Claire was secretly unnerved. Andy was already finding an ability to push and grunt and wriggle against the gravity, still only a few centimeters at a time, but she had a nasty vision of him falling over the edge. Claire was developing a distaste for edges.

A robotic forklift whirred past. Claire froze, cowering in the back of their recess, clutching Andy to her, grabbing one of Tony's hands. The whirring trailed off into the distance. She breathed again.

"Relax," Tony squeaked. "Relax . . ." He breathed deeply in an apparent effort to follow his own advice.

Claire peered doubtfully out of the cubicle at the forklift, which had stopped farther down the corridor and was engaged in retrieving a plastic carton from its coded cell.

"Can we eat now?" She had been nursing Andy on and off for the last three hours in an effort to keep him quiet, and was drained in every sense. Her stomach growled, and her throat was dry.

"I guess," said Tony, and dug a couple of ration bars out of their hoard in the pack. "And then we'd better try to work our way back to the hangar."

"Can't we rest here a little longer?"

Tony shook his head. "The longer we wait, the more chance they'll be looking for us. If we don't get on a shuttle for the transfer station soon, they may start searching the outbound jumpships, and there goes our chance of stowing away undiscovered until after they boost past the point of no return."

Andy squeaked and gurgled; a familiar aroma wafted from his vicinity.

"Oh, dear. Would you please get out a diaper?" Claire asked Tony.

"Again? That's the fourth time since we left the Habitat."

"I don't think I brought near enough diapers," Claire worried, smoothing out the laminated paper and plastic form Tony handed her.

"Half our pack is filled with diapers. Can't you—make it last a little longer?"

"I'm afraid he may be getting diarrhea. If you leave that stuff on his bottom too long, it eats right through his skin—gets all red—even bleeds—gets infected—and then he screams and cries every time you touch it to try to clean it. Real loud," she emphasized.

The fingers of Tony's lower right hand drummed on the shelf floor, and he sighed, biting back frustration. Claire wrapped the used diaper tightly in itself and prepared to stash it back in their pack.

"Do we have to cart those along?" Tony asked suddenly. "Everything in the pack is going to reek after a while. Besides, it's heavy enough already."

"I haven't seen a disposal unit anywhere," said Claire. "What else can we do with them?"

Tony's face screwed up with inner struggle. "Just leave it," he blurted. "On the floor. It's not like it's going to float off down the corridor and get into the air recirculation, here. Leave them all."