Vee took a step forward, holding her hand out. The other’s wings twitched minutely, its body swelled, and it drifted forward.
Vee’s breath caught in her throat.
A second creature, this one more heavily lined, or wired, came up next to the first one. They hovered close together, their beaks, maybe they were really more like muzzles, almost touching. Then, together they turned and flew back into the gondola under the silver and white balloon.
The moment was gone so abruptly that Vee was a little surprised to find she herself was still there.
And Angela still has no air tank. Vee cursed herself for standing and staring. She turned and lumbered back across the ragged plain.
Last time, last time. You can do this. She held tightly to the thought. Her plate warnings were now more orange than yellow. Her muscles felt stretched out and limp. Sweat trickled down her face, pooling for a moment in her collar before the cloth wicked it away. Her back itched. Her hands had swollen until her gloves felt too tight.
“You all right?” asked Josh.
“Barely,” she admitted. “But I’ll made it.”
From here she could see Scarab Five’s open airlock and the glass-encased bodies lying on the floor.
If they can make it, I sure as hell can. She glanced back to make sure the others were keeping up. They limped and stumbled their way back, just as she did. The aliens had vanished.
We’ll all make it because we have to back each other’s stories up.
They bundled back into the airlock, trying to cram onto the benches. Except Adrian. He squatted down next to Charlotte and laid a hand on her wrist, as if his gloved fingers could feel her pulse through that alien crystal.
“Shut it down, Kevin, depressurize,” said Josh as he dogged the hatch. He was panting hard, and Vee saw the rivers of sweat running down his face.
“Doing it now.” Kevin’s voice had relaxed, weirdly enough, and he sounded more like the pilot who had shepherded them all down than the terrified man she’d last seen on the corridor floor.
The pump began struggling to take them back to human conditions. Relief surged through Vee. She slumped against the inside of her hardsuit. Angela Cleary lay right at her feet, like a corpse that had been dipped in plastic. Vee closed her eyes. Angela was breathing under there. They all were. No one was dead yet. Except that person the aliens took away.
Why did they take the dead one away?
“It’s a fake, huh?” Josh’s voice interrupted her thoughts and she was grateful, even when she interpreted his tone. “If the Discovery is a fake, what the hell were those? Holographs?”
“You thought the Discovery was a fake?” said Troy. “When we’ve just seen the builders—”
“The Discovery is a fake,” snapped Vee. She started shaking. A thousand different emotions churned inside her and she couldn’t put a name to any of them. “Those creatures did not build the Discovery. Did those things look like they could fit through the tunnel? Those were birds, not moles.”
“So there are two sets of aliens?” said Troy, sounding dazed.
“Yes,” said Vee. “Us and them.”
Adrian hadn’t moved from his crouch next to Charlotte. He ran his gloves over the solid, crystal casing. Vee had no doubt he was thinking, How are we going to get them out of there? Vee sure was.
A sound like a shot split the air. Vee jerked backward. A crack swept down Charlotte’s case. It branched out, sending a network of fractures all along the crystal. Another shot, and another and another. The cases shattered.
Well, that answers that.
“Charlotte!” Adrian brushed away flakes of crystal that turned to dust as soon as he touched them. Vee, then Josh, fell clumsily to their knees, following his example. Vee brushed off Angela’s face, trying to get the stuff clear before she inhaled it.
Angela gasped, then choked. Her body convulsed under Vee’s hand and her face contorted horribly.
“Shit! Kevin! Kill the pump!” cried Adrian. “They’re getting the bends! Kill the pump!”
“No! They can’t live under this pressure!” Vee yelled. The gauge wasn’t even up to three atmospheres. That much pressure was not something an unsheltered body could tolerate. They were going to be crushed. Right in here. Right in front of them.
“The bends will kill them!” shot back Adrian. He was right. If they were brought up too fast, the gases in their blood would turn into bubbles in their veins, and those bubbles would float into their hearts.
But if they remained under this intense pressure, they’d simply be squeezed to death by the air.
No-win situation, thought Vee, almost hysterically.
“Keep us down, Kevin!” shouted Adrian. “Where’s the rescue drop?”