Between the Strokes of Night

“Still feeling all right?” said Judith Niles when the task was done. “Perfectly fine. No aches and pains, no sleepiness. Still have that bit of pressure in my neck, but all the other joints are very comfortable. Shall I switch to the cameras?”

“Whenever you’re ready.”

Gibbs nodded. The faceplate of the suit slowly darkened. His face became a dark gray and slowly faded from view as the plate achieved total opacity. The watchers heard a grumble through the suit radio. “Lousy color in here. If my TV didn’t perform better than this I’d turn it in for service.”

The suited figure turned slowly to point its forward viewing camera to look through the chamber window. “Charlene, you’ve turned green.”

“I feel it. We’ll worry about camera color balance later. Can you move the blocks again? And keep talking as you do it, just the way you did last time.” “Piece of cake.” The bulky figure began to move the blocks slowly back to their original stand. “Reminds me of the work that they used to give you in the army when you were doing basic training. Supposed to tire us out and keep us out of trouble. First you move the pile of dirt over here, then when you were finished somebody else would move it back. Then you would move — “

It happened with startling suddenness. There was no drowsy trailing-off of speech. At one moment the suited figure was working efficiently, his matter-of-fact tones clear over the suit radio. Then they were looking in at a silent, motionless statue, frozen with a red block stretched out in one gloved hand.

Charlene Bloom gave a cry of alarm, while Judith Niles took a long, shivering breath. “That’s it. No cause for panic, Charlene, it’s what we were expecting. Start bringing the pressure up — slowly. We don’t want a problem there. I’ll make sure the bed is ready. My guess is that he’ll be out for at least half an hour.” She moved over to the phone. Behind her, Charlene stared wide-eyed at Wolfgang Gibbs’ unconscious figure. She had to fight the temptation to bring the pressure instantly to sea level, and rush into the chamber herself.

* * *

Jan de Vries was waiting in her office, calmly reading a file marked Confidential — Director Only. He looked up as she came in.

“How is he?”

“Recovered. He was out several minutes, and he remembers nothing of the whole episode. So far as Wolfgang is concerned, he didn’t even begin the tests with the suit on video.” Judith Niles did not sit down, but instead paced back and forth in front of the chair where Jan de Vries was sitting. “No aftereffects now, and full alertness.”

“So your hypothesis is correct. You predicted what would happen, and the subject performed exactly as required.” De Vries slapped the file closed. “Everything can now proceed precisely as you planned. We will move the Institute to orbit, spend a month or two in supposed problem analysis, and then hand Salter Wherry the solution to his major problem; after which we will be in a position to pursue our own researches, as the Institute’s new contract explicitly permits. Wonderful. The manipulation is complete, exactly as designed.” His mouth twisted in a grimace. “So, my dear, where is the jubilation? You do not have the air of one whose plans approach fruition.”

“I’m not satisfied — not at all.” Judith Niles paused, looking quizzically down at the diminutive figure of de Vries in the depths of the big armchair. “Listen to this sequence, then tell me what you think. Item one: a year ago there was a slight change in the type of space suit worn in Salter Station for outside construction work. The new one uses a slightly different set of rings and seals in the neck portion.

“Item two.” She checked off on the fingers of her right hand. “For some positions of the head, the new suit causes increased pressure on the wearer’s carotid arteries.”

“Slight pressure?”

“Not that slight — big enough for the wearer to notice. Item three: increased pressure within the carotid arteries can cause momentary blackouts. “Item four: when a suit is on normal visual operation, the blackout is momentary, too brief to be noticed. But when the suit is on remote and using TV cameras instead of faceplate viewing, the scanning rates on the TV give a feedback to the brain that reinforces the blackout. Result: narcolepsy. The wearer will not break out of the cycle unless there is some external interruption. How does that sound to you?”

De Vries sat silent for a few moments, then nodded. “Plausible — more than plausible, almost certainly correct.”

“All right. I agree. So here’s item five.” She closed her fist. “All of this has been known for forty years. The increased pressure in the carotids is a classical cause of narcolepsy. The brain wave reinforcement is a standard positive feedback mechanism. What does all that say to you?”