"So?" I asked. "Who wants to be first?"
Neither Lizard nor Duke answered. The intense pink landscape was somehow intimidating. We studied it in silence. The drifts kept sliding and collapsing under their own weight. We were in the middle of a rolling sea of powdery dunes.
I realized I'd been making an inaccurate comparison. These weren't snowdrifts-this was dust as fine as smoke, and piled as delicately as spider silk. The rosy powder was so fine the light glittered and sparkled as if the dunes were made of magic. It was impossible to see them clearly. They were bright and vague and hard to focus on.
There were tiny motes floating in the air. I could feel my eyes starting to water. But I had an odd thought about this stuff-I had to test it.
I stepped down the ramp, three steps, four-knelt and scooped up a handful. It felt like talcum, smooth and powdery-but with a curious silkiness. It was almost liquid.
I sifted a little more, till I was rubbing the last of it between my fingers. "It's very faintly gritty. There must be some larger particles in it too. I don't know." I touched a fingertip to my tongue. It was sweet. I glanced back upward. Both Lizard and Duke were watching me with curious expressions. "It tastes as good as it smells."
I scooped up another handful and blew on it. It puffed away like smoke-like dandelion fur. The motes drifted in the air like snowflakes. I was right in my guess.
I came back up the ramp and stepped back into the chopper, brushing the last of it from my hands. "I know what this stuff is-" I said it hesitantly. The realization was numbing.
Both Lizard and Duke looked at me.
"Remember Dr. Zymph's speech at the conference?" I said to Lizard. "-The one where she listed some of the different creatures in the Chtorran ecology? Well, these are the puffballs! Or what's left of them-they powder like dandelions."
"But so much-?" wondered Lizard. She looked out at the frozen pink landscape again.
I shrugged. "I guess they all blew up at once. The right combination of heat and sun and wind and who knows what else and you get puffballs. But they're practically pure protein," I said. "You can eat all you want. The stuff is harmless-"
"Harmless to everything but precision machinery," Lizard said. "Dammit. The one decent thing in the Chtorran ecology and it knocks airplanes out of the sky."
"Have you got a science kit here?" I asked. "I want to bag some of this."
"Yeah, wait a minute-" I followed her into the back. She opened another panel and dug out a pack for me. I returned to the hatch with a plastic bag.
"This stuff's a mess," coughed Duke, stepping around me. "We're going to need masks."
"I'm already getting them," called Lizard. "And goggles too."
"The puffballs powder as soon as they hit the ground," I reported. I stepped down onto the ramp again. There were fresh puffballs drifting down now-the great wall of clouds were just coming overhead. Some of the puffballs were as large as apricots-but so ethereal to look at they were hardly there. They were just spherical hints in the air, bursting like bubbles if they even brushed against each other, or anything.
"They can't even support their own weight," I called. "The stuff must be compacting under each new layer." I began filling the plastic bag.
"Here's a mask," said Lizard, reappearing in the doorway. I came back up the ramp to get it; she handed me an O-mask with goggles. And an air pack. "That stuff is pretty fine," she explained. "You'd better carry your own air."
"Good thinking," said Duke. He was already pulling his mask down over his head. "What about weapons?"
"What do you want?"
"What have you got?"
"Come take a look-"
Duke followed her aft. I heard the sound of a floor panel being pulled up. Then Duke whistled. "Holy Jesus! This ship is better equipped than a man with three balls!"
"I like to be careful," I heard Lizard say.
I wasn't surprised. I remembered her from my last visit to Denver. The woman was inhuman. What would surprise me would be seeing the famous Colonel Tirelli caught unprepared. I hoped I'd never be there to see it happen. I doubted there would be survivors.
I stepped out onto the ramp again and looked around.
Something moved.
On the far side of the dune, just behind that pink bush. Something small.
I thought I saw eyes. A face. Staring at me.
I wanted to call Duke, but I was afraid of scaring it off. InsteadI took another step down the ramp. Slowly.
The face didn't move. The eyes blinked.
I wondered what Duke and Lizard were doing. I wished I could warn them not to make any sudden moves or loud noises.
I took another step. Very slowly, I shaded my eyes against the sun and the glittering pink dust.
The eyes behind the bush were large. And gold. The face was pink. And furry. But it wasn't a worm face. Worms didn't have faces. Worms had two eyes, sort of, and a mouth, sort of-but that still didn't add up to a face. A worm had no more face than a snail. This was a face. Almost... human. I couldn't tell if the fur was really pink or just covered with dust. I'd bet the latter.
I took another step down. I was on the lowest step of the ramp. One more step ...
FOURTEEN
-AND THEN Duke appeared in the door behind me. "What do you want, Jim-the torch or the freezer?"
The eyes vanished. I caught a quick glimpse of a furry body and that was all. Something scuttled and there was pink smoke. "Shit!"
"What was that-?" said Duke.
"There was something out there-" I pointed. "Some kind of humanoid!"
"Where-?"
"Over there!" I dropped off the bottom step of the ramp and sank chest deep in the pink powder. A great cloud of it swirled up around me. I ignored it and started pushing toward the bush the creature had been hiding behind. The powder was as light as cotton candy. It pushed aside like cobwebs. It was hardly there at all.
"Jim-wait! It might be a worm!"
"This was no worm! I know a worm when I see one! This was humanoid!"
"Here! Take the freezer!" He came down the ramp after me, but stopped on the bottom step. He was carrying a long nozzled rod and a pair of small tanks. Liquid nitrogen. The rod was almost as tall as I was and connected to the tanks by a stiff silvery hose. I'd used this kind of portable unit before. I grabbed it from Duke and shrugged quickly into the harness. The tanks sat on my back and I could use the rod to direct a soft-pressure spray of instant supercooling. It was a great way to gather specimens
Duke reached up behind him and grabbed the flamethrower. "All right, let's go see-" He jumped into the dust. It came up in a cloud.
Lizard appeared in the doorway carrying a laser-gun. Duke waved her back. "No, you stay with the ship! Get on the radio. This might be something." I knew what he meant by that. We might not come back. But we could leave a clue for the ones who came after us.
Lizard got it; she nodded. "I'll cover you from the turret."
"Good. Let's go, Jim." We pushed off. The dust was almost waist deep.
I glanced back once and waved toward the chopper. I couldn't tell if Lizard waved back. I had to concentrate on my footing.
I was discovering something interesting about the pink powder we were trying to move through. It was only fluffy on the top. The deeper it was, the denser it got. The more I moved, the lower I sank-and I was sinking deeper with every step. It was like the lunar dust that almost killed that astronaut, "Free Fall" Ferris. The similarity was scary. I began to wonder if this was such a good idea. I started to lift the spray nozzle over my head to protect it-and then I had another thought.
I set the nozzle for wide-spray, pointed it forward, and touched the trigger lightly. A cold white cloud whooshed out, putting a sudden chill into the air. The pink powder snapped and sputtered and solidified.