"Half a mo," Web said. He laid his helmet against the door and listened. Nothing. If he was inside, he wasn't moving. Which was the smart thing to do. "Okay," Web said, "cross your fingers." He opened the door. A great bright light shone out of the opening. For a brief moment he was startled, until he realized that it was only the normal electric light of the room, intensified by the black around him. Cautiously, with his handflash held like a club, he stepped into the room. There was nobody behind the door. "What's up, what's up?" Dundon called. "Nothin'," Web said. "Listen, don't keep getting in my hair. I'll tell you what happens as I go along. I'm in the receiving room. Nobody here. But the lights are on." The room was bare, metal-floored, lined with lockers. Two of the lockers were open, and from where he stood Web could see clothing hanging from pegs. There was nothing unusual about the room. Web described it to Dundon, walked across the floor to the next door. "Don't take your helmet off," Dundon roared. "You bet your sweet life," Web grinned. "I have to leave the doors open a little to let the radio line pass through. The pressure's going down pretty quick." "Oh," said Dundon. And then after a while he said, "Let's hope there's nobody alive in there." "If he is," Web said, "he's somebody we don't need. There's nothing wrong with the reflector. He could have light-signaled any time he wanted to." Dundon was silent. Web pushed open the door to the next room, which would be the radio shack, and waited. Then he peeked inside. There was no one here either. "Empty," Web said. "Stop for a minute," Dundon said. "Put your helmet against the wall." "I already did," Web said, but he did it again. "Do you hear anything?" "Nope. Quiet as a ... grave." "Keep listening as you go along." Good idea. And then he thought of another good idea. He called out to Joe Falk. "Yes?" "I just wanted to know if you were still out there." "I don't leave without one hell of a yell," Falk chuckled. "And you don't leave without me either." Web faced the next door, the tension mounting. He could not get over the feeling that there had to be somebody aboard. At least there had to be bodies, certainly, because nothing had left the satellite. Forty-seven men had come up here. The bodies were probably all pretty close together. He stopped thinking about that because it only made it difficult to keep on looking. He opened the next door, and there was nobody there either. He began to have an awful suspicion.