Production Test

"We're canceling the order on those suits," said Johnson. "Those three dozen on the Queen are no good. Every one the boys tried out broke down with them. They stink. We're going over to Realworth's ground joints."

"Take it easy, now, Henry," said Kimberly with frozen deliberation. "You know how production is. There may be some bugs in the suits that we've overlooked, but we've tested them frontwards and backwards. We know they're good and we'll back them up."

"Bugs! There're enough bugs to crawl off with the suits."

"Just tell me what the trouble is."

"The Queen landed at Copernicus Central. The passengers were let off as usual and the crew begun getting into the suits for terminal inspection of the hull and jets. Incidentally, those Iron Maidens stink, too. Why can't you figure out some kind of a dog for the joints so a spaceman won't have to get inside one of those things to put the suit on or off?"

"We're working on it," said Kimberly patiently. "We'll get it in time, but you want spacesuits now. And this is better than having to handle the old iron pants with a crane."

"Not much."

"Well, get on. What happened?"

"Twelve of the crew began the inspection. Chief Engineer Medford was watching from a port. All of a sudden one of the boys flipped back an arm like something had hit him with a ball bat. It just hung straight out. Then pretty soon another guy who was bending down on his knees to look below a tube straightened out and shot up nearly sixty feet to the top of the Queen's center deck."

"The joint counterbalances gave way!"

"You guessed it. In less than five minutes every one of those boys was spread-eagled and laid out over the landscape like gingerbread men. Some were still standing, but most were lying on their back and couldn't move a muscle. There has probably not been such a concentration of profound profanity in a location of like area since the beginning of space flight."

"I'm sure we can find —"

"Listen! Do you know how they got back into the ship?"

"I suppose they sent out some more men and hauled them back in."

"That's what Medford thought he was going to do. He sent out three more to attach lines and haul the others in. They got four hooked up and then they were laid out like a cooky cutter had run over them. Four for three — it wasn't a good deal. They still had eleven men to go. Medford tried one more and he only got one hooked up before his suit spread out on him and left him standing there."

"Well — how did they get back in?"

"They didn't. They're still there."

Kimberly sat back in his chair with a fishlike gulp. "Henry, you don't mean — When was — When did this happen?"

Johnson glanced at his watch out of sight of the screen. "Exactly thirty-three and one half hours ago. Those men are —"

"Well, you've got ground joint suits at Copernicus!"

"We'd switched over on the Queen, remember?" Johnson's teeth showed just a trifle now. "We believed in the reputation of Kimberly, and had the locks built for your new suits. We didn't have an iron pants aboard. In the terminal every blasted suit had been shipped out on an emergency call to that freight that exploded four thousand miles off course. You do read the papers?"

"And your —"

"My men are still there and will continue to be there for two hours and fifteen minutes more when Capitol's ship, Carolinia, whose owners have not been such fools as to adopt Kimberly suits, will let down and kindly assist my men back in."

"You could have —" Kimberly fumbled.

"No, we couldn't. Medford, the home office, our engineer's staff, and everybody else has been trying to figure it out for over thirty hours. A total blank. They couldn't get the men back in.

"There are just two more items, and then I'm through. Number one: Your suits are haunted."

"Haunted!"

"Screams like a built-in banshee nearly drove the men crazy for a while until they were laid out. It was so high-pitched they could scarcely hear it at first, but it was there. Is it one of your improvements? I didn't notice anything about it in this spread you have in 'Rocket Flight'."

"Look, Henry, our suits may spread eagle, but they don't scream."

"Seventeen men on the Moon say they do."

"Must have been defective radios oscillating."

"They cut them off. The suits are haunted. You know what happens to a ship or piece of equipment when something like that starts around. It doesn't have to make sense."

"Henry, we'll —"

But the screen was suddenly blank. Kimberly was saved the necessity of trying to think just what they'd do at the moment.

He put his head between his hands and groaned. He felt as if a large meteorite had rolled slowly over him. The two-page, four-color advertisement of Kimberly Suits was still spread out on the desk before him. A sudden taste like half ripe vinegar filled his mouth. He slapped the magazine shut and gave it a shove that sent it over the edge of the desk to the floor.

Haunted spacesuits! Awghhh —