the other side moved out. The Captain’s face became very red behind his visor.
… or, of course, it might turn out to be a simple rocker switch,” he added.
Suddenly the large, circular hatch began to swing inwards, and the ship’s atmosphere rushed out through the opening seal. The fabric of the portable lock they had attached to the hull bellied outwards and the metal cylinder of its double seal drew away from them, allowing them to stand up inside a large, inflated hemisphere of transparent plastic. As they were watching the hatch move inwards and upwards to the ceiling of the ship’s lock chamber, a short loading ramp was slowly extruded. It curved downwards to stop at the position that would have corresponded to ground level had the ship been on the ground.
Murchison had arrived and had been watching them through the portable lock fabric. “The air that escaped was from the lock chamber, because the flow has already stopped. If I could measure the volume of that lock chamber and our own portable job, I could calculate the aliens’ atmospheric pressure requirements as well as analyze the constituent gases m coming in.”
“Obviously a boarding hatch,” said the Captain. “They should have a smaller, less complicated lock for space EVAs and—”