He pointed down the passage to their left, the one that terminated in the Beehive.
The entire cylinder was rippling.
“That’s not good,” Rachel said.
The ripples were moving toward them, and they looked bigger and stronger than anything she’d seen. A big, nasty cat’s-eye was headed directly toward them.
VALYA
This had, without doubt, been the worst day of Valentina Makarova’s life. It wasn’t as long as the agonizing day when her father had been struck while walking drunk on a Moscow highway and been taken to a hospital to die. It wasn’t as physically taxing as the time she had contracted pneumonia and was out of her mind with fever and fear.
It wasn’t as disorienting as last week’s transit from Earth to Keanu in the vesicle.
But this day combined the worst of all three.
And it did not appear to be over yet.
In fact, confronting a large, terrifying alien just as she and Dale, Zack, and Makali had reached some kind of shelter meant there was only bad yet to come.
Valya knew she had not been an example of plucky pioneer spirit or gritty determination on the trek from Vesuvius Vent to this one. She had, in fact, spent most of the hike on the edge of hysteria—
To her amazement, Zack was right in front of the alien. Of course, there was almost nowhere else to go. Valya, Dale, and Makali were crowded behind him.
The Sentry was half again as tall as a human being, roughly symmetrical; it had a head, a torso, two arms, and two legs. But it also had two other pairs of arms protruding from its midsection. All arms ended in similar flaplike hands—each with half a dozen long fingers, at least two of them opposable.
The left lower arm was brandishing what looked a piece of aluminum tubing.
The creature was blue-green in color—that was either its skin or clothing or possibly armor. The skin looked shiny and hard to Valya.
The face was shadowed, hard to see. Complicating everything, the creature seemed to be swathed in the same flaking skinsuit material as the four humans.
“You know this thing?” Makali said.
“Its type. I’ve seen two,” Zack said. “Killed one.”
The Sentry, if that was what it was, remained motionless…like a jungle cat waiting to pounce, Valya thought. As Zack slowly moved side to side, apparently looking for a chance to dash around the Sentry, the alien reacted, rotating its big, thick body. On the second move, Valya saw something shiny and anomalous, a silvery piece of metal embedded in the Sentry’s back, and what looked like blood discoloring it.
Not that she had any right to think this, given her limited experience, but it seemed that the alien had trouble moving to its right.
“Zack,” she said.
“Something to offer, Valya?”
“I think he’s hurt!”
As if to prove her wrong, the Sentry took a swipe at Zack’s head, prompting a scream from Makali and, from Dale, “Val, just shut up!”
But Zack easily ducked the blow, and Valya grew more convinced that the alien was wounded.
“He’s not going to be able to hit you, Zack.”
“I hope you’re right!” he said.
“Zack, what are you trying to do?” Makali said.
“Get past him—” He tried it again; the Sentry took a second swipe at him, but this one was so slow and clumsy that Zack was able to grab the tube.
And yank it out of the Sentry’s grasp!
“Way to go!” Dale yelled. “See how he likes it!”
Fortunately, instead of clobbering the creature—which, given its size, would still be a bit of a trick—Zack merely brandished it…and was rewarded with the sight of the alien backing away and sinking down.
“What is going on?” Makali said.
“I told you,” Valya said. “It’s injured. Look at the back.”
The Sentry had lowered itself, folding its legs, until it was only as tall as they were. It leaned its good side against the wall of the Beehive…and now they could all see the obvious injury.
“Zack,” Makali said, “we can get past him.”
But Zack was regarding the creature, which was now gesturing with five of its six arms. (The one closest to the wound was hanging limp.) “I think it’s trying to talk to us.”
“I don’t hear anything,” Dale said.
“Sign language,” Valya said.
Dale turned to her and smiled nastily. “Oh, good, right in your wheelhouse. Translate, will you?”
“Fuck you,” she said. But Dale’s mean-spirited suggestion wasn’t too far wrong; Valya knew two different sign language systems. If anyone could figure out what the Sentry was trying to say, she would be the one.
Of course, it might take years. And given its physical condition, she wasn’t sure the Sentry would last another hour.
But Zack was already taking the lead. He slowly laid the tube on the ground—out of the Sentry’s reach, Valya hoped. Then he pointed to himself and his fellows, saying, in turn, “Human, human, human, human.” Then pointed to the Sentry, and opened his hands in what, for human beings, would have been an obvious Who are you? gesture.
The Sentry flapped its hands in what seemed to be a reply. If, looking from left to right, you numbered the alien’s upper hands as one and two, its middle pair as three four, and the lower, almost vestigial pair, as five six, the response went: two, one, four.
Or so Valya chose to see it. It would be difficult enough to decode these gestures in normal circumstances; the creature was wounded and likely not using hand number three. How would that change the message?
Zack was holding palms up, gently waving them, saying, We mean no harm.
The Sentry had no reply.
Zack carefully pointed to the wound. Then he tapped himself on the chest. “Ow!” He made a creditable howling-in-pain sound.
“Christ,” Dale said softly, but loud enough for Valya to hear.
All she could do was shoot him a dire look. Was he stupid or just evil? Any extraneous sound or movement was going to confuse the Sentry!
The Sentry used all three major arms to touch its chest. Then it pointed to the wound as best it could, all three hands.
And made a sound of its own! It was loud, like having a whale singing a meter away!
“Holy shit,” Makali said. This time Valya did not feel the need to offer censure; she was thinking the same thing.
Holding up his right hand, as if to say, Let me try this, Zack slowly reached toward the Sentry…toward the wound.
The Sentry’s head turned slowly, cautiously—or so it seemed to Valya. But it did not raise a hand to block Zack’s move.
Zack actually touched the metal shard with a fingertip.
The Sentry remained frozen, though clearly wary.
Zack closed index finger and thumb on the shard and tried to wiggle it.
The Sentry made a sound, but not the roar; this was closer to a growl.
But, Valya noted with fascination…no hand gestures at all!
Zack slowly moved his hand away. He thought for a moment, then brought his hands together, almost in prayer. “Stuck tight,” he said. The Sentry merely looked at him.
Now Zack turned to Makali. “How are your surgical skills?”
“Non-existent,” she said. “And I hope that doesn’t mean—”
“We’re going to take that thing out. A little goodwill gesture.”
“Like Androcles and the lion?” Valya said, as amused as she was horrified by the idea.
“Didn’t the lion wind up eating Androcles?” Dale said.
Everyone ignored him. “It looks to me as though our friend was wearing one of the skinsuits, which really gives me some crazy ideas, given the blood you saw, and the fact that this piece of tube looks terrestrial. But to the point: I think the skinsuit sealed around the wound and is keeping that shard in place.”
“Why would it be better to have it out?” Makali clearly didn’t want to become the designated space surgeon, and Valya couldn’t blame her.
“If you had a bullet or an arrow stuck in you, you’d want it out.”