When the floor was completed, the SimSup congratulated them. “Okay, boys; we’ll take a break and refurbish before the next session. Come out through the docking adapter.”

Preceded by the divers, Bleeker made his way through the cramped adapter and toward the brightly lit water beyond.

“Now you, Chuck,” the SimSup said.

Jones made his way into the shadowy adapter; the lockers clustered about, restricting his movement. He was illuminated by the tank lights behind him, and the free blue water of the facility ahead of him.

When he was well inside the adapter, the exit to the Apollo mock-up slammed shut.

Jones pulled up short. He wrapped his gloved palms around the hatch lever. It wouldn’t give.

“What’s going on?”

“Jones.” The SimSup voice was terse. “You’ve suffered a multiple failure. Your Command Module is disabled; you can’t return to it; you can’t get it loose of the docking port. The power in the workshop cluster is about to fail. What do you do? Go.”

Then the lights failed. He was left floating in pitch-darkness. Even the tank lights had gone out.

“What kind of asshole game is this?…”

He took a breath and calmed himself down. SimSups were famous for throwing crap like that at you. He had to find an answer to it, and fast; he could yell at them later.

He knew the theory. If Skylab astronauts couldn’t get home, a new Apollo would be sent up from the Cape. But if the disabled Apollo was jammed to the docking port, what use would that be?

In the pitch-darkness, he was starting to forget which way up he was.

These fucking sims.

He tried to concentrate; he pictured the adapter as he’d seen it just before the “failure”: the useless docking port before him; the access tunnel back to the workshop behind him.

He suffered a surge of panic. He reached out at random; his gloved hands clattered against lockers and handholds. The space was too big, he realized suddenly; that was what was disorienting him. If he were safely tucked up in Mercury -

Take it easy. You’re not in any danger. You can always back out into the tank. The divers are still there.

Yeah, he thought sourly. But if I do that, I’ll have fucked up. The Grand Old Man of the Astronaut Office. Put him in a swimming bath for two minutes, and he screws the pooch.

In fact, he thought, I’m already screwing up by taking so long. How many seconds? Half a minute? There must be something obvious I’m meant to do; something I’m missing. Think, damn it. If the docking port is blocked, then how -

Then it came to him. The docking adapter had two docking ports. Bleeker had gotten out through the axial port; but there was also a radial port, stuck to the side of the adapter for just the sort of problem he had.