"Well," said Stuart, "there's hero number one."
Leblanc said, "I want to go back to Earth, but I-"
Mullen interrupted, "I don't think our chances of destroying the ship are good enough unless-"
"Heroes number two and three. What about you, Polyorketes, You would have the chance of killing two Kloros."
"I want to kill them with my bare hands," growled the farmer, his heavy fists writhing. "On their planet, I will kill dozens."
"That's a nice safe promise for now. What about you, Colonel? Don't you want to march to death and glory with me?"
"Your attitude is very cynical and unbecoming, Stuart. It's obvious that if the rest are unwilling, then your plan will fall through."
"Unless I do it myself, huh?"
"You won't, do you hear?" said Porter, instantly.
"Damn right I won't," agreed Stuart. "I don't claim to be a hero. I'm just an average patriot, perfectly willing to head for any planet they take me to and sit out the war."
Mullen said, thoughtfully, "Of course, there is a way we could surprise the Kloros."
The statement would have dropped flat except for Polyorketes. He pointed a black-nailed, stubby forefinger and laughed harshly. "Mr. Bookkeeper!" he said. "Mr. Bookkeeper is a big shot talker like this damned greenie spy, Stuart. All right, Mr. Bookkeeper, go ahead. You make big speeches also. Let the words roll like an empty barrel."
He turned to Stuart and repeated venomously, "Empty barrel! Cripple-hand empty barrel. No good for anything but talk."
Mullen's soft voice could make no headway until Polyorketes was through, but then he said, speaking directly to Stuart, "We might be able to reach them from outside. This room has a C-chute I'm sure."
"What's a C-chute?" asked Leblanc.
"Well-" began Mullen, and then stopped, at a loss.
Stuart said, mockingly, "It's a euphemism, my boy. Its full name is 'casualty chute.' It doesn't get talked about, but the main rooms on any ship would have them. They're just little airlocks down which you slide a corpse. Burial at space. Always lots of sentiment and bowed heads, with the captain making a rolling speech of the type Polyorketes here wouldn't like."
Leblanc's face twisted. "Use that to leave the ship?"
"Why not? Superstitious? -Go on, Mullen."
The little man had waited patiently. He said, "Once outside, one could re-enter the ship by the steam-tubes. It can be done-with luck. And then you would be an unexpected visitor in the control room."
Stuart stared at him curiously. "How do you figure this out? What do you know about steam-tubes?"
Mullen coughed. "You mean because I'm in the paper-box business? Well-" He grew pink, waited a moment, then made a new start in a colorless, unemotional voice. "My company, which manufactures fancy paper boxes and novelty containers, made a line of spaceship candy boxes for the juvenile trade some years ago. It was designed so that if a string were pulled, small pressure containers were punctured and jets of compressed air shot out through the mock steam-tubes, sailing the box across the room and scattering candy as it went. The sales theory was that the youngsters would find it exciting to play with the ship and fun to scramble for the candy.
"Actually, it was a complete failure. The ship would break dishes and sometimes hit another child in the eye. Worse still, the children would not only scramble for the candy but would fight over it. It was almost our worst failure. We lost thousands.
"Still, while the boxes were being designed, the entire office was extremely interested. It was like a game, very bad for efficiency and office morale. For a while, we all became steam-tube experts. I read quite a few books on ship construction. On my own time, however, not the company's."
Stuart was intrigued. He said, "You know it's a video sort of idea, but it might work if we had a hero to spare. Have we?"
"What about you?" demanded Porter, indignantly. "You go around sneering at us with your cheap wisecracks. I don't notice you volunteering for anything."
"That's because I'm no hero, Porter. I admit it. My object is to stay alive, and shinnying down steam-tubes is no way to go about staying alive. But the
rest of you are noble patriots. The colonel says so. What about you, Colonel? You're the senior hero here."
Windham said, "If I were younger, blast it, and if you had your hands, I would take pleasure, sir, in trouncing you soundly."
"I've no doubt of it, but that's no answer."
"You know very well that at my time of life and with my leg-" he brought the flat of his hand down upon his stiff knee- "I am in no position to do anything of the sort, however much I should wish to."
"Ah, yes," said Stuart, "and I, myself, am crippled in the hands, as Pory-orketes tells me. That saves us. And what unfortunate deformities do the rest of us have?"
"Listen," cried Porter, "I want to know what this is all about. How can anyone go down the steam-tubes? What if the Kloros use them while one of us is inside?"
"Why, Porter, that's part of the sporting chance. It's where the excitement comes in."
"But he'd be boiled in the shell like a lobster."
"A pretty image, but inaccurate. The steam wouldn't be on for more than a very short time, maybe a second or two, and the suit insulation would hold that long. Besides, the jet comes scooting out at several hundred miles a minute, so that you would be blown clear of the ship before the steam could even warm you. In fact, you'd be blown quite a few miles out into space, and after that you would be quite safe from the Kloros. Of course, you couldn't get back to the ship."
Porter was sweating freely. "You don't scare me for one minute, Stuart."
"I don't? Then you're offering to go? Are you sure you've thought out what being stranded in space means? You're all alone, you know; really all alone. The steam-jet will probably leave you turning or tumbling pretty rapidly. You won't feel that. You'll seem to be motionless. But all the stars will be going around and around so that they're just streaks in the sky. They won't ever stop. They won'f even slow up. Then your heater will go off, your oxygen will give out, and you will die very slowly. You'll have lots of time to think. Or, if you are in a hurry, you could open your suit. That wouldn't be pleasant, either. I've seen faces of men who had a torn suit happen to them accidentally, and it's pretty awful. But it would be quicker. Then-"
Porter turned and walked unsteadily away.
Stuart said, lightly, "Another failure. One act of heroism still ready to be knocked down to the highest bidder with nothing offered yet."
Polyorketes spoke up and his harsh voice roughed the words. "You keep on talking, Mr. Big Mouth. You just keep banging that empty barrel. Pretty soon, we'll kick your teeth in. There's one boy I think would be willing to do it now, eh, Mr. Porter?"
Porter's look at Stuart confirmed the truth of Polyorketes' remarks, but he said nothing.
i i Stuart said, "Then what about you, Polyorketes? You're the barehand man with guts. Want me to help you into a suit?" • "I'll ask you when I want help." 1 "What about you, Leblanc?"
The young man shrank away.
"Not even to get back to Margaret?"
But Leblanc could only shake his head.
"Mullen?"
"Well-I'll try."
"You'll what?"