"Can you keep a scan on possible spots too thin to bear any weight?"Killashandra had a quick vision of herself falling through level after level of cinder.
"Monitoring," was the ship's response.
Killa realized she'd been holding her breath and expelled it.That allowed her stomach to mention it was empty, so while she made a confident circuit of the cavern, she sucked up the ration.In several places and with great care, she placed her gloved hand on the walls; her wrist gauge gave not so much as a wiggle.The ambient temperature of the cavern was the same as that on the satellite's surface.But there was something she was missing.Unable to think what that was, she shrugged and sucked on her tube.
"Hey, this glop's not bad, Bren," she said.
"Not eating already?"
"On the hour, every hour," Lars answered.He hunkered down by the visible end of the material and poked, careful not to let his chisel touch the glowing substance as he scraped out a semicircle.He gave a grunt."It's going down.But where?Any access to the next level, Bren?"
"I think so," the ship answered after a bit."Sort of a maze, but your suits have tracers on 'em, so I can keep track and direct you.Go out the way you came in…"
Following his directions, they traveled one of the more tortuous routes they had ever followed, accustomed as they were to the vagaries of sly crystal in the Milekey Ranges on Ballybran.
"I'm glad we don't have to stay too long in this place," Killa muttered, shining her lights around.The passageways seemed darker than ever after the subtle radiance of the junk-jewel cave.She preferred to have as much light around her as possible in dark burrows.The rock around them seemed to absorb their lights."You eat it," she growled as she walked.
"What?Me?Oh, you mean the rock?"Lars asked."Yeah, it does sort of soak it up.Speaking of which…"
"Not you, too!"Brendan exclaimed, almost sputtering."It's scarcely two hours since you consumed an immense meal."
"Hmmm, true!"
"Humpf."
"We can last about another hour, I think," Lars said, and grinned as Killa glanced back at him.Would Brendan catch the teasing note?
"At this rate," replied Brendan trenchantly, "we'll be here for months!Turn obliquely right now, and watch that it is oblique-there's a hole!"
"Whoops, so there is," Killa said, teetering on the edge as her hand and head lamps outlined the even deeper blackness.Then, as she swung right, the comforting arch of a passage was visible."Nice save there, Bren.And what have we here but another cave!"Her tone was richly facetious."And," she added, as she shone both lamps in a swing, "our little creepy-crawly has fingers in this pie, too."
Lars stepped around her and walked up to the glittering nubbin just entering the roof of this cavity.He dropped his light to the floor, and they could both see a small pile of debris.Lars hunkered down and, with the end of his hammer, carefully prodded the mound, examining the end of the tool when he had finished.
"Nope, not a melt.More like simple dust."
"Take a sample," his partner suggested.
"Take a sample of the rock, too," Brendan added.
"Now, look a'that," Killa said, holding her light steady on the opposite wall, where the liquid opal had intruded as well."How many layers of this cave complex did the geologists explore?"
"At the original landing site, they penetrated several miles below the surface before they could proceed no further, but not here.However, records indicate that, in the cave above, the arch of the junk was incomplete.Nor do they mention that it penetrated below the first level in the landing site."
"Fascinating!"Killa commented."How many such manifestations were recorded, Bren?"Dammit, she had studied those reports only last night and she couldn't recall the details.
"In nine of the twenty-three sites explored, they observed this opalescence.By then they hadn't found anything else particularly noteworthy, so they decided to proceed to the next system on their route when…"
"Hmm, yes, indeed, when!"
"You'd think it would grow up, out of the core," Lars mused, "instead of down from the surface."
"If it is indigenous," Brendan suggested.
Lars and Killa were silent a moment, considering that theory."Well, being alien to this system would answer why it's topside instead of down below," Lars remarked.
"Is there a way to prove alien origin?"Killa asked.
"If you could find a sample that'll submit to examination, possibly," the ship replied wryly.
"Suppose we explain that this won't hurt?"Killa was feeling waggish at this point.Faint from hunger, maybe.She sucked on the tube and got a mouthful of something rather more sweet than she liked.But it did depress the hunger pangs."An alien substance?Hmm.Wherever could it have originated?"
"There are more things on heaven and earth, Horatio…" Brendan intoned in a marvelously sepulchral note.
"Nonsense, Bren, there's usually a scientific explanation for everything," Killa said sharply.The very idea of something like the opal just "dropping" in made her slightly nervous.They hadn't discovered anything about it yet.And it had killed a whole exploratory team.
"I wonder," Lars said slowly, "if a quick freeze might not work to get us a sample."
"Work how?"Killa asked, her mind taken off both stomach and apprehension.
"I can't imagine how this stuff generates heat enough to melt an alloy as tough as the chisel, but maybe liquid nitrogen…"
"Wouldn't hurt to try," Bren said."Fight liquid with liquid?"
"Have you got some?"Killa asked, again surprised.
"My dear Killashandra Ree, this ship has everything!"Bren's voice was smug."My inventory shows that there are two cylinders of liquid nitrogen in storage.I have both spray and stream nozzles that will fit the standard apertures."
"Hmmm."
"I'll have one ready when you return for your next meal," Brendan added at his driest.
"And more luminescent paint, too," Lars added as the last drop dribbled out of his marking tube.
They retraced their steps very carefully, feeling the cindery crunch of the surface under their booted feet.Again something teased at the back of Killa's mind but refused to be identified.
The promised meal awaited them in the airlock, and they could barely wait until the iris had cycled shut and the oxygen level was adequate before they undid their helmets and attacked the food.
"Oh, this is good, Bren," Killa said, gobbling down refried steakbean and reaching for the orange-and-green milsi stalks of which she was particularly fond.Lars, as usual, was munching on grilled protein.
"Is indeed," Lars mumbled.
"You'll notice the nitro tank?"Brendan asked pointedly.
"Hmmm…" and Killashandra waved a forkful of beans at it."Appreciate that."
"And the marker tubes?"
It was Lars's turn to reply."Thanks."
"You're welcome."Brendan sounded a trifle miffed.
"Can't help this," Lars added, glancing up apologetically at the airlock's optic.
Brendan's sigh was audible."No, I suppose you can't, really.I've just never seen any bodies consume so much food in such a short time.And you're both bone-thin."
"Symbiont," Killashandra managed to say, one hand cramming as many of the bright green vegetable spheres into her mouth as would fit, while she scooped up more milsi stalks in the other."You'll never see a fat singer," she added after swallowing her mouthful.
Oddly enough, the compulsion to gorge eased off about the time they were mopping up the plates with yeast bread that was one of Brendan's specialties.Though as a shell person, he was nourished entirely by the fluids pumped into the titanium capsule that contained his stunted body, still he was fascinated by food and did most of the catering, even when Boira was on board.