“Not to me, either,” Jerry said. “If we mess this up, we may not get a second chance.” He thought of Inca sentries watching Spaniards rowing ashore from their galleons. They’d be freaking out. They couldn’t build ships like that. What kind of powerful strangers could?

Before long, they found out.

Dale said, “What I will do tomorrow is have Clementine’s central claw retracted so it doesn’t obstruct the airlock … if that is an airlock. A day or two after that, we can find out whether there’s any obvious way in.”

“‘We’?” Jerry echoed. Waddaya mean, we, Kemosabe? went through his head. He didn’t come out with that, luckily. He just asked, “Do you mean me?”

“Are you volunteering?” Dale returned. “If you are, you’re the logical person to try it first. If you’re not, I won’t order you to and I won’t hold it against you. I wouldn’t order any man to risk his life. I understand you’d be doing that here.”

“I’ve been risking my life ever since I signed up to go after the K-129, haven’t I?” Jerry said. He hesitated again. He’d known there was danger since he found out the sub lay on the bottom because it did something—nobody was sure what, even now—to piss off the starship that got there first. But the danger of just knocking on Humpty Dumpty’s door seemed a lot more immediate. He sighed. “Yeah, I guess I’m volunteering. This is what I came along for, isn’t it?”

“Nobody came along to be a victim.” Dale was thinking along with him, all right. “The goal is to get inside and learn as much as we can. There are risks involved, sure. But we’ve run risks since we started lowering Clementine toward Humpty Dumpty.”

Clementine. Humpty Dumpty. The names sounded innocent—comical, even. No one on the K-129 was laughing. No one on the Glomar Explorer, either. Yeah, this was for keeps. Jerry sighed again. “Okay.”

Tape the booties over the protective outer suit. Feel all around each calf to make sure the seal was tight. Tape the surgical gloves over the ends of the suit’s sleeves. Southpaw Jerry had no problem doing up his right arm. Using his off hand to secure things on his left was harder, but he managed. He nodded to Dave, who was watching as he and Steve put on the gear that might or might not save their skins. “Glad I had some practice.”

“Good. That’s good.” The recovery director nodded back. No I told you so in his tone or manner. He was a pro. He helped Jerry with the straps that held the air tank on his back, then did the same for Steve. “Remember, start using them as soon as you go into the moon pool. You have forty-five minutes after that.”