"Tranquils. We smuggle them on board. Helps with the blastoff and
'phasing' for the overdrive. Not that those stiffnecked brass will
believe it."
"Thanks, Kettleman. You and everybody seems to be pretty helpful to me.
I don't know exactly what I've done to deserve it."
"We get tired of looking at the same faces out there month after
month. It's a treat to have somebody new on hand."
It sounded reasonable to him, but he felt there was something more to
it than that. Well, he was an ethnologist, or almost one. He could
figure out group behavior. All he had to do was take time to think
about the problem for a little while....
Only he didn't have time to think.
He discovered why everybody was in their bunks.
The spaceship fired its atomic drive.
Starbuck tried to lift a tranquil to his lips. He didn't make it.
Painfully, he found out why a man would prefer to go through a
spaceship takeoff in a tranquilized condition.
* * * * *
"Come," the captain said.
Starbuck palmed back the door to the captain's cabin and stepped inside.
Captain Birdsel stood in front of the small wall mirror tattooing a
flying dragon on his bared chest. "Yes? What is it, Ben?"
"Sir, you remember that the ship's brain directed me to return at this
time today. But I understand I'll have to have your permission to go
onto that part of the bridge."
"The brain's directive was quite enough, my boy." He laid down the
needle. "But I'll accompany you there if you like."
"Just as you wish, sir."