"Take us days to remove all the screens and purifiers," said Hoskins,
"and then we'd be up against the intake ports. You could stroll out
through any of them about as far as your forearm. And after that it's
hull-metal, skipper. _That_ you don't cut, not with a piece of the Sun's
core."
The Captain got up and began pacing, slowly and steadily, as if the
problem could be trodden out like ripe grapes. He closed his eyes and
said, "I've been circling around that idea for thirty minutes now. Look:
the hull can't be cut because it is built so it can't fail. It doesn't
fail. The port controls were also built so they wouldn't fail. They do
fail. The thing that keeps us in stays in shape. The thing that lets us
out goes bad. Effect: we stay inside. Cause: something that wants us to
stay inside."
"Oh," said Johnny clearly.
They looked at him. He raised his head, stiffened his spine against the
bulkhead. Paresi smiled at him. "Sure, Johnny. The machine didn't fail.
It was--controlled. It's all right." Then he turned to the Captain and
said carefully, "I'm not denying what you say, Skipper. But I don't like
to think of what will happen if you take that tack, reason it through,
and don't get any answers."
"I'd hate to be a psychologist," said Ives fervently. "Do you
extrapolate your mastications, too, and get frightened of the stink you
might get?"