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which spread rapidly and dissolved in the surrounding water.
The Melfan made untranslatable noises and scuttled backward.
"What's wrong?" said Conway sharply. "Is it poisonous?"
"No, Doctor. There is a strong acid content but it is not immediately harmful.
If you were a water breather you would say that it stinks. But look at the
effect on the muscle."
The great pillar of muscle rooted firmly to both floor and roof was quivering,
its sharp curve beginning to straighten out.
"Yes," said Conway briskly, "this supports our theory about the creature's
method of ingestion. But now I think we should return to Descartes-this area
may not be as dead as we thought."
Specialized teeth plants served as a filter and killing barrier to food drawn
into the creature's stomach. Other symbiotic plants growing on the muscle
pillars released a secretion which caused them to stiffen, expand the stomach,
and draw in large quantities of food-bearing water. Presumably the secretion
also served to dissolve the food, digest it for assimilation through the
stomach wall or by other specialized plants- they had taken enough specimens
for
Thornnastor to be able to work out the digestive mechanism in detail. When the
power of the digestive secretion had been diluted by the food entering the
stomach their effect on the muscles diminished, allowing the pillars to
partially collapse again and expel undigested material.
Blisters were beginning to rupture off the other pillars now. By itself that
did not mean that the beast was alive, only that a dead muscle could still
respond to the proper stimulus. But the cavern roof was being pushed up and
water was flowing in again.
"I agree, Doctor," said Edwards, "let's get out of here. But could we leave by
a different mouth-we might learn something from a stretch of new scenery.
"Yes," said Conway, with the uncomfortable feeling that he should have said
no. If dead muscles could twitch, what other forms of involuntary activity
were possible to the gigantic carcass? He added, "You drive, but keep the
cargo hatch and personnel lock open-I'll stay outside with the e-ts .
A few minutes later Conway was hanging onto a handy projection as the vehicle
followed the e-ts into a different mouth opening. He hoped it was a mouth and
not a connection with something
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it was curving toward a live area of coast.
But before the lowering temperature of his feet could affect his speech
centers enough for him to order them back the way they had come, there was an
interruption.
"Major Edwards, stop the cruiser, please," said one of the Melfans. "Doctor
Conway, down here. I think I have found a dead.. . colleague."
It was a Drambon SRJH, no longer transparent but milky and shriveled with a
long, incised wound traversing its body, drifting and bumping along the floor.
"Thornnastor will be pleased with you, friend," said Conway enthusiastically.
"And so will
O'Mara and Prilicla. Let's get it aboard with the other specimens. Oh, I'm not
a water breather, but..
"It doesn't," the Melfan replied to the unspoken question. "I'd say that it
was too recently dead to be offensive.~~
The Chalder came sweeping back, its tentacles gripped the dead SRJH and
transferred it to the refrigerated specimen compartment, then it returned to
its position. A few seconds later one flat, toneless, translated word rasped
in their receivers.
"Company. ~
Edwards directed all his lights ahead to show a fighting, squirming menagerie
practically filling the throat ahead. Conway identified two kinds of large sea
predators who had obviously been able to batter a way through the brittle
teeth, several smaller ones, about ten SRJHs and a few large-headed, tentacled
fish that he had never seen before. It was impossible to tell at first which
were fighting which or even if it mattered to the beings concerned.
Edwards dropped the vehicle to the floor. "Back inside! Quickly!"
Half-running, half-swimming toward the vehicle, Conway envied the underwater
mobility of the Melfans so' much that it hurt. He overtook the Hudlar who had
the jaws of a big predator locked on its carapace. Just above him one of the
new life-forms had an SRJH wrapped around it, the Drambon doctor already
turning red as it treated its patient in the only way it knew how.
There was a deep, reverberating clang as another predator charged the cruiser,
smashing two of their four lights.
"Into the cargo hold!" Edwards shouted hoarsely. "We've no time to fiddle
about with personnel locks!"
"Get off me, you fool," said the Hudlar with the predator on its back. "I'm
inedible."
"Conway, behind you!"
Two big predators were coming at him along the bottom while the Chalder was
shooting in from the flank. Suddenly there was a Drambon doctor undulating
rapidly between the leading predator and Conway. It barely touched the beast
but the predator went into a muscular spasm so violent that parts of its
skeleton popped white through the skin.
So you can kill as well as cure, thought Conway gratefully as he tried to
avoid the second predator. The Chalder arrived then and with a swipe of its
armored tail cleared the Hudlar's back while simultaneously its enormous maw
opened and crashed shut on the second predator's neck.
"Thank you, Doctor," said Conway. "Your amputation technique is crude but
effective."
"All too often," replied the Chalder, "we must sacrifice neatness for
speed..."
"Stop chattering and get in!" yelled Edwards.
"Wait! We need another local medic for O'Mara," began Conway, gripping the
edge of the hatch. There was a Drambon doctor drifting a few yards away,
bright red and obliviously wrapped around its patient. Conway pointed and to
the Chalder said, "Nudge it inside, Doctor. But be gentle, it can kill, too."
When the hatch clanged shut a few minutes later the cargo hold contained two
Melfans, a
Hudlar, the Chalder, the Drambon SRJH with its patient and Conway. It was
pitch dark. The vehicle shuddered every few seconds as predators crashed
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against its hull, and conditions were so cramped that if the Chalder moved at
all everyone but the armor-plated Hudlar would have been mashed flat.
Several years seemed to go past before Edward's voice sounded in Conway's
helmet.
"We're leaking in a couple of places, Doctor-but not badly and it shouldn't
worry water breathers in any case. The automatic cameras have some good stuff
on internal life-forms being helped by local medics. O'Mara will be very
pleased. Oh, I can see teeth ahead. We'll soon be out of this
Conway was to remember that conversation several weeks later at the hospital
when the living and dead specimens and film had been examined, dissected, and
viewed so often that the leech-like Drambons undulated through his every
dream.
O'Mara was not pleased. He was, in fact, extremely displeased-with himself,
which made things much worse for the people around him.
"We have examined the Drambon medics singly and together, friend Conway," said
Prilicla in
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