THE SLENDOR STUBIAN SPACECRAFT had not been designed for transporting this many people in comfort, especially when five of them were rather large earthlings. The atmosphere re-circulating device was whirring a bit louder that it had been, almost seeming to cough now and again, probably from working overtime, and while none of the people on board were going hungry, they were about to experience their first crisis of the trip.
They were about to run out of beer.
This was not acceptable.
"George, yew got to step on it," Billy Joe exclaimed, eyeing the dwindling stack of six packs that rested beside the wall. "We're movin' bout as fast as sorghum molasses on a cold morning. We're gonna run out of brewski's, and if we do, they ain't no tellin' what Jack will try to do. He'll be tryin' to make some kind of home brew, and, son, if he gets turned loose on yer food manufacturin' machine, he's liable to come up with dang near anything. Fact is, George, if we have to start drinkin' Jack's homebrew, we're all apt to be blind runnin' crazy before we get to Stubia."
"Sorry, billljo," JorG said, "but ship am running at top speed damn skippy already. Make it go faster, and we will bust a gut fer sure."
Cindy glanced at the little green man sitting next to her husband.
"George, who told you to say, 'bust a gut?'" she wanted to know.
"Heard Jack say that, Cindy, when Dolly told joke about the hotdamn traveling farmer and the salesman's ugly daughter. Jack say he laugh so hard he almost bust a gut."