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  Dallas had finished drying himself. Now he touched a button set into the base of his coffin. A drawer slid silently outward on nearly frictionless bearings. It contained his clothing and a few personal effects.

  As he was dressing, Ash ambled over to stand nearby. The science officer kept his voice low, spoke as he finished seaming his clean shirt.

  'Mother wants to talk to you.' As he whispered, he nodded in the direction of the yellow light flashing steadily on the suspended console nearby.

  'I saw it right off.' Dallas slipped arms into a shirt. 'Hard yellow. Security one, not warning. Don't tell the others. If anything's seriously wrong, they'll find out soon enough.' He slipped into an impressed brown jacket, left it hanging open,

  'It can't be too bad, whatever it is.' Ash sounded hopeful, gestured again at the steadily winking light. 'It's only yellow, not red.'

  'For the moment.' Dallas was no optimist. 'I'd have preferred waking up to a nice, foresty green.' He shrugged, tried to sound as hopeful as Ash. 'Maybe the autochef's on the blink. That might be a blessing, considering what it calls food.'

  He attempted a smile, failed. The Nostromo was not human. It did not play practical jokes on its crew, and it would not have awakened them from hypersleep with a yellow warning light without a perfectly good reason. A malfunctioning autochef did not qualify as a candidate for the latter.

  Oh well. After several months of doing nothing but sleeping, he had no right to complain if a few hours' honest sweat was now required of him . . .

  The central computer room was little different from the other awake rooms aboard the Nostromo. A disarming kaleidoscope of lights and screens, readouts and gauges, it conveyed the impression of a wild party inhabited by a dozen drunken Christmas trees.

  Settling himself into a thickly padded contour seat, Dallas considered how to proceed. Ash took the seat opposite the Mind Bank, manipulated controls with more speed and ease than a man just out of hypersleep ought to have. The science officer's ability to handle machines was unmatched.

  It was a special rapport Dallas often wished he possessed. Still groggy from the after-effects of hypersleep, he punched out a primary request. Distortion patterns chased each other across the screen, settled down to form recognizable words. Dallas checked his wording, found it standard.

  ALERT OVERMONITORING FUNCTION FOR MATRIX DISPLAY AND INQUIRY.

  The ship found it acceptable also, and Mother's reply was immediate. OVERMONITOR ADDRESS MATRIX. Columns of informational categorizations lined up for inspection beneath this terse legend.

  Dallas examined the long list of fine print, located the section he wanted, and typed in, COMMAND PRIORITY ALERT.

  OVERMONITOR FUNCTION READY FOR INQUIRY, Mother responded. Computer minds were not programmed for verbosity. Mother was no exception to the rule.

  Which was fine with Dallas. He wasn't in a talkative mood. He typed briefly, WHAT'S THE STORY, MOTHER?, and waited . . .

  You couldn't say that the bridge of the Nostromo was spacious. Rather, it was somewhat less claustrophobic than the ship's other rooms and chambers, but not by much. Five contour seats awaited their respective occupants. Lights flashed patiently on and off at multiple consoles, while numerous screens of varying shapes and sizes also awaited the arrival of humans who were prepared to tell them what to display. A large bridge would have been an expensive frivolity, since the crew spent most of its flight time motionless in the freezers. It was designed strictly for work, not for relaxation or entertainment. The people who worked there knew this as thoroughly as did the machines.

  A seal door slid silently into a wall. Kane entered, followed closely by Ripley, Lambert, and Ash. They made their way to their respective stations, settled behind consoles with the ease and familiarity of old friends greeting one another after a long time apart.

  A fifth seat remained empty, would continue unoccupied until Dallas returned from his tête-a-tête with Mother, the Nostromo's Mind Bank computer. The nickname was an accurate one, not given in jest. People grow very serious when speaking about the machinery responsible for keeping them alive. For its part, the machine accepted the designation with equal solemnity, if not the emotional overtones.

  Their clothing was as relaxed as their bodies, casual travesties of crew-member uniforms. Each reflected the personality of the wearer. Shirts and slacks, all were rumpled and worn after years of storage. So were the bodies they encased.

  The first sounds spoken on the bridge in many years summed up the feelings of all present, even though they couldn't understand them. Jones was meowing when Ripley set him on the deck. He changed that to a purr, sliding sensuously around her ankles as she snuggled herself into the high-backed seat.

  'Plug us in.' Kane was checking out his own console, caressing the automatics with his eyes, hunting for contrasts and uncertainties as Ripley and Lambert commenced throwing necessary switches and thumbing requisite controls.

  There was a flurry of visual excitement as new lights and colours migrated across readout panels and screens. It gave the feeling that the instruments were pleased by the reappearance of their organic counterparts and were anxious to display their talents at first opportunity.

  Fresh numbers and words appeared on readouts in front of him. Kane correlated them with well-remembered ones imprinted in his mind. 'Looks okay so far. Give us something to stare at.'

  Lambert's fingers danced an arpeggio on a tightly clustered rank of controls. Viewscreens came alive all over the bridge, most suspended from the ceiling for easier inspection. The navigator examined the square eyes closest to her seat, frowned immediately. Much that she saw was expected. Too much was not. The most important thing, the anticipated shape that should be dominating their vision, was absent. So important was it that it negated the normality of everything else.

  'Where's Earth?'

  Examining his own screen carefully, Kane discerned blackness speckled with stars and little else. Granting the possibility that they'd emerged from hyperspace too soon, the home system at least should be clear on the screen. But Sol was as invisible as the expected Earth.

  'You're the navigator, Lambert. You tell me.'

  There was a central sun fixed squarely in the middle of the multiple screens. But it wasn't Sol. The colour was wrong, and computer-enhanced dots orbiting it were worse than wrong. They were impossible, improper of shape, of size, of number.

  'That's not our system,' Ripley observed numbly, giving voice to the obvious.

  'Maybe the trouble's just our orientation, not that of the stars.' Kane didn't sound very convincing, even to himself. 'Ships have been known to come out of hyperspace ass-backward to their intended destinations. That could be Centauri, at top amplification. Sol might be behind us. Let's take a scan before we do any panicking.' He did not add that the system visible on the screens resembled that of Centauri about as much as it did that of Sol.

  Sealed cameras on the battered skin of the Nostromo began to move silently in the vacuum of space, hunting through infinity for hints of a warm Earth. Secondary cameras on the Nostromo's cargo, a monstrous aggregation of bulky forms and metal shapes, contributed their own line of sight. Inhabitants of an earlier age would have been astonished to learn that the Nostromo was towing a considerable quantity of crude oil through the void between the stars, encased in its own automatic, steadily functioning refinery.

  That oil would be finished petrochemicals by the time the Nostromo arrived in orbit around Earth. Such methods were necessary. While mankind had long since developed marvellous, efficient substitutes for powering their civilization, they had done so only after greedy individuals had sucked the last drop of petroleum from a drained Earth.

  Fusion and solar power ran all of man's machines. But they couldn't substitute for petrochemicals. A fusion engine could not produce plastics, for example. The modern worlds could exist without power sooner than they could without plastics. Hence the presence of the Nostromo's commercially viable, if historically incon
gruous, cargo of machinery and the noisome black liquid it patiently processed.

  The only system the cameras picked up was the one set neatly in the centre of the various screens, the one with the improper necklace of planets circling an off-colour star. There was no doubt now in Kane's mind and less than that in Lambert's that the Nostromo's intended that system to be their immediate destination.

  Still, it could be an error in time and not in space. Sol could be the system located in the distance just to this star's left or right. There was a sure way to find out

  'Contact traffic control.' Kane was chewing his lower lip. 'If we can pick up anything from them, we'll know we're in the right quadrant. If Sol's anywhere nearby, we'll receive a reply from one of the outsystem relay stations.'

  Lambert's fingers nicked different controls. 'This is the deep-space commercial tug Nostromo, registration number one eight zero, two four six, en route to Earth with bulk cargo crude petroleum and appropriate refinery. Calling Antarctica traffic control. Do you read me? Over.'

  Only the faint, steady hiss of distant suns replied over the speakers. Near Ripley's feet, Jones the cat purred in harmony with the stars.

  Lambert tried again. 'Deepspace commercial tug Nostromo calling Sol/Antarctica traffic control. We are experiencing navigation-fix difficulties. This is a priority call; please respond.' Still only the nervous stellar sizzle-pop. Lambert looked worried. 'Mayday, mayday. Tug Nostromo calling Sol traffic control or any other vessel in listening range. Mayday. Respond.'

  The unjustified distress call (Lambert knew they were not in any immediate danger) went unanswered and unchallenged. Discouraged, she shut off the transmitter, but left the receiver on all-channels open in case another broadcasting ship happened to pass close by.

  'I knew we couldn't be near our system,' Ripley mumbled. 'I know the area.' She nodded toward the screen hanging above her own station. 'That's nowhere near Sol, and neither are we.'

  'Keep trying,' Kane ordered her. He turned back to face Lambert. 'So then where are we? You got a reading yet?'

  'Give me a minute, will you? This isn't easy. We're way out in the boondocks.'

  'Keep trying.'

  'Working on it.'

  Several minutes of intense searching and computer-cooperation produced a tight grin of satisfaction on her face. 'Found it . . . and us. We're just short of Zeta II Reticuli. We haven't even reached the outer populated ring yet. Too deep to grab onto a navigation beacon, let alone a Sol traffic relay.'

  'So what the hell are we doing here?' Kane wondered aloud. 'If there's nothing wrong with the ship and we're not home, why did Mother defrost us?'

  It was only coincidence and not a direct response to the exec's musing, but an attention-to-station horn began its loud and imperative beeping. . . .

  Near the stern of the Nostromo was a vast chamber mostly filled with complex, powerful machinery. The ship's heart lived there, the extensive propulsion system that enabled the vessel to distort space, ignore time, and thumb its metallic nose at Einstein . . . and only incidentally power the devices that kept her fragile human crew alive.

  At the fore end of this massive, humming complex was a glass cubicle, a transparent pimple on the tip of the hyperdrive iceberg. Within, settled in contour seats, rested two men. They were responsible for the health and well-being of the ship's drive, a situation both were content with. They took care of it and it took care of them.

  Most of the time it took perfectly good care of itself, which enabled them to spend their time on more enlightening, worthwhile projects such as drinking beer and swapping dirty stories. At the moment it was Parker's turn to ramble. He was reciting for the hundredth time the tale of the engineering apprentice and the free-fall cathouse. It was a good story, one that never failed to elicit a knowing snigger or two from the silent Brett and a belly laugh from the storyteller himself.

  '. . . and so the madam busts in on me, all worried and mad at the same time,' the engineer was saying, 'and insists we come and rescue this poor sap. Guess he didn't know what he was getting into.' As usual, he roared at the pun.

  'You remember that place. All four walls, floor and ceiling perfectly mirrored, with no bed. Just a velvet net suspended in the centre of the room to confine your activities and keep you from bouncing off the walls, and zero-gee.' He shook his head in disapproving remembrance.

  'That's no place for amateurs to fool around, no sir! Guess this kid got embarrassed or cajoled into trying it by his crewmates.'

  'From what the girl involved told me later, as she was cleaning herself up, they got started off fine. But then they started to spin, and he panicked. Couldn't stop their tumbling. She tried, but it takes two to stop as well as start in free-fall. What with the mirrors messing up his sense of position and all, plus the free tumbling, he couldn't stop throwing up.' Parker downed another mouthful of beer. 'Never saw such a mess in your natural life. Bet they're still working on those mirrors.'

  'Yeah.' Brett smiled appreciatively.

  Parker sat still, letting the last vestiges of the memory fade from his mind. They left a pleasantly lascivious residue behind. Absently, he flipped a key switch over his console. A gratifyingly green light appeared above it, held steady.

  'How's your light?'

  'Green,' admitted Brett, after repeating the switch-andcheck procedure with his own instrumentation.

  'Mine too.' Parker studied the bubbles within the beer. Several hours out of hypersleep and he was bored already. The engine room ran itself with quiet efficiency, wasted no time making him feel extraneous. There was no one to argue with except Brett, and you couldn't work up a really invigorating debate with a man who spoke in monosyllables and for whom a complete sentence constituted an exhausting ordeal.

  'I still think Dallas is deliberately ignoring our complaints,' he ventured. 'Maybe he can't direct that we receive full bonuses, but he is the captain. If he wanted to, he could put in a request, or at least a decent word for the two of us. That'd be a big help.' He studied a readout. It displayed numbers marching off plus or minus to right and left. The fluorescent red line running down its centre rested precisely on zero, splitting the desired indication of neutrality neatly in two.

  Parker would have continued his rambling, alternating stories and complaints had not the beeper above them abruptly commenced its monotonous call

  'Christ. What is it now? Can't let a guy get comfortable before somebody starts farting around!'

  'Right.' Brett leaned forward to hear better as the speaker cleared a distant throat.

  It was Ripley's voice. 'Report to the mess.'

  'Can't be lunch, isn't supper.' Parker was confused. 'Either we're standing by to offload cargo, or . . .' He glanced questioningly at his companion.

  'Find out soon,' said Brett.

  As they made their way toward the mess, Parker surveyed the less than antiseptically clean walls of 'C' corridor with distaste. 'I'd like to know why they never come down here. This is where the real work is.'

  'Same reason we have half a share to their one. Our time is their time. That's the way they see it.'

  'Well, I'll tell you something. It stinks.' Parker's tone left no doubt he was referring to something other than the odour the corridor walls were impregnated with . . .

  II

  Though far from comfortable, the mess was just large enough to hold the entire crew. Since they rarely ate their meals simultaneously (the always functional autochef indirectly encouraging individuality in eating habits), it hadn't been designed with comfortable seating for seven in mind. They shuffled from foot to foot, bumping and jostling each other and trying not to get on each other's nerves.

  Parker and Brett weren't happy and took no pains to hide their displeasure. Their sole consolation was the knowledge that nothing was wrong with engineering and that whatever they'd been revived to deal with was the responsibility of persons other than themselves. Ripley had already filled them in on the disconcerting absence of their intended
destination.

  Parker considered that they would all have to re-enter hypersleep, a messy and uncomfortable process at its best, and cursed under his breath. He resented anything that kept him separated from his end-of-voyage paycheck.

  'We know we haven't arrived at Sol, Captain.' Kane spoke for the others, who were all eying Dallas expectantly. 'We're nowhere near home and the ship has still seen fit to hustle us all out of hypersleep. Time we found out why.'

  'Time you did.' Dallas agreed readily. 'As you all know,' he began importantly, 'Mother is programmed to interrupt our journey and bring us out of hyperdrive and sleep if certain specified conditions arise.' He paused for effect, said, 'They have.'

  'It would have to be pretty serious.' Lambert was watching Jones the cat play with a blinking telltale. 'You know that. Bringing a full crew out of hypersleep isn't lightly done. There's always some risk involved.'