“You’re bleeding!” she said.

“So are you.” At least his blood was an acceptable color for human blood. It was now all over her gym suit.

She wiped her nose and stared at her bloody hand.

“Don’t tilt your head back,” Titus advised. “Better to lose a lot of blood than ruin your neck from gravity. Crawl.” They had no more than five strides to go, but it took an eternity. The few weeks he’d been on the moon had undermined his strength.

At last they climbed into seats. Titus hit the controls in the armrest. “Dead. It’s going to be a long ride.”

“Can’t be. Safeties kick in at four g’s, or the motors burn out. Designed that way. Awful lot of momentum in this baby.” Panting, she added through clenched teeth, “If I survive this, I’m going to get the sonuvabitch responsible!”

And if she dies, how do I explain surviving four g’s for an hour? His record showed he had high blood pressure and mild claustrophobia. The anxiety would be sending a human’s blood pressure reading off the scale.

He’d acquired the phobia by being killed in a car crash and then buried alive. He was thankful it was a mild phobia, but now that he had nothing to do but endure, he worried about how to explain not having a heart attack or stroke.

For the lift-off, he’d been issued special medication-which he hadn’t taken, of course. Maybe he could “confess” that and say he’d had it with him now? But why carry it in his gym suit? Irrational fear of the centrifuge? That would get him sent back to Earth, but he couldn’t quit until he’d pinpointed the probe’s target and Connie replaced him.

And the odor of human blood was making him ravenous.

Then the lights went off.

“Oh, shit. Titus, I hate the dark. Hold my hand.”

It was really dark. Other than the dim glow of her body and the warm machinery, it was like a buried coffin.

“Hey, Titus-you all right?”

“Yeah.” He took her hand.

“Is it my imagination, or is it getting stuffy in here?”

“Let’s not dwell on it.” He did a quick calculation. “There’s plenty of air for the time we’ll be in here. Just relax. Four g’s isn’t really all that much.”

She squeezed his hand. “This helps.”

She was right. His universe narrowed to the few square centimeters of skin against his. Somehow, she communicated more to him by that simple touch than words ever could. Hot tears stung his eyes and a bit of moisture leaked out the corners and down his temples. And he didn’t know why.

He concentrated on enduring and keeping her confident.

“It is getting stuffy in here,” Mintraub panted.

“Won’t be long now.” But he was panting, too. Could somebody be pumping CO2 in?

The darkness became reddish, sparkling. It brought back the awful time in his coffin. He had wakened and started using oxygen. There hadn’t been much. His raging hunger triggered panic, using more oxygen. He hadn’t realized he’d been mentally screaming for help powered by Influence. When Abbot’s hand, glowing with vitality, had broken through the coffin lid, flooding cool air, mud, and rain down upon him, he had gone for Abbot’s throat like a ravening animal.

Now, with all his adult strength, he struggled to keep his plight from radiating to Abbot. He didn’t need any more debts to his father. He wasn’t going to let Abbot see him in that feral panic again. He just wasn’t going to let that happen.

He clung to that until, like a hand relaxing in death, his mind let go of its thoughts and surrendered to dormancy.

“. normal enough for someone revived by CPR an hour ago. But I wish we had had telemetry during the centrifuge ride. His eyes show some hemorrhage, but the pupils are the same size. Chuck, look at this. He’s wearing contacts-”

Titus grabbed for consciousness, as fingers peeled back his eyelids. He jerked his head away, gasping at the pain.

“Hey, he’s conscious.”

All at once, Titus realized he was in the infirmary. He must have passed out before the centrifuge stopped. No! They said CPR. I must have gone dormant. Feeling clumsy, he summoned Influence and shrouded himself in normality.

Chuck bent over Titus with a pen light.

The light was too bright, and Titus flinched, commanding silently, You saw what you expected to see as normal.

“What am I supposed to look at, Dave?”

Dave bent down. Titus widened the command to include“No need to look again.”

Dave responded, “Guess I was mistaken. Been studying those corpses too much. Humans aren’t that weird.”

The two withdrew, and Titus assessed his surroundings. It was a booth formed by drapes around the gurney on which he lay. Equipment carts, a wastebasket, a sink, and a vidcom on the one solid wall completed the examination room.

He tried to sit up but found he’d been strapped down. Chuck pushed him back. “Now just be still a while, Titus. You’re going to be fine. But we have to make sure-”

“I am fine,” argued Titus. “Unstrap me. Where’s the woman who was with me?”

Chuck’s hands moved of their own accord, but the doctor was better trained than that. He pulled his hands back and asserted, “You must lie still. You’ve had a cardiac arrest, but I just ran a quick comparison through the computer and there’s no damage, no change. Sometimes miracles do happen. But you’ll stay with us a couple of days, just in case.”

Oh, no I won’t. “Where’s the woman who was with me?” He was really afraid now. If he’d gone dormant, what of her?

“Don’t you worry about a thing. Ms. Mintraub is fine. We’ve sent her home. She didn’t arrest or take a nasty bump on the head like you did.”

Behind the curtains, an outer door burst open and a babble of voices filled the room. Titus discerned Abbot’s rumble, Carol Colby’s clear, commanding tones, and above them all Inea– with an edge of panic, saying, “I insist. I must see him immediately!”

“Inea!” said Abbot, his Influence filling the room. “The doctors have their procedures.”

“Inea,” called Titus, “I’m right here.” He was surprised at the ragged edge to his voice and the raw fear in the pit of his stomach. Thinking fast, he added, “You don’t have to worry about the chemists’ tank-I’ve taken care of it all. We’ll be ready to test your program in the morning!”

Smugly, he listened to Colby reply. Just maybe it would divert Abbot from the obvious conclusion about him and Inea.

By the time Colby had finished admonishing him about his health being more important than the press demonstration she had worked her way through the medtechs and doctors to his cubicle, trailed by the others.

Titus shot a glance at Abbot, and put all his strength into Influence as he told Colby, “I’m fine. Just get me out of here. I’ve got work to do.” And, dear God, I’m hungry! Nervous sweat beaded his upper lip. What if they don’t let me go? His eyes met Inea’s, and he faked confidence. But she had seen his fear, and she eyed the medics uncertainly.

Yet it was Abbot who acted. He added the Influence needed to convince everyone that the bandages painted on Titus’s forehead, palms, and knees meant nothing. They argued about the cardiac arrest, and Abbot challenged, “Since your instruments show no such evidence, perhaps he was only unconscious. He certainly doesn’t seem like a heart patient to me.” Abbot set them to convince each other as he wandered about poking at their computers and recorders. Occasionally, he’d flash Titus a magnanimous grin and erase something.

Abbot knew how weak Titus was. After being mashed in the centrifuge, suffocated, then pounded on by some amateur at CPR as the oxygen began to revive him from brief dormancy, how could he feel? But he grinned back at Abbot, determined not to let it show. Not before him, and not before Inea.

The medical discussion raged. Colby was reluctant to order Titus released on her authority, while the doctors refused to take responsibility for bypassing precedures. Titus knew the best way to break the deadlock was to stand up and sign himself out on his own recognizance. But of course there was no way he could reach the fastenings on the straps.