Allison looked at the board, too, his narrow shoulders hunched. "They've never failed before," he muttered through chattering teeth. "What?" Endicott seemed bemused. "The buttons. Punch 'em, and you always get what you want--except now!" "Now, now," Endicott said soothingly. "Panic isn't going to help us any. All we have to do is sit tight--and wait. They'll send a relief ship out--" "When?" "In the morning. Morning, sure. They had us on the 'viewer, don't forget. They'll know exactly where to look." "They won't be able to locate us in this white stuff." "I tell you they know precisely where we are. And anyway the scanviewer will pick us up." "I don't think they'll ever find us." Allison slumped down on his transverse geeseat, stared wide-eyed at the drift forming slowly inside the torn metal of the windward side of the control room. "This white stuff scares me." He shivered, then got up hastily, his boots slipping slightly on the snow-slick decking, and punched the button again. "It's got to work!" he cried and beat on the board with his fist. "Stop that!" Endicott said sharply. There was a crack of a slap in the control room, then silence. In a moment Endicott said in his soothing voice, "Sorry, Allison. Everything'll be all right. Don't you worry." "If you say so, Chief." Allison stood in the center of the control room, his arms slack by his sides. "We'll be all right," Endicott said. "We have food capsules--" "Sure, Chief." "We'll be all right, except--" Endicott peered through the rents in the hull into the storm outside. "All we have to do is sit tight," he added hastily. "We'll freeze tonight without heat." Allison's voice was still breathless with panic. "Yeah. Yeah, I've been thinking about that. There's some thing 'way down deep in my mind--something I can't quite get--" Endicott still looked out at the storm-thrashed trees, a puzzled expression wrinkling his face. "Something from my childhood--I was born a long time before you, you know, before they set up state conditioning homes for children. Long before they set up this 'everything-from-buttons' business. Lived with my own people, I did, and I seem to remember--seem to remember--" The puzzled expression became a frown of concentration. "Or maybe it was something I read a long time ago," he mused. "Did what?" Allison perked up. "Read. You wouldn't know what that was. Everything comes from buttons now, entertainment, food, light, heat--everything.... No, it was from my childhood, I'm sure. I remember my people used to take me out in the country--" Endicott mused on while a cloak of snow grew on the shoulders of his jacket, and the light began to fade. "Out in the country? What for? Nobody goes out there." Allison's eyes gleamed slightly in the growing dusk. "--for picnics. And--" Endicott's eyes brightened, and one hand clenched. "For what?" Allison's head thrust forward. "What?" Endicott snapped, irritated at having his train of thought broken.