I'm no fool, Artur Jarvon thought.
The closest star in his viewscreen, a bloated red giant six and a half light years away, echoed back his silent declaration in a resounding bass.
No fool ... no fool ... no fool....
"I'm tough," Jarvon announced out loud to himself through clenched teeth.
Tough ... tough ... tough....
The blinking lights of the control panel took up a soprano refrain.
Jarvon was investing all of the objects around him with their own personalities. This was one of the ways in which he combated the loneliness.
Scratching his unshaven chin, he leaned back in the contour swivel chair and surveyed the featureless ceiling. He heard the chair's steel bearings squeal beneath him for the umteen-thousandth time. Three months of oiling and still he hadn't been able to silence that infernal squealing. Three months of staring at the black and boring spaceways, of reading the unchanging instrument panel, of entering the same figures on the same keyboard of the same console again and again. Three months and he felt that in one more minute he would go mad. Although deliverance was at hand, every minute seemed like that now. He held on to sanity with his clenched teeth, by the fingertips that plowed-scratching against his unshaven chin until the flesh was raw. He held on to sanity minute by minute ... and he waited.
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