He turned from her, ducked swiftly through the hatchway and chose a port-side ramp that would carry him up to the Maintenance deck. There would be at least one tender berthed there in good working condition. He flattened himself against the ramp wall as he neared its end; listened. Nothing. Maintenance was just sitting around as usual, and during the sleep period, there'd be only a skeleton crew. In the semi-darkness, he reached up, felt his fingers brush along the curved, smooth ceiling of the gently inclined passage. There; an emergency pressure duct, designed to open automatically in the event of malfunction of the ship's atmospheric regulators. Emergency pressure could be built up through the ducts in the event of any sudden fall of more than eight ounces per square inch; and would be instantly released should it mount more than three pounds above. All he had to do was jam this single duct to the "excess" position and hold his breath. It was like picking a lock with his bare fingers, and they felt like fat sausages. And then he had it. There was a sudden scream of escaping air about him, and he plunged forward. Somewhere an alarm clanged, and he knew that within moments the skeleton maintenance crew would be suited and pouring in on the ramp with everything it had, from Geiger counters to baling wire. Already, even above the near deafening alarms, he could hear the pounding of their feet. He dashed for it. Reached the berth, and there was a tender snuggled into it, ready and waiting. He had the small craft's outer lock opened within seconds. "KANE!" He whirled, even as the inner lock was sliding open. It was Deanne Starn. And she was running toward him. The inner lock was open, and Jon pushed her through it, and then had himself strapped before the miniature control console almost before the blinker winked to signal that the outer and inner lock ports were sealed. He waited a nerve wracking twenty seconds before the Flagship's flank yawned open, and then jammed the firing studs down with his accelerators full open. The tender leaped from its berth like a wounded thing, and for a moment Space spun sickeningly, and Jon's eyes blurred from the unprecedented take-off acceleration. Might as well break all the rules in the book. Then the stabilizers were taking over, and things began to straighten out. He flipped the craft's automatics in, unbuckled his straps and got weightlessly underway toward the tender's aft-section. "Kane, where are you going? Where are we going?" "I'm going to diddle with this tub until that big barge back there can't pick us up for Spacedust. And we're going to a little backwater planetoid that the ITA only gets to once every thirty years or so. They used to call it Titan." "A satellite of one of the Sol planets, isn't it?" "You're coming up with a lot of smart answers all of a sudden." "Can you--can you find it? All by yourself?" "My father was born right next door. I can find it."