Fantastic Voyage - By Isaac Asimov Page 0,50

snorkel was fluid, clinging motionlessly.

Grant said, "I'm going to get it up through now, into the alveolus."

Michaels said, "When you get to the alveolus, be careful. I don't know how you'll be affected by inhalation and exhalation but you're liable to find yourself in a hurricane."

Grant was moving upward, yanking at the snorkel as he found purchases in the soft yielding tissue for gripping fingers and kicking feet.

His head rose beyond the alveolar wall and quite suddenly, he was in another world. The light from the Proteus penetrated through what seemed to him a vast thickness of tissue and in its muted intensity, the alveolus was a tremendous cavern, with walls that glinted moistly and distantly.

About him were crags and boulders of all sizes and colors, sparkling iridescently, as the inefficient reflection of miniaturized light gave them all a spuriously beautiful luster. He could see now that the edges of the boulders remained hazy even without the presence of slowly swirling fluid to account for it.

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