Then he thought he had eaten fire, and his throat and lungs were raw.
Johnny Nine swayed on his feet. The magnetized soles kept him erect. The Earth-faces spun dizzily around him. He reached for his helmet, instinctively, reached and missed, reached again.
He clawed frantically at his helmet, and everything around him turned black.
The helmet fell in place with a loud clang of steel on steel.
He was unconscious only five minutes, but, as consciousness flowed back, he felt his head hammer with sharp pains, and lights danced before his eyes. He was afraid he was going to be sick inside the space suit.
It was fifteen minutes before he was recovered enough to listen to what they had to tell him.
An Earth doctor, the pilot ship's surgeon, made it very plain.
"... Twenty-one generations is a long time," the doctor had told him, "for an animal that can adapt itself as easily as man...."
Johnny Nine could complete the rest of it: Sometime, long ago, perhaps as early as the Second Generation, perhaps at the time of the Great Sickness, the terrarium had been thrown out of balance. And, as the balance continued to shift, man continued to adapt.
He could hear them, around him, talking quietly.
"We haven't told yur Ship, yet. We thought you'd better do that."
The Earthmen fell silent, ringing him in.
"Yes," he said, "I'll tell them. I'll tell them Earth's air is poison, and her water, and her land." His voice was hollow. "I'll tell them that."
He staggered toward the space port, blindly.
Johnny Nine looked at them, the ring of friendly, kindly, sad faces.
He stepped into the lock, and, when the outer door opened, he popped away from the pilot ship.
He floated toward the Ship that was Home.
How am I going to tell them? he asked himself. How am I going to tell them?
And Marte? Tell her that she will never feel the free wind on her face?
Johnny Nine floated awkwardly away from the pilot ship.