There could not be - yet that purposeful scrabbling was clearer than ever.ĭespite the nonsense that has been written about us, it is not true that spacemen are superstitious. I whirled madly in my harness, scanning the entire sphere of vision around me. In that first, heart-freezing moment it seemed that something was trying to get into my suit-something invisible, seeking shelter from the cruel and pitiless vacuum of space. The soundless void was bringing to my ears the faint, but unmistakable, stirrings of life. Though I was in utter isolation, far from any other human being or indeed any material object, I was not alone. It was no longer possible to pretend that the noise disturbing me was that of some faulty mechanism. I had long ago learned to trust my instincts in such matters it was their alarm signals that were flashing now, telling me to return to the station before it was too late… The meters on the control board gave no clues all the needles were rock-steady on their scales, and there were none of the flickering red lights that would warn of impending disaster. I froze instantly, holding my breath and trying to locate the alien sound with my ears. It was an intermittent, muffled thudding, sometimes accompanied by a scraping noise, as of metal upon metal. They had changed now to them had been added a sound which I could not identify. These sounds reverberate through the suit, unable to escape into the surrounding void they are the unnoticed background of life in space, for you are aware of them only when they change. It is never completely silent inside a space suit you can always hear the gentle hiss of oxygen, the faint whir of fans and motors, the susurration of your own breathing - even, if you listen carefully enough, the rhythmic thump that is the pounding of your heart. It was at that moment, as I launched myself out into the abyss, that I knew that something was horribly wrong. For a short trip like this, I did not bother to check the suit’s internal lockers, which were used to carry foodĪnd special equipment for extended missions. All my needles were well in the safety zone, so I lowered the transparent hemisphere over my head and sealed myself in. They are stubby cylinders, about seven feet long, fitted with low-powered propulsion jets, and have a pair of accordion-like sleeves at the upper end for the operator’s arms.Īs soon as I’d settled down inside my very exclusive space craft, I switched on power and checked the gauges on the tiny instrument panel. Ours are really baby space ships, just big enough to hold one man. The space suits we use on the station are completely different from the flexible affairs men wear when they want to walk around on the moon.
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