Joe said wrily, "It seems that we ought to weigh something, now we've
got here. So we feel queer that we don't. Shoes, Mike?"

Mike peeled off the magnetic-soled slippers from their place on the
cabin wall. He handed them out and opened the door. A biting chill came
in it. Joe slipped on the shoe-soles with their elastic bands to hold
them. He stepped out the door.

He didn't land. He floated until he reached the sidewall. Then he pulled
himself down by the netting. Once he touched the floor, his shoes seemed
to be sticky. The net and the plastic sidewalls were, of course, the
method by which a really large airlock was made practical. When this
ship was about to take off again, pumps would not labor for hours to
pump the air out. The sidewalls would inflate and closely enclose the
ship's hull, and so force the air in the lock back into the ship. Then
the pumps would work on the air behind the inflated walls--with nets to
help them draw the wall-stuff back to let the ship go free. The lock
could be used with only fifteen minutes for pumping instead of four
hours.

The door in the back of the lock clanked open. Joe tried to walk toward
it. He discovered his astounding clumsiness. To walk in magnetic-soled
shoes in weightlessness requires a knack. When Joe lifted one foot and
tried to swing the other forward, his body tried to pivot. When he
lifted his right foot, he had to turn his left slightly inward. His arms
tried to float absurdly upward. When he was in motion and essayed to
pause, his whole body tended to continue forward with a sedate toppling
motion that brought him down flat on his face. He had to put one foot
forward to check himself. He seemed to have no sense of balance. When he
stood still--his stomach queasy because of weightlessness--he found