"Since we also will be in hyperspace until that time, it is clear that the generator must be cut from within the vessel. Electrical and mechanical relays are out of the question. Therefore two of our personnel will keep alternate watches in her control room, to pull the necessary switches. I am not going to order any man to such a duty, nor am I going to ask for volunteers. If the man on duty is not killed outright--this is a distinct possibility, although not a probability--speed in getting back here will be decidedly of the essence. It seems to me that the best interests of the Patrol will be served by having the two fastest members of our force on watch. Time trials from the Boskonian panel to our air lock are, therefore, now in order." This was Kinnison's device for taking the job himself. He was, he knew, the fastest man aboard, and he proved it. He negotiated the distance in seven seconds flat, over half a second faster than any other member of the crew. Then: "Well, if you small, slow runts are done playing creepie-mousie, get out of the way and let folks run that really can," Van Buskirk boomed. "Come on, Worsel, I see where you and I are going to get ourselves a job." "But see here, you can't!" Kinnison protested, aghast. "I said members of the crew." "No, you didn't," the Valerian contradicted. "You said 'two of our personnel,' and if Worsel and I ain't personnel, what are we? We'll leave it to Sir Austin." "Indubitably 'personnel,'" the arbiter decided, taking a moment from the apparatus he was setting up. "Your statement that speed is a prime requisite is also binding." Whereupon the winged Velantian flew and wriggled the distance in two seconds, and the steel-thewed Dutch-Valerian ran it in three! "You big, knot-headed Valerian ape!" Kinnison hissed a malevolent thought; not as the expedition's commander to a subordinate, but as an outraged friend speaking plainly to friend. "You knew I wanted that job myself, you clunker--damn your thick, hard crust!" "Well, so did I, you poor, spindly little Tellurian wart, and so did Worsel," the giant warrior shot back in kind. "Besides it's for the good of the Patrol--you said so yourself! Comb _that_ out of your whiskers, half-portion!" he added, with a wide and toothy grin, as he swaggered away, lightly brandishing his ponderous mace. The run to the point in space where the vortex had been was made on schedule. Switches drove home, most of the fabric of the enemy vessel went out of phase, the voyagers experienced the weirdly uncomfortable acceleration along an impossible vector, and the familiar firmament disappeared into an impalpable but impenetrable murk of featureless, textureless gray.