Can’t just sit here. And it’s not that bad. It’s not as though they really threatened me—
You’re not among friends here, Scanlon.
— not explicitly.
He tries to figure out exactly where he lost them. It seemed like a reasonable enough proposition. The prospect of shorter tours shouldn't have put them off like that. Even if they are addicted to this godawful place, it was just a suggestion. Scanlon went out of his way to be completely nonthreatening. Unless they took exception to his mention of their carelessness in the safety department. But that should have been old news; they not only knew the chances they were taking, they flaunted them.
Who am I kidding? That's not when I lost them. I shouldn't have mentioned Lubin, shouldn't have used him as an example.
It made so much sense at the time, though. Scanlon knows Lubin’s an outsider, even down here. Scanlon’s not an idiot, he can read the signs even behind the eyecaps. Lubin's different from the other vampires. Using him as an example should have been the safest thing in the world. Scapegoats have been a respected part of the therapeutic arsenal for hundreds of years.
Look, you want to end up like Lubin? He sleeps outside, for Christ’s sake!
Scanlon puts his head in his hands. How was I supposed to know they all did?
Maybe he should have. He could have monitored sonar more closely. Or timed them when they went into their cubbies, seen how long they stayed inside. There were things he could have done, he knows.
Maybe I really did fuck up. Maybe. If only I’d—
Jesus, that sounds close. What is—
Shut up! Just shut the fuck up!
Maybe it shows up on sonar.
Scanlon takes a breath and ducks into Comm. He’s had basic training on the gear, of course; it’s all pretty intuitive anyway. He didn’t really need Clarke’s grudging tutorial. A few seconds’ effort elicits a tactical overview: vampires, strung like beads on an invisible line between Beebe and the Throat. Another one off to the west, heading for the Throat; probably Lubin. Random topography. Nothing else.
As he watches, the four icons closest to Beebe edge a pixel or two closer to Main Street. The fifth in line is way out ahead, almost as far out as Lubin. Nearly at the Throat already.
Wait a second.
Vampires: Brander, Caraco, Clarke, Lubin, Nakata. Right.
Icons: one, two, three, four, five—
Six.
Scanlon stares at the screen. Oh shit.
Beebe’s phone link is very old-school; a direct line, not even routed through the telemetry and comm servers. It’s almost Victorian in its simplicity, guaranteed to stay on-line through any systems crash short of an implosion. Scanlon has never used it before. Why should he? The moment he calls home he’s admitting he can’t do the job by himself.
Now he hits the call stud without a moment’s hesitation. “This is Scanlon, Human Resources. I’ve got a bit of a—”
The line stays dark.
He tries again. Dead.
Shit shit shit. Somehow, though, he isn’t surprised.
I could call the vampires. I could order them to come back in. I have the authority. It’s an amusing thought for a few moments.
At least the Voice seems to have faded. He thinks he can hear it, if he concentrates, but it’s so faint it could even be his imagination.
Beebe squeezes down on him. He looks back at the tactical display, hopefully. One, two, three, f—
Oh shit.
He doesn’t remember going outside. He remembers struggling into his preshmesh, and picking up a sonar pistol, and now he’s on the seabed, under Beebe. He takes a bearing, checks it, checks it again. It doesn’t change.
He creeps away from the light, towards the Throat. He fights with himself for endless moments, wins; his headlamp stays doused. No sense in broadcasting his presence.
He swims blind, hugging the bottom. Every now and then he takes a bearing, resets his course. Scanlon zigzags across the sea floor. Eventually the abyss begins to lighten before him.
Something moans, directly ahead.
It doesn’t sound lonely any more. It sounds cold and hungry and utterly inhuman. Scanlon freezes like a night creature caught in headlights.
After a while the sound goes away.
The Throat glimmers half-resolved, maybe twenty meters ahead. It looks like a spectral collection of buildings and derricks set down on the moon. Murky copper lights spills down from floods set half-way up the generators. Scanlon circles, just beyond the light.
Something moves, off to the left.
An alien sigh.
He flattens down onto the bottom, eyes closed. Grow up, Scanlon. Whatever it is, it can’t hurt you. Nothing can bite through preshmesh.
Nothing flesh and blood…
He refuses to finish the thought. He opens his eyes.
When it moves again, Scanlon is staring right at it.
A black plume, jetting from a chimney of rock on the seabed. And this time it doesn’t just sigh; it moans.
A smoker. That’s all it is. Acton went down one of those.
Maybe this one—
The eruption peters out. The sound whispers away.
Smokers aren’t supposed to make sounds. Not like that, anyway.
Scanlon edges up to the lip of the chimney. 501C. Inside, anchored about two meters down, is some sort of machine. It’s been built out of things that were never meant to fit together; rotary blades spinning in the vestigial current, perforated tubes, pipes anchored at haphazard angles. The smoker is crammed with junk.
And somehow, the water jets through it and comes out singing. Not a ghost. Not an alien predator, after all. Just— windchimes. Relief sweeps through Scanlon’s body in a chemical wave. He relaxes, soaking in the sensation, until he remembers:
Six contacts. Six.
And here he is, floodlit, in full view.
Scanlon retreats back into darkness. The machinery behind his nightmares, exposed and almost pedestrian, has bolstered his confidence. He resumes his patrol. The Throat rotates slowly to his right, a murky monochrome graphic.
Something fades into view ahead, floating above an outcropping of featherworms. Scanlon slips closer, hides behind a convenient piece of rock
Vampires. Two of them.
They don't look the same.
Vampires usually look alike out here, it's almost impossible to tell them apart. But Scanlon’s sure he’s never seen one of these two before. It’s facing away from him, but there’s still something— it’s too tall and thin, somehow. It moves in furtive starts and twitches, almost birdlike. Reptilian. It carries something under one arm.
Scanlon can’t tell what sex it is. The other vampire, though, looks female. The two of them hang in the water a few meters apart, facing each other. Every now and then the female gestures with her hands; sometimes she moves too suddenly and the other one jumps a little, as if startled.
He clicks through the voice channels. Nothing. After a while the female reaches out, almost tentatively, and touches the reptile. There’s something almost gentle— in an alien way— about the way she does that. Then she turns and swims off into the darkness. The reptile stays behind, drifting slowly on its axis. Its face comes into view.
Its hood seal is open. Its face is so pale that Scanlon can barely tell where skin ends and eyecaps begin; it almost looks as if this creature has no eyes.