remember fastening it down.
Must've been jarred loose
during the whirlpool.
Better get these on as quickly as possible.
They've stopped on
the outer limits of the left lung.
Another delay, with only 42 minutes left.
It'll be close
but there's still a margin of safety.
Let's find out what's holding them up.
Contact the Proteus.
Must be some kind of mechanical difficulty.
I told you to cut down on the sugar.
Oh, I can't help it. I'm just weak, I guess.
- Shouldn'tyou answer that?
- Not now. We need air, not greetings.
- It's full of rocks.
- Those are impurities embedded in the lung.
Carbon from smoke and specks of dust.
Well, we'd better get on with it.
Careful! There's a tremendous air pressure
in there in relation to our size.
I'll hold her from the other side of the wall.
Maybe that will do it.
- Tie my safety line to the sub.
- Here. Let me have it.
All right, now. Push the snorkel through
as soon as I get inside.
Wait for the lull -
between the time he inhales and exhales.
Now!
Full.
He's gone!
What can we do?
"Delay caused by stop to refuel air. "
"Proceeding through pleural cavity. "
"Refuel air"?
Why not?
They had a choice of over a billion alveoli.
And a broken trigger wire.
A smashed transistor.
No way to fire the lamp.
Well, that's the end of the laser.
- You must carry spare parts.
- Nothing that's built into the chassis.
- If it only hadn't come loose!
- That's beside the point now.
- Isn't there another operation you could try?
- No. No, there's no other way.
I don't see the sense in going on with this.
- But we must!
- With no laser?
If you had a transistor about this size
and power output
and a thin enough wire, could you mend it?
Yes, but it requires absolute precision.
A surgeon might.
Yes. Yes, I could do it.
Well, if I had the parts!
I've got a source. All we have to do is tap it.
Grant, just a minute. You're surely
not going to dismantle the wireless?
It's just one transistor and a circuit wire.
That'll knock out our communications.
We'll be cutting ourselves off.
They'd still be able to track us by radar
because of the radioactive fuel.
What's it to be? The wireless, or Benes's life?
Send a message to the control tower.
Message from the Proteus, sir.
"Cannibalising wireless to repair laser. "
- They're what?
- "This is our last message. "
Incommunicado!
Now they're really on their own.
We can track 'em, but that's all we can do.
Something told me I got into
the wrong end of this business.
Inner space...!
The transistor will do,
but the wire is much too thick.
- There's nothing closer.
- Let me see.
I might be able to scrape it thin enough.
Cora, would you bring me
a number 11 scalpel, please?
Yes, Doctor.
Looks like the sea at dawn.
We're safe as long as it remains that colour.
We're in the pleural sac.
It keeps the lungs from rubbing against
the wall of the chest. Up there.
When those membranes become inflamed
we get pleurisy and a racking cough.
Cough? If he can kick up a storm
by just breathing...!
His pleura's in fine condition.
Should be plain sailing from here on.
Let's hope so.
So far, someone's tried to sabotage
this mission twice.
Sabotage?
I don't quite understand.
I sawthe laser before we started.
It was fastened down securely.
What happened was no accident.
Any more than my safety line snapping
after it was tied off to the sub.
- Surely you don't suspect Duval.
- That line was tampered with.
I don't know what to say.
I know he's under a cloud, but...
there's not a more dedicated man
in medicine.
We still never know anyone's mind.
I don't believe it. It was an accident.
- Two in a row?
- It's possible.
Look at those walls up ahead.
We're entering the lymphatic system.
Those are nuclei of cells lining a duct.
I always had an idea
there was only one system: the circulatory.
The lymphatic system
drains off excess fluid from the tissues.
Without it, we'd all blow up like balloons.
-