Fantastic Voyage - By Isaac Asimov Page 0,51

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 blood-stream, 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