There were worse times and places to argue about it, but Alsint
couldn't remember them. "There wasn't any signal," he said. He caught
the cynical expression on the guard's face and extended his hand. "See
for yourself."
The watch was working, indicating time till takeoff, but the
unmistakable glow and the irritating tingle, guaranteed to wake any man
out of a sleep this side of the final one, were missing.
The guard blinked. "Never heard of that ever happening," he said. "Tell
you what--I'll testify that it wasn't your fault. That'll clear you.
You can get a job on the next ship and catch up with your own in a
month at the most."
It wasn't that easy, nor so simple. Alsint glanced frantically at the
watch. Minutes left now, though he couldn't be sure. If the signal
wasn't functioning, maybe the time was wrong too. "I'll never get on
that one again," he said. "It's a tag ship."
The guard scrutinized him more closely, differentiating his uniform
from others similar to it. "In that case you'd better go to the traffic
tower," he said reluctantly. "They'll stop it for you."
They would, but he'd waste half an hour getting past the red tape at
the entrance. There were a number of reasons why he couldn't let the
ship leave without him. "I know our crew," he said. "They'll be waiting
for me. Let me try to get on."
The guard shrugged. "It's your funeral." Slowly the gate swung open.
Alsint dashed through. He had to hurry, but it wasn't as dangerous as
the guard imagined. The watch had failed, but inside the ship was a
panel which indicated the presence or absence of any crew member. That
panel was near the pilot. He wouldn't take off without clearing it.
Besides, there was standard takeoff procedure--always someone at the
visionport, watching for latecomers, of which there were usually a
few. Alsint raised his head as he ran. He couldn't see anyone at the
visionport.
Breathing heavily, he brushed against the ship. Late, but not too late.
He turned the corner at the vane.
He didn't like what he saw. The ramp was up and the outer lock was
closed. They were waiting for clearance from the spaceport.
His composure slipped a little. If the clearance came within the next
few minutes, he'd be dead. Not that the clearance would come. A ship
just didn't lift off, leaving one of the crew behind--or he hoped it
didn't.
He pounded on the lock and shouted, though it was useless. Inside, they
couldn't hear him. The noise frightened a little red bird which had
been hovering nearby. It flew around his head, squawking shrilly.
* * * * *
Alsint scowled at it. It reminded him unpleasantly of the park. If he
hadn't gone there, he'd be safe inside the ship. True, parks were rare,
and people who went to them even more rare. After so many months in the
ship, it had been a great temptation--for him, not the others. No one
else had been interested.
Now he had to get in. A tremor ran through the hull and he realized how
urgent it was. A little more of this and he would be caught under the
rockets.
The airlock was smooth, but he located the approximate latching point
on the outside and stripped off the watch, holding it against the ship
by the band. He tried to remember and thought the face should be turned
inward. He held it that way and hoped he was right. He closed his eyes
and swung hard with his fist.
His hand exploded with pain and he could feel the flash on his face.
The energy, which was sufficient to drive the instrument for a thousand
years, dissipated in much less than a second. An instant later the hand
which held the strap reacted to the heat. He dropped the useless watch
and opened his eyes.
He had figured it right and he was also lucky. The energy had turned
inward, as he had hoped, otherwise he'd have no hand, and the latching
mechanism had been destroyed. The resulting heat had buckled the plate
outward. The hull was trembling with greater violence as the takeoff
rockets warmed up.
The airlock was still very hot. His fingers sizzled as he grasped the
curled edge and pulled out. It moved a little. He shifted his hands for
a better grip and heaved. It opened.
He scrambled inside and shut it behind him, latching it with the
emergency device. Close, but it didn't matter as long as he'd made it.
The ship began to rise and the acceleration forced him to kneel in the
passageway between the outer and inner lock. He kept thinking of the
little red bird he'd seen outside. Burned, no doubt, as he would have
been.
Finally the rockets stopped and the heaviness disappeared. They were
out of the atmosphere and hence the ship had shifted to interstellar
drive. The heat from the rockets began to abate. He was grateful for
that.
He got to his feet and staggered to the inner lock and leaned against
it. That didn't open, either. He shouted. It might take time, but
eventually someone would come close enough to hear him.
There was air in the passageway and he knew he could survive. It had
been too hot; now it was getting cold. He shivered and shook his head
in bewilderment.
None of this was the way it ought to be. It had never been difficult to
get on the ship. If he didn't know better, he'd say--
But this was not the time to say that.
He didn't hear the footsteps on the other side. The lock swung in and
he fell forward. His burned hands were too cold to hurt as he checked
his fall.
Scantily clad, Larienne stood over him. "Playing hiding games?" she
asked. She got a better look and knelt by his side. "You're hurt!"
So he was, but mostly he was tired. In the interval before he accepted
the luxury of unconsciousness, the thought flashed across his mind
before he could disown it: Someone on the ship was trying to take the
plant away, or wanted him to fail.
Either would have been accomplished if he had been left behind.
* * * * *
He sat in his room, thinking. He wished he knew more about the crew.
Six months was enough to give him wide acquaintance, but not the deep
kind. They were a clannish lot on the ship. His own assistant he knew
well enough, and the doctor. The captain he hardly ever saw. The rest
of them he knew by sight and name, but not much else: the few married
couples, the legally unattached girls, and the larger number of male
technicians.
None of them, as far as he could see, had any incentive to engineer the
mixup which had nearly caused him to miss the ship. Of course he might
be reading into it more than was there. It could have happened that way
accidentally. And then maybe it didn't.
His thoughts were interrupted by a knock. "Who's there?" he called.
Larienne walked in. "Nobody asks _who_," she said. "It's always _come
in_. Even I know that, and I've been on this traveling isolation ward
a mere three years."
She dropped into a chair and draped her legs, long legs that were worth
showing off. She had a certain air of impartiality that attracted
attention. She was smart, though, and knew when to discard impartiality.
She eyed him curiously. "I'm trying to discover the secret of your
popularity. That damn plant is pining for you."
"It's not me," he said. "You have to know how to handle it."
"Thanks," she said dryly. "I don't know how. But Richel Alsint, boy
plant psychologist, does. He knows when to increase the circulation,
when to give it an extra shot of minerals, and when, on the other hand,
to scare the damn thing out of its wits, which I sometimes believe it
actually has."
"Don't personalize it," he warned. "It's partly plant and partly a
machine. Your mistake is that you treat it as if it were wholly a
machine."
"Seems to me I've heard that before. What should I do that I don't?"
"Cycles," he said. "Rhythm. A machine doesn't need that kind of
treatment, but a plant does. Normally it starts as a seed, grows to
maturity, produces more seeds, and eventually dies. Our plant isn't
like that, of course. It never produces seeds, and, if we're careful,
doesn't die. Yet it does have something that faintly corresponds to
the original cycles."
She sighed. "It might help if I knew what it was--geranium, or
sunflower, or whatever."
He had told her, but apparently she didn't want to remember. "It isn't
one plant. It's been made from hundreds; even I don't know what they
were. One best feature from this, another strong feature from something
else. We've taken plants apart and recombined them into something new.
This is just--plant."
* * * * *
Larienne dropped her legs to a more comfortable if less esthetic
position. "Hydroponics was simpler," she objected.
"It was," he said. "And if you want to know, old-fashioned dirt farming
was even simpler. Our combination plant and machine is merely a step
and a half ahead of hydroponics."
"Suppose you come out and tell me what I've done wrong," she said,
getting up.
"One last thing," he said. "Remember that plants evolved on planets.
No matter what we do, we can't convince the plant that it's still
on a planet. Light's the easiest. As far as we know, it will grow
indefinitely under our artificial light. Artificial gravity is
different. I don't know the difference, and neither do the physicists,
but the plant does. It can live in the ship just so long and then has
to be taken out for a rest. There are other things that affect it,
vibration, noise, and maybe more. You know how I have to keep after the
pilot to dampen his drive. All these things change the cycle it has to
have."
"Agreed," she said impatiently, meaning mostly that she didn't care.
"Let's go out and look at it."
The plant was a machine and the machine was a plant. It occupied
a large space in the center of the ship. And it wasn't wasted
space; properly cared for, the plant could supply food for the crew
indefinitely.
The plant machine evolved from earlier attempts to convert raw material
and energy into food. Originally algae were used because they were
hardy and simple to control. But the end product had to be processed
and algae did not produce the full scale of nutrients in the proper
proportion for the human diet.
Certain cells of more highly evolved plants were far more efficient in
the conversion of raw materials into proteins, vitamins and the like.
Originally, inedible parts were produced too, the stalk, which might or
might not be used for food, and the leaves and roots. On a planet with
plenty of room, this made little difference. But on an overcrowded
planet, or one with a poisonous atmosphere, and especially on a ship
where space was at a premium, normal methods could not be used.
In the plant machine were certain cells which had been selected because
of their ability to produce a variety of nutrients. The inedible parts
of the plant were replaced by machinery. Instead of roots to draw water
and minerals from the soil, there were pumps and filters. Instead of
stems to elevate that material to the leaves, there were hoses. Instead
of entire leaves to perform photosynthesis, there were only those cells
most efficient at the process. There were no seeds, tubers, roots, nor
fleshy stalks to store the food. Collecting trays replaced them. There
was no waste space; nothing was produced that couldn't be eaten.
There was an additional problem of reconciling the various cell fluids
and different rates of growth. In part, that was accomplished by the
plant machinery; the rest depended on the plant mechanic. His job was
akin to that of a factory manager. In a sense, the plant machine was
nothing more than a highly organized and complex factory, of which the
productive units were the actual cells.
* * * * *
Alsint went along the aisles. Dials and gauges everywhere--a continuous
record was kept of every stage. Each record was important, but nothing
that could be reduced to a formula. The plant was not in bad shape,
considering. At his instructions, Larienne made certain adjustments.
"Why reduce the light?" she asked. "I thought this unit grew better
with stronger light."
"It does, within limits."
"I was within those limits."
"You were, but consider this. The plant from which these cells came
grow fastest in early summer, but it isn't edible at that time. In
late summer, it is. The light change merely corresponds to original
conditions."