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Giordino looked up into the unsrapher on theof coffee

"The chief valve-and switch-pusher should have had his brew exactly five o," said Giordino

"Sorry So "Everything check out?"

"Okay across the board," Giordino answered "I gave the aft battery section a rest We'll juice off the center section for the next eighteen hours"

"Lucky we didn't drift into a rock outcropping e shut down"

"Surely you jest" Giordino slid down in his seat, squinted his eyes and yaith effortless finesse "Sonar hasn't picked out anything larger than a baseball-size rock in the last six hours The bottoirl friend's stomach"

"You mean chest," Woodson said "I've seen her picture" Woodson was s, which was rare for him

"Nobody's perfect," Giordino conceded "However, considering the fact her father is a wealthy liquor distributor, I can overlook her bad points-"

He broke off as Rudi Gunn, the commander of the mission, leaned into the pilot's conified by a pair of horn-ri him the look of an undernourished owl about to strike Yet his appearance was deceiving Rudi Gunn arm and kind Every man who ever served under his command respected him enormously

"You two at it again?" Gunn smiled tolerantly

Woodson looked soleain"

"After fifty-one days on this drifting closet, even his grandleah the viewport For a few seconds only a diradually, just below the Sappho I, he could make out the reddish ooze of the top layer of bottoht red shri, floated across the beaht before it vanished into the darkness

"Daet out and walk around," Gunn said as he stepped back "No telling e ht find out there"

"Sa you'd find in the runted "Absolutely zilch" He reached up and tapped a gauge "Colder terees Fahrenheit"

"A great place to visit," Woodson said, "but you wouldn't want to spend your golden years there"