The guard was out for a while, they made sure of that first. Then there was a hasty consultation. "The airlocks are guarded," Johnny said, "and if they tumble to the ventilator shafts, they can smoke us out in no time. How are we going to get a scout-ship without showing ourselves? For that matter, how are we going to get a scout-ship away from here without being blown up the way the _Scavenger_ was blown up?" "I think I know a way," Tom said. "We have to have something to keep a lot of the crew busy. If we could get to the ship's generators and put them out of commission somehow, it might do it." "Why?" Greg wanted to know. "Because of the air supply," Tom said. "Without the generators, the fans won't run. They'll have to get a crew to fix them or they'll suffocate." "But that would only take a few men," Johnny said. "As soon as the generators went out, they'd look for us, and if we were missing ... well, they'd have the whole crew beating the bushes for us. It wouldn't be long before somebody thought of the ventilators." "But we've got to do something, and do it fast," Tom said. "I know." Johnny chewed his lip. "It's a good idea, but we need more than just the generators. We've got to disable the ship ... throw so many things at them so fast from so many different directions that they don't know which way to turn. That means we'd need to split up, and we'd need weapons." He hefted the guard's Markheim. "One stunner between three of us isn't enough." "Well, we have this." Tom unbuckled Roger Hunter's gun case from his belt. "Dad's revolver. It's not a stunner, but it might help." He tossed the case to Johnny. "I can give you both a rundown on how the shafts go. We could plan to meet at a certain spot in a certain length of time...." He broke off, looking at Johnny. The big miner had taken Roger Hunter's gun from the case, and hefted it in his hand, started to check it automatically as Tom talked. But now his hand froze as he stared at the weapon. "What's wrong?" Tom asked. "This gun is wrong," Johnny said. "All wrong. Where did you get this thing?" "From Dad's spacer pack, the one the Patrol brought back. The Major gave it to us in Sun Lake City." Tom peered at the gun. "Is it broken or something? It's just Dad's revolver...." "It is, eh?" Johnny turned the gun over in his hand. "Whoever told you about guns?" "What's wrong with it?" There was an odd expression on Johnny's face as he handed the weapon back to Tom. "Take a look at it," he said. "Tell me whether it's loaded or not." Tom looked at it. Except for a few hours on the firing range, he had had no experience with guns; he couldn't have taken down a Markheim and reassembled it if his life depended on it. But he had seen his father take the old revolver out of the leather case many times before. Now Tom could see that this was not the same gun.