"In there someplace," she said. "Out of range of this screen, but we could probably locate it with detector instruments." "Why all the jabber?" demanded Brecken. "Let's get going!" Phillips stared at him. "What's the rush? Did he sell you that easily?" "Huh? Oh, hell, no! I mean let's make a dive for Mars. They were dumb to set us loose with a fast ship. We're dumber if we don't use it!" "That's right," agreed Truesdale eagerly. "We don't owe them anything. They owe us; for the years they took out of our lives!" * * * * * Truesdale had a point there, Phillips felt. This could grow into quite a discussion, and he was not sure which side he wanted to take. He had no great urge to become a hero, but on the other hand there was something about Brecken that aroused a certain obstinacy in him. "Wait a minute!" Donna protested; "what do you think you're going to do?" "Slip into a curve for Mars," said Brecken. "Slow down enough to take to chutes an' let this can smack up in the deserts somewhere. They'll never know if we got out, an' we'll be on our own." The girl turned to Phillips. "How about you?" she asked. "Don't you think we should at least consider what Varret told us? If this plague is as dangerous as he says, this is no time to--" "Do you _have_ to be so bloodthirsty?" complained Truesdale. "I don't want to kill anybody," declared the girl; "maybe we could just disable the cruiser." "Aw, kill your jets!" Brecken broke in. "I've been waiting for a chance like this for years. Don't get any ideas!" "But listen!" pleaded Donna. "It's a terrible thing, but if we don't do it, we won't be safe on Mars ourselves; they'll land and set an epidemic loose." "I'll take my chances with it," said Brecken. "You're supposed to know something about piloting. Now get us on a curve for Mars, an' be snappy about it!" Donna turned desperately to Phillips. "Why not look over the ship," the engineer suggested, "before we blast off on half our jets? We can make up our minds when we see what we have for fuel and weapons." Brecken opened his mouth to object, but was smitten by an unpleasant thought. "Suppose they didn't leave us enough fuel to make Mars!" "We can find out soon enough," said Phillips, leading the way to the door. They trooped down the corridor on his heels, past the few closet-like compartments set aside for living quarters. It was a single-deck ship, with storage compartments above and below for fuel, oxygen, and other necessities. The corridor was liberally supplied with handrails, apparently in case of failure of the artificial gravity system. About halfway to the end, another passage crossed the fore-and-aft one, and a few steps farther was a ladder. This extended up and down a vertical well, which in space amounted to a second cross corridor. Phillips was right when he guessed that the door beyond opened into the rocket room.