All its external sensors had been seared cleanly from the hull, and many of the internal position-fixing devices had been destroyed or confused by the unnatural physics of Orbitsville. But the clocks were still in operation — and they had recorded a time lapse of five days. Five days from the passage through the Beachhead City aperture to the final touchdown on a hillside far into the interior. Starting from that basic fact, and using only a pocket calculator, it took just a few seconds for those on board to realize that they had travelled a distance of more than fifteen million kilometres.

In terms of the overall size of Orbitsville the journey was infinitesimal. A short hop, a stone’s throw, a stroll across sunlit grass and woodlands — but in human terms the distance itself was more of a barrier than mountains or torrents. It was known, for instance, that back on Earth many a country postman had in his lifetime walked a total distance equal to a trip to the Moon, but that was only 385,000 kilometres. Walking back to Beachhead City would have been a task to be carried out by successive generations over a period of a thousand years.

Using the vast resources of the Bissendorf’s workshops it would have been possible to build a fleet of vehicles which might have cut the journey time down to a mere century — except that wheels and other automobile components wear out in a matter of months. It would not be possible to transport the maintenance and manufacturing facilities which might have enabled the caravan to complete its golden journey.

There was also the difficulty that no man or machine knew the exact direction in which to travel. It would have been possible to get a rough bearing from the angle of the day and night ribs across the sky, but a rough bearing would be of no value. At the distances involved, a deviation of only one degree would have caused the train to miss Beachhead City by hundreds of thousands of sun-gleaming kilometres.

By the time the dead had been buried, the day was well advanced, and the remaining men and women of the Bissendorf’s crew were ceasing to be citizens of Earth. They were experiencing the infinity-change, the wistful, still contentment which poured down from the motionless sun of Orbitsville.

“We’re going back,” Garamond announced flatly.

He studied the faces of his executive staff, noting how they were reacting. Some looked at him with open amusement, others stared downwards into the grass, seemingly embarrassed. Behind them, further along the hillside, the great scarred hulk of the Bissendorf shocked the eye with its incongruity, and beyond it microscopic figures moved on the plain in the rituals of a ball game. The sun was directly overhead, as always, creating only an occasional flicker of diamond-fire on the dark blue waters of the lakes which banded the middle distance. Garamond began to feel that his words had been absorbed by Orbitsville’s green infinities, sucked up cleanly before they reached the edge of the irregular ring in which the group was sitting, but he resisted the urge to repeat himself.

“It’s a hell of a long way,” Napier said, finally breaking the heavy silence. His statement of the obvious, Garamond knew, constituted a question.

“We’ll build aircraft.”

O’Hagan cleared his throat. “I’ve already thought of that, Vance. We have enough workshop facilities still intact to manufacture a reasonable subsonic aircraft, and the micropedia can give us all the design data, but the distance is just too great. You run into exactly the same problem as with wheeled vehicles. Your aircraft might do the trip in three or four years — except that we haven’t the resources to build a plane which can fly continuously for that length of time. And we couldn’t transport major repair facilities.” O’Hagan glanced solemnly around the rest of the group, reproving them for having left it to him to deal with a wayward non-scientist.

Garamond shook his head. “When I said we are going back, I didn’t mean all of us, in a body. I meant that I am going back, together with any of the crew who are sufficiently determined to make it — even if that means only half-a-dozen of us.”

“But…”

“We’re going to build a fleet of perhaps ten aircraft. We’re going to incorporate as much redundancy as is compatible with good aerodynamics. We’re going to fly our ten machines towards Beachhead City, and each time one of them breaks down we’re going to take the best components out of it and put them in the other machines, and we’re going to fly on.”

“There’s no guarantee you’ll get there, even with the last aircraft.”

“There’s no guarantee I won’t.”

“I’m afraid there is.” O’Hagan’s pained expression had become even more pronounced. “There’s this problem of direction which we have already discussed. Unless you’ve got a really accurate bearing on Beachhead City there’s no point in setting out.”

“I’m not worried about getting a precise bearing,” Garamond said, making a conscious decision to be enigmatic. He was aware that in the very special circumstances of the Bissendorf’s final flight the whole concept of command structure, of the captain-and-crew relationship, could easily lose its validity. It was necessary at this stage to re-establish himself in office without the aid of insignia or outside authority.

“How do you propose to get one?”

“I propose instructing my science staff to attend to that chore for me. There’s an old saying about the pointlessness of owning a dog and doing your own barking.” Garamond fixed a steady challenging gaze on O’Hagan, Sammy Yamoto, Morrison, Schneider and Denise Serra. He noted with satisfaction that they were responding as he had hoped — already there were signs of abstraction, of withdrawal to a plateau of thought upon which they became hunters casting nets for a quarry they had never seen but would recognize at first sight.

“While they’re sorting that one out,” Garamond continued, speaking to Napier before any of the science staff could voice objections, “we’ll convene a separate meeting of the engineering committee. The ship has to be cut up to get the workshop floors level, but in the meantime I want the design definition drawn up for the aircraft and the first production tapes prepared.” He got to his feet and walked towards the improvised plastic hut he was using as an office. Napier, walking beside him, gave a dry cough which was out of place issuing from the barrel of his chest.

“TB again?” Garamond said with mock sympathy.

“I think you’re going too fast, Vance. Concentrating too much on the nuts and bolts, and not thinking enough about the human element.”

“Be more specific, Cliff.”

“A lot of the crew have got the Orbitsville syndrome already. They don’t see any prospect of getting back to Beachhead City, and many of them don’t even want to get back. They see no reason why they shouldn’t set up a community right here, using the Bissendorf as a mine for essential materials.”

Garamond stopped, shielded his eyes and looked beyond the ship towards the plot of land, marked with a silver cross, where forty men and women had been buried. “I can understand their feelings, and I’m not proposing to ride herd on those who want to stay. We’ll use volunteers only.”

“There could be less than you expect.”

“Surely some of them, a lot of them, have reasons for getting back.”

“The point is that you aren’t proposing to take them back, Vance. The planes won’t make it all the way, so you’re asking them to choose between staying here in a strong sizeable community with resources of power, materials and food — or being dropped somewhere between here and Beachhead City in groups of ten or less with very little to get them started as independent communities.”