Private Dowst shrugged, too. "Too bad. High vack was waiting for him.
Nothing you can do when Old Man Nothing wants you. Not a thing in space!"
Rip listened, interested. This was the talk of old space hands, who
had given the high vacuum of empty space a personality, calling it
"high vack," or "Old Man Nothing." With understandable fatalism, they
believed--or said they believed--that when high vacuum really wanted
you, there was nothing you could do.
Rip had come across an interesting bit of word knowledge. Spacemen and
Planeteers alike had a way of using the phrase "by Gemini!" Gemini, of
course, was the constellation of the Twins, Castor and Pollux. Both were
useful stars for astrogation. The Roman horse soldiers of ancient history
had sworn "by Gemini," or "by the Twins." The Romans believed the stars
were the famous Greek warriors Castor and Pollux, placed in the heavens
after their deaths. In later years, the phrase degenerated to the simple
"by jiminy," and its meaning had been lost. Now, although few spacemen
knew the history of the phrase, they were using it again, correctly.
Other space talk grew out of space itself, not out of history. For
instance, the worst thing that could happen to a man was to have his
helmet broken.
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