Captain Fromer was also creating vivid accounts—of quite another sort—that would soon be amusing several hundred billion news-hungry citizens of the Federation.

When the repair ship arrived, it came, to Hansen’s astonishment, to the asteroid, and not alongside Fromer’s ship. He soon found out that there was someone else who shared the Captain’s embarrassment.

“I’m Bullard,” said a tall, thin, mournful man. “Mind if I sit?”

“Help yourself,” Hansen waved a hand toward the meager accommodations. He had no idea why a Senior Engineer was being so deferential, but he enjoyed the feeling of power.

[Pg 10]

[Pg 10]

“You’re probably wondering about a lot of things,” Bullard began sadly. “Frankly, we don’t have any ideas about how we can fix Captain Fromer’s door.” He waited to let that sink in. Then he continued: “It took us three days back at the base to find out that when these ships were built, almost five hundred years ago, nobody bothered to include detail drawings of the door mechanism.”

“But why? You certainly know how to build—”

“We know how to build Star Class ships, sure. We’ve built a few in the past century or two. There’s never been need for replacement, really. These ships are designed to last forever. The original fleet was conceived to fill the System’s needs for a full thousand years.”

“But the doors on the few ships that have been built. How—”

“The ship’s we’ve built were exact duplicates of Captain Fromer’s ship—except for the door.” Bullard’s long face radiated despair. “No one ever questioned why the door mechanism wasn’t included in the original plans. We simply designed another type—a different type—of door.”

“Well, you certainly can find out how this particular door works, can’t you?”

“I hope so,” Bullard said, wringing his hands. “But we have a couple of other problems. Number one, Captain Fromer has an extremely important passenger aboard. None other than His Exalted Excellency, R’thagna Bar. He is—or was—on his way home after concluding a treaty of friendship with the President of the Federation.”

Hansen managed a whistle.

“Furthermore,” Bullard continued, “His Excellency has to be home soon to get 

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