Then he smelled a sickening odor. As he drove on against the ever-thickening element, he was permeated with the stink.
It reminded him of rotting beef. If it got worse, he was going to vomit.
Tappy was pulling harder on him as if she were getting impatient with his lagging.
Then she fell, her hand sliding out of his. He could not see until the bright light came back. For seven seconds, he had a good look at her. She had fallen over something. Just before the light went away, leaving him in the greasy darkness, he realized that she had stumbled over a body. It was in the uniform of a Gaol, and it was lying facedown, but its neck and body and arms and legs were swollen.
The source of the stench was the dead fall.
He thought, Up in the airplane, I saw men going into the cloud.
]But I did not see any coming out.
Tappy got up, though he did not know it until her groping hand touched his chest. He reached out and pulled her close. She was trembling.
"What's going on?" he said, holding her close.
She could not answer him, of course. She released herself from his arms, felt along his arm, and gripped his hand again. Then she was leading him into the cloud.
The stink of death was left behind after only a few paces. That cloud must be heavy and keep the molecules of the decaying body from going far. Certainly, the stuff sheathing him was getting denser. He had to push even more against it. His growing nausea, however, was now receding.
I'll bet no Gaol has reached the building or whatever it is, he thought. Why does Tappy think she can succeed'? Even if she does have some ability the others lack, she'll have to leave me behind.
And why did that man die? If he could not go ahead, why did he not turn around and come back out of the cloud? What killed him?
Finally, he could not struggle any more. He was winded, and each breath was heavy with oiliness. The stuff seemed to soak into his mouth and nose, his throat, his lungs. He was trapped like a fly in molasses. Panicky, he yanked back on Tappy's hand, but she did not move. Her hand came loose from his. He struggled to take a step backward and found that he could not move his hind foot more than several inches.
If I die, he thought, will my corpse sag slowly, sinking by inches until I finally lie on the ground? Will my body begin decomposing halfway through my slow-motion fall?
Then something touched his chin.
The light, brighter than lightning, returned, and he saw Tappy.
She was turned around, had gotten closer to him, and had reached out with a questing finger.
She could move, though her briefly seen face was twisted with effort.
"Go on, Tappy!" he shouted. "You can't help me! Go on!"
He could hear his voice, but it seemed to be inside his head.
He doubted that his words got very far from his lips before they were absorbed.
BUT her touches did not stop. Her hands were on his shoulder, trying to lift him, trying to make him resume walking. She didn't want to go on without him.
He tried again, this time with reason rather than muscle. "Tappy, you have something important to do. You have a destiny. You are the Imago! You must get to where you're going, and you can do it, because you are what you are. But I am only mortal. I can't reach the source of that light. I will die just as that Gaol soldier did. That's how it's meant to be: only you can get through."
He paused, gasping with the effort of shouting through the cloying fog. But he had to convince her. "My job is done. I had to get you safely to this place. Now you must go on. Don't let this effort be in vain! Go and be the Imago! Go! Go!"
But she refused. He knew why: she might be the Imago, but she was also Tappy, the blind, mute girl. She had a crush on him. He, fool that he was, had taken advantage of it, and that had done nothing to abate her love. She had refused to leave him before, and she was refusing now. Reason was no good against adolescent passion.
Which meant that if he gave up, so would she, and it would be for nothing. He had to do something. But what?
Then he thought of the radiator. It had gotten them out of more than one scrape already; could it do so again? But this seemed so farfetched that he couldn't quite say it outright. "The-can ithere?"
But she understood him immediately. She passed her hands along his body until she found the radiator. She brought it up and found a button. He didn't even know which one, only that she put one of his fingers on it.
It was worth a try. He aimed the device away from her, turned it on, and pressed that button.
This time a visible beam came from it. Rather, an invisible beam with a visible effect: it dissipated the fog. In its path the fog just seemed to shrivel or melt, giving out a noisome odor, leaving a tunnel of clear air.
could he go into that tunnel? If it was the fog that held him, then maybe he could. He hauled one leg forward, toward the clear region ahead. The fog resisted, seeming unwilling to give up the Ib, but the fog had been weakened, and the leg was able to break through. Then the other leg. The tunnel was narrow here, but broad ahead, in a slowly thickening cone. His feet remained mired, but his legs were now clear, and he was able to duck his head to clear it, too. What a relief, to breathe free again!
He worked his way farther into the tunnel. It was like stepping out of quicksand; now his body was free. The tunnel remained where it had been carved, enabling him to move through it. He looked back, and saw it slowly squeezing together behind him.
But that didn't matter. In fact, it might be good, because he didn't want to leave a passage for the Gaol forces to enter.
He aimed the radiator toward the intermittently flashing light.
It sliced through the fog, leaving a closing offshoot like'the cutoff elbow of a meandering river. When he held the beam in place, the new tunnel broadened and clarified. He wiggled it around enough to enlarge the tunnel at the near end, then turned it off. He didn't want to waste the radiator's power, not knowing how much of a charge it had.
He glanced at Tappy, who was standing beside him. "It's working," he said, his confidence resurging. "On to the light?"
She nodded. "Then follow me." He marched ahead. He did not want that beam touching her!
Soon there was a whiteness that did not dissipate. It was the hard surface of the structure inside the cloud. It glowed blindingly.
By its light he saw pseudopodia of cloud extending inward from the round rim of the tunnel, like so many cilia eager to move him along this intestinal tract. He was not comfortable with the image.
Then, abruptly, it was gone. He blinked, trying to adapt his sight to the relative gloom. Now there seemed to be nothing where the building had been!
In seven seconds it was back, blindingly bright again.
"Tappy, there's something strange here."
She merely urged him on, pushing him from behind.
"There's a glowing wall or something, the side of the building, if that's what it is, for seven seconds; that's what makes the light through the cloud. Then it's gone, and I think it's just an empty hole that the thick fog can't fill in, in only seven seconds. But it can't just vanish! It doesn't sink into the ground; it's just here, and then it's gone, and then it's here again." He was watching it do this while he spoke, shielding his eyes from the brightness so that he could see better in the darkness. "It's as if it just ceases to exist, but there's no implosion of air or anything. Tappy, that thing may be dangerous"'