by Isaac Asimov
Grant said, “This place is full of rocks.”
“Dust and grit, I imagine,” came Michaels’ voice. “Dust and grit. The legacy of living in civilization, of breathing unfiltered air. The lungs are a one-way passage; we can take dust in but there’s no way of pushing it out again.”
Owens put in, “Do your best to hold the snorkel over your head, will you? I don’t want any fluid plugging it. —Now!”
Grant heaved it high. “Let me know when you’ve had enough, Owens,” he panted.
“I will.”
“Is it working?”
“It sure is. I have the field adjusted strobophilically so that it acts in rapid spurts according to the … Well, never mind. The point is the field is never on long enough to affect liquids or solids significantly but it is miniaturizing gases at a great rate. I’ve got the field extended far beyond Benes into the atmosphere of the operating room.”
“Is that safe?” asked Grant.
“It’s the only way we can get enough air. We have to have thousands of times as much air as all of Benes’ lungs contain, and miniaturize it all. Is it safe? Good Lord, man, I’m sucking it in right through Benes’ tissues without even affecting his respiration. Oh, if I only had a larger snorkel.” Owens sounded as gay and excited as a youngster on his first date.
Michaels’ voice in Grant’s ear said, “How are you being affected by Benes’ breathing?”
Grant looked quickly at the alveolar membrane. It seemed stretched and taut under his foot, so he guessed he was witnessing the slow, slow end of an inhalation. (Slow in any case; slower because of the hypothermia; slower still because of the time distortion induced by miniaturization.)
“It’s all right,” he said. “No effect at all.”
But now a low rasp made itself felt in Grant’s ear. It grew slowly louder and Grant realized an exhalation was beginning. He braced himself and held on to the snorkel.
Owens said jubilantly, “This is working beautifully. Nothing like this has ever been done before.”
The motion of air was making itself felt about Grant, as the lungs continued their slow but accelerating collapse and the rasp of exhalation grew louder. Grant felt his legs lifting from the alveolar floor. On an ordinary scale, he knew, the air current in the alveolus was indetectably gentle but on the miniaturized scale, it was gathering into a tornado.
Grant gripped the snorkel in desperation, flinging both arms about it and both legs. It strained upward and so did he. The very boulders—dust boulders—came loose and rolled slightly.
The wind slowly died then as the exhalation came to its slow halt and Grant released the snorkel with relief.
He said, “How’s it doing, Owens?”
“Almost done. Hang on for a few seconds, will you, Grant?”
“Okay.”
He counted to himself: twenty—thirty—forty. The inhalation was starting and air molecules were impinging upon him. The alveolar wall was stretching again and he stumbled to his knees.
“Full!” cried Owens. “Get back in.”
“Pull down on the snorkel,” yelled Grant. “Quickly. Before another exhalation comes.”
He pushed downward and they pulled. Difficulty arose only when the lip of the snorkel approached the interface. It held tight there for a moment as though in a vice—and then pulled through with a small thunderclap of joining surface film.
Grant had watched too long. With the snorkel safely in, he made a motion as though to plunge into the crevice and through the interface at its bottom, but the beginning of the exhalation surrounded him with wind and caused him to stumble. For a moment, he found himself wedged between two dust boulders and in wrenching free found that he had slightly barked one shin. (Hurting one’s shin against a particle of dust was surely something to tell one’s grandchildren.)
Where was he? He shook his lifeline, freeing it from some snag on one of the boulders, and pulled it taut. It would be easiest to follow it back to the crevice.
The lifeline snaked over the top of the boulder and Grant, bracing his feet against it, climbed rapidly upward. The strengthening exhalation helped him do so and there was scarcely any sensation of effort in the upward striving. Then still less. The crevice, he knew, was just the other side of the boulder and he might have gone around it but for the fact that the exhalation made the route over it the simpler and because (why not admit it?) it was more exciting this way.
The boulder rolled beneath his feet, at the peak of the exhalation wind, and Grant lifted free. For the moment he found himself high in the air, the crevice just beyond, exactly where he had expected it to be. It was only necessary to wait a second or two for exhalation to cease and he would lunge quickly for the crevice, the bloodstream, and the ship.
And even as he thought so, he felt himself sucked wildly upward, the lifeline following and snaking entirely free of the crevice which, in half a moment, was lost to sight.
The snorkel had been pulled out of the alveolar crevice and Duval was snaking it back to the ship.
Cora said anxiously, “Where’s Grant?”
“He’s up there,” said Michaels, peering.
“Why doesn’t he come down?”
“He will. He will. It takes some negotiating, I imagine.” He peered upward again. “Benes is exhaling. Once that’s done, he’ll have no trouble.”
“Shouldn’t we grab hold of his lifeline and pull him in?”
Michaels threw out an arm and forestalled her. “If you do that and yank just as an inhalation starts, forcing him downward, you may hurt him. He’ll tell us what to do if he needs help.”
Restlessly, Cora watched and then broke away toward the lifeline. “No,” she said, “I want to …”
And at that moment, the lifeline twitched and snaked upward, its end flashing past, and out through the opening.
Cora screamed, and kicked herself desperately toward the opening.
Michaels pursued. “You can’t do anything,” he panted. “Don’t be foolish.”
“But we can’t leave him in there. What will happen to him?”
“We’ll hear from him by his radio.”
“It may be broken.”
“Why should it be?”
Duval joined them. He said, chokingly, “It came loose as I watched. I couldn’t believe it.”
All three gazed upward helplessly.
Michaels called, tentatively, “Grant! Grant! Do you receive me?”
Grant went tumbling and twisting upward. His thoughts were as jumbled as his line of flight.
I won’t get back, was the dominant thought. I won’t get back. Even if I stay in radio contact, I can’t come in on the beam.
Or could he?
“Michaels,” he called. “Duval.”
There was nothing at first, then a faint crackling noise in his ears; and a distorted squawk that might have been “Grant!”
He tried again, “Michaels! Do you hear me? Do you hear me?”
Again the squawking. He could not make out anything.
Somewhere within a tense mind there came a calm thought, as though his intellect had found time to make a serene note. Although miniaturized light waves were more penetrating than the ordinary kind, miniaturized radio waves seemed less penetrating.
Very little was known about the miniaturized state, apparently. It was the misfortune of the Proteus and her crew to be pioneers into a realm that was literally unknown; surely a fantastic voyage if ever there was one.
And within that voyage, Grant was now on a fantastic subvoyage of his own; blown through what seemed miles of space within a microscopic air chamber in the lung of a dying man.
His motion was slowing. He had reached the top of the alveolus and had moved into the tubular stalk from which it was suspended. The far-off light of the Proteus was dim indeed. Could he follow the light, then? Could he try to move in whatever direction it seemed stronger?
He touched the wall of the tubular stalk and stuck there, like a fly on flypaper. And
with no more sense than the fly, at first, he wriggled.
Both legs and an arm were stuck to the wall, in no time. He paused and forced himself to think. Exhalation was complete but inhalation would be beginning. The air current would be forcing him downward. Wait for it!
He felt the wind begin and heard the rushing noise. Slowly, he pulled his clinging arm loose and bent his body out into the wind. It pushed him downward and his legs came loose, too.
He was falling now, plummeting downward from a height which, on his miniaturized scale, was mountainous. From the unminiaturized point of view, he knew he must be drifting downward in feathery fashion, but as it was, what he experienced was a plummet. It was a smooth drop, non-accelerated, for the large molecules of air (almost large enough to see, Michaels had said) had to be pushed to one side as he fell and that took the energy that would otherwise have gone into acceleration.
A bacterium, no larger than he, could fall this distance safely, but he, the miniaturized human, was made up of fifty trillion miniaturized cells and that complexity made him fragile enough, perhaps, to smash apart into miniaturized dust.
Automatically, as he thought that, he threw up his hands in self-defense when the alveolar wall came whirling close. He felt the glancing contact; the wall gave soggily and he bounced off after clinging for a moment. His speed of fall had actually slowed.
Down again. Somewhere below, a speck of light, a bare pinpoint had winked on as he watched. He kept his eye fixed on that with a wild hope.
Still down. He kicked his feet wildly to avoid an outcropping of dust boulders; narrowly missed and struck a spongy area again. Again falling. He thrashed wildly in an attempt to move toward the pinpoint of light as he fell and it seemed to him he might have succeeded somewhat. He wasn’t sure.
He came rolling down the lower slope of the alveolar surface at length. He flung his lifeline around an outcropping and held on just barely.
The pinpoint of light had become a small glare, some fifty feet away, he judged. That must be the crevice and close though it was, he couldn’t possibly have found it without the guidance of the light.
He waited for the inhalation to cease. In the short interval of time before exhalation, he had to make it there.
Before inhalation had come to a complete halt, he was slipping and scrambling across the space between. The alveolar membrane stretched in the final moment of inhalation and then, hovering at that point for a couple of seconds, began to lose its tension as the first instants of gathering exhalation began.
Grant threw himself down the crevice which was ablaze with light. He kicked at the interface which rebounded in rubbery fashion. A knife slit through; a hand appeared and seized his ankle in a firm grip. He felt the pull downward just as the upward draft was beginning to make itself felt about his ears.
Down he went with other hands adding to the grip on his legs and he was back in the capillary. Grant breathed in long, shuddering gasps. Finally, he said, “Thanks! I followed the light! Couldn’t have made it otherwise.”
Michaels said, “Couldn’t reach you by radio.”
Cora was smiling at him. “It was Dr. Duval’s idea. He had the Proteus move up to the opening and shine its headlight directly into it. And he made the opening bigger, too.”
Michaels said, “Let’s get back in the ship. We’ve lost just about all the time we can afford to lose.”
CHAPTER 13
Pleura
Reid cried out, “A message is coming through, Al.”
“From the Proteus?” Carter ran to the window.
“Well, not from your wife.”
Carter waved his hand impatiently. “Later. Later. Save all the jokes and we’ll go over them one by one in a big heap. Okay?”
The word came through: “Sir, Proteus reports DANGEROUS AIR LOSS. REFUELING OPERATION CARRIED THROUGH SUCCESSFULLY.”
“Refueling?” cried Carter.
Reid said, frowning, “I suppose they mean the lungs. They’re at the lungs, after all, and that means cubic miles of air on their scale. But …”
“But what?”
“They can’t use that air. It’s unminiaturized.”
Carter looked at the colonel in exasperation. He barked into the transmitter. “Repeat the last sentence of the message.”
“REFUELING OPERATION CARRIED THROUGH SUCCESSFULLY.”
“Is that last word ‘successfully?’ ”
“Yes, sir.”
“Get in touch with them and confirm.”
He said to Reid, “If they say ‘successfully,’ I suppose they handled it.”
“The Proteus has a miniaturizer on board.”
“Then that’s how they did it. We’ll get an explanation afterward.”
The voice came up from communications. “Message confirmed, sir.”
“Are they moving?” asked Carter, making another connection.
A short pause and then, “Yes, sir. They’re moving through the pleural lining.”
Reid nodded his head. He looked up at the Time Recorder, which read 37, and said, “The pleural lining is a double membrane surrounding the lungs. They must be moving in the space between; a clear road, an expressway really, right to the neck.”
“And they’ll be where they started half an hour ago,” grated Carter. “Then what?”
“They can back into a capillary and find their way to the carotid artery again, which is time-consuming; or they may by-pass the arterial system by taking to the lymphatics, which involves other problems. —Michaels is the pilot; I suppose he’ll know what to do.”
“Can you advise him? For God’s sake, don’t rest on protocol.”
Reid shook his head. “I’m not sure which course is wisest, and he’s on the scene. He’ll be a better judge as to how well the ship can withstand another arterial battering. We’ve got to leave it to them, general.”
“I wish I knew what to do,” said Carter. “By the Lord, I’d take the responsibility, if I knew enough to do so with a reasonable chance of success.”
“But that’s exactly how I feel,” said Reid, “and why I’m declining the responsibility.”
Michaels was looking over the charts. “All right, Owens, this wasn’t the place I was heading for, but it will do. We’re here and we’ve made an opening. Head for the crevice.”
“Into the lungs?” said Owens, in outrage.
“No, no.” Michaels bounded from his seat in impatience and climbed the stairs so that his head poked into the bubble. “We’ll get into the pleural lining. Get the ship going and I’ll guide you.”
Cora knelt at Grant’s chair. “How did you manage?”
Grant said, “Barely. I’ve been scared more times than I can count—I’m a very scary person—but this time I nearly set a record for fright-intensity.”
“Why do you always make yourself out to be such a coward? After all, your job …”
“Because I’m an agent? Most of it is pretty routine, pretty safe, pretty dull; and I try to keep it that way. When I can’t avoid frightening situations, I have to endure them for the sake of what I believe I’m doing. I’m sufficiently brainwashed, you know, to think it the patriotic thing—in a way.”
“In a way?”
“In my way. It’s not just this country or that, after all. We’re long past the stage where there can be a meaningful division of humanity. I honestly believe our policies are intended to uphold the peace and I want to be part, however small, of that upholding. I didn’t volunteer for this mission, but now that I’m here …” He shrugged.
Cora said, “You sound as though you’re embarrassed to be talking about peace and patriotism.”
Grant said, “I suppose I am. The rest of you are driven by specific motivation, not by vague words. Owens is testing his ship; Michaels is piloting a course across a human body; Duval is admiring God’s handiwork; and you …”
“Yes?”
Grant said softly, “You are admiring Duval.”
Cora flushed. “He’s wor
th admiration, he really is. You know, after he suggested we shine the ship’s headlights into the crevice so as to give you something to shoot for, he did nothing further. He wouldn’t say a word to you on your return. It’s his way. He’ll save someone’s life, then be casually rude to him and what will be remembered will be his rudeness and not his life-saving. But his manner doesn’t alter what he is.”
“No. That’s true; though it may mask it.”
“And your manner doesn’t affect what you are. You affect a brittle, adolescent humor in order to mask a deep involvement in humanity.”
It was Grant’s turn to redden. “You make me sound an uncommon jackass.”
“To yourself perhaps. In any case, you’re not a coward. But now I’ve got to get to work on the laser.” She cast a quick glance at Michaels, who was returning to his seat.
“The laser? Good Lord, I’d forgotten. Well, then, do your best to see it’s not crucially damaged, will you?”
The animation that had brightened her through the previous conversation died away. “Oh, if I only could.”
She moved to the rear. Michaels’ eyes followed her. “What about the laser?” he said.
Grant shook his head. “She’s going to check now.”
Michaels seemed to hesitate before his next remark. He shook his head slightly. Grant watched him but said nothing.
Michaels settled himself into his seat and said at last, “What do you think of our present situation?”
Grant, until now absorbed in Cora, looked up at the windows. They seemed to be moving between two parallel walls that almost touched the Proteus on either side; gleaming yellow and constructed of parallel fibers, like huge tree trunks bound side by side.
The fluid about them was clear, free of cells and objects, almost free of debris. It seemed to be in dead calm and the Proteus churned through it at an even, rapid clip with only the muffled Brownian motion to interject any unevenness into its progress.
“The Brownian motion,” said Grant, “is rougher now.”
