But there were clean clothes waiting when he came out. He dressed and felt brand new and utterly peaceful and rested, and it seemed to him very much like the way he had often felt on a new spring morning. It was very, very good! Then he smelled coffee and became ravenous. There were the others in the Platform's kitchen, sitting in the chairs that had straps on them so the crew needn't float about because of weightlessness. There was an argument in progress. The Chief grinned at Joe. Mike the midget looked absorbed. Haney was thinking something out, rather painfully. Sally was busy at the Platform's very special stove. She had ham and eggs and pancakes ready for Joe to eat. "Gentlemen," she said, "you are about to eat the first meal ever cooked in a space ship--and like it!" She served them and sat companionably down with them all. But her eyes were very warm when she looked at Joe. "Leavin' aside what we were arguin' about," said the Chief blissfully, "Sally here--mind if I call you Sally, ma'am?--she says the slide-rule guys have given our job the works and they say it's a better job than they designed. Take a bow, Joe." Sally said firmly: "When the technical journals are through talking about the job you did, you'll all four be famous for precision-machining technique and improvements on standard practices." "Which," said the Chief sarcastically, "is gonna make us feel fine when we're back to welding and stuff!" "No more welding," Sally told him. "Not on this job. The Platform's closed in. They've started to take down the scaffolding." The Chief looked startled. Haney asked: "Laying off men yet?" "Not you," Sally assured him. "Definitely not you. You four have the very top super-special security rating there is! I think you're the only four people in the world my father is sure can't be reached, somehow, to make you harm the Platform." Mike said abruptly: "Yeah. The Major thought he had headaches before. Now he's really got 'em!" Mike hadn't seemed to be listening. He'd acted as if he were feverishly absorbing the feel of being inside the Platform--not as a workman building it, but as a man whose proper habitat it would become. But Joe suddenly realized that his comment was exact. There'd been plenty of sabotage to prevent the Platform from reaching completion. But now it was ready to take off in two days. If it was to be stopped, it would have to be stopped within forty-eight hours by people with plenty of resources, who for their own evil ends needed it to be stopped. These last two days would contain the last-ditch, most desperate, most completely ruthless stepped-up attempts at destruction that could possibly be made. And Major Holt had to handle them.