ly. "That recording
of Mitch's voice is just about all we have. The Ship was under full
power when it hit. There wasn't much left."

Johnny looked absently out the window at the gleaming needle of Ship II
beside the flimsy-looking gantry. Full power was a lot of power.

The psychologist followed Johnny's eyes. "Beautiful," he said, and the
word brought to Johnny's mind the wide-eyed pale face of Mitch's wife,
staring at him.

"That Ship is the best we can make her," Lambert said. "Engineering is
as certain as they can be that there was no structural failure on Ship
I."

"So?" Johnny said, still staring at the Ship. Even at this distance, he
could almost believe he could see his own lean face reflected in the
shining metal.

"So we look somewhere else for the cause of failure," said Lambert.

"Where?" said Johnny. He turned back, saw that the psychologist was
putting a new reel on the tape recorder.

"The weak link in the control system," Lambert said.

"There weren't any."

"One."

"What?"

"Mitch Campbell."

Johnny stood, angry. "Mitch was good. Damn good."

The psychologist looked up, and his eyes were tired. "I know it," he
said calmly. "Listen to this." He started the machine playing the new
tape.

Johnny listened to it through. The voice that came out was high and
wavering. It shook, it chattered, words were indistinguishable. It was
thin with tension, and it rang in Johnny's ears with unwanted
familiarity.

"What's it sound like to you?" Lambert asked when it had finished.

"Like Mitch's voice," Johnny admitted reluctantly.

"It did to me, too. What do you think it is?"

"Don't know," said Johnny shortly. "Might be a pilot whose plane is
shaking apart."

"No."

"I don't know."

Lambert sat back down behind his desk and sucked on his pipestem. He
regarded Johnny impassively, seeming to consider some problem remote
from the room.

Abruptly, he stood again and went to the window, watching the ant-like
activity around the base of Ship II.

"That was a madman's voice," he said. "I made the recording while I was
interning at a state institution."

"So?"

"Mad with fear," Lambert said. "Pure. Simple. Unadulterated. That was
the sound of terror you heard, Johnny. Terror such as few humans have
ever known. That man knew such fear he could not remain sane and live
with it."

_I had a true wife but I left her ... oh, oh, oh._

"You think Mitch--"

"You said yourself the voices were a