Pascal was the first one out of the hatch. Under Wo’s orders, telephoned into the pressurized airlock, Karlstad and Muzorawa placed the unconscious woman in the airlock and slowly pumped out the perfluorocarbon liquid. They followed the preplanned procedure exactly, despite the urgency; it took the better part of an hour for her lungs to drain.
Patti Buono fidgeted nervously every instant of the wait. Grant saw that even Wo looked tense, almost frightened, his eyes darting back and forth like a trapped animal’s.
Once Krebs told them that the airlock was down to normal air pressure, Quintero swung the heavy hatch open. Irene Pascal lay limp and still, on her side, her electrode-studded legs folded to fit the cramped area of the airlock floor. Her skinsuited body looked cold and still dripped oily liquid. Grant could not tell if she was breathing.
Ukara leaped past the startled Quintero into the airlock and sank to her knees beside the prostrate body.
“She’s not breathing!” Kayla cried.
Patti Buono slapped an oxygen mask over the prostrate woman’s face. “Quick, help me carry her to the infirmary. Quickly!”
Quintero reached for Pascal, but Ukara pushed him away. “No!” she snapped. “Let me do it.”
She grasped the unconscious Pascal under the shoulders while Grant squeezed into the airlock and picked up her feet. Together they ran past the guards and down the corridor toward the infirmary. The corridor was completely empty except for them and Buono, her moccasins thumping on the thin carpeting as she tried to keep pace. Grant saw another trio of uniformed guards pacing up and down a few meters beyond the infirmary’s entrance.
And Sheena was knuckle-walking alongside them. What are they doing with her? Grant wondered as, puffing from the exertion, he helped Ukara carry Pascal’s limp body into the infirmary. A quartet of medics was already there. Buono pounded in behind them and immediately began shouting orders. Grant and Kayla were shooed away, back into the corridor, and the infirmary door slid firmly shut.
Wo was wheeling up the corridor, with Frankovich puffing along beside him. The director impatiently yanked open the infirmary door and rolled inside. Grant could see the team of green-gowned medics huddled over Pascal’s bed.
Frankovich stopped at the door, chest visibly heaving.
“What about the rest of the crew?” Grant asked.
“They’re okay,” said Frankovich. “Decompressing and coming through the airlock one at a time.”
The guard captain showed up, ducked into the infirmary for a few moments, then came out and shut the door again. He folded his arms across his chest and stood there with a stony expression on his face, the picture of inflexible authority, obviously intending to keep anyone else from entering the infirmary until Dr. Wo gave his permission.
Grant hesitated, not knowing what to do, where to go. He saw Sheena again, farther up the corridor, accompanying the guards. If the gorilla had noticed Grant, she gave no sign of it. She just shambled along on her knuckles, a dozen paces in one direction, then back the other way, like a soldier on guard duty.
Grant asked the taciturn guard captain, “Why is Sheena here?”
Barely moving his lips, the captain said, “We use her now and then for crowd control.”
“Crowd control? There isn’t any crowd here.”
“Ah, you see? It works.”
“Sheena shouldn’t be exposed to crowds,” Grant said.
The ghost of a smile flickered across the captain’s stern, hawk-nosed face. “It’s the other way around, rather. People are frightened of the ape.”
“She wouldn’t hurt anyone!”
“They don’t know that.”
Sheena wouldn’t hurt anyone, Grant repeated to himself. Not unless someone hurt her first.
The captain said flatly, “The director wants to keep this section clear. The gorilla discourages people from coming close.”
“I see.”
“You ought to be leaving now,” said the captain.
“I want to wait here,” Ukara said.
“All of you, on your way,” the captain insisted. “There’s nothing more for you to do here.”
Ukara snarled, her hands arching into red-tipped claws. For an instant Grant thought she was going to leap at the guard captain, a coiled steel panther attacking a stolid, well-muscled buffalo.
Then Frankovich touched her arm and said, “He’s right, Kayla. Let’s go help the others.”
Ukara visibly shuddered. But she turned away from the captain and followed Frankovich down the corridor, back toward the airlock, in the direction opposite Sheena.
Still unmoved, the guard captain jabbed a finger at Grant’s chest. “You, too. On your way.”
Grant took a deep breath and walked toward the three uniformed guards patrolling with Sheena. The gorilla stopped her shuffling walk when she saw Grant approaching.
“Hello, Sheena,” he said softly. The small burned patch of hair on her skull looked a deliberate brand of shame to Grant.
The gorilla stared at him out of deep-brown, red-rimmed eyes. “Grant,” she said.
Grant held out his hand, palm up, as if begging. The guards watched with amused grins.
“Are we still friends, Sheena?”
“Grant hurt Sheena.”
“I didn’t mean to. It was an accident.”
“Hurt.”
“I’m sorry.”
Sheena looked down at Grant’s hand, still outstretched toward her. At last she said, “You go now.”
“Sheena, I want to be your friend again,” Grant pleaded.
“You go!”
“But, Sheena—”
The gorilla shook her head, a gesture that involved her massive shoulders, as well. “You go!”
Defeated, Grant let his hand drop and turned his back to Sheena. As he walked away, he heard one of the guards stage-whisper, “Would you believe it? A lovers’ quarrel with an overgrown monkey!”
One by one, the crew of
The hatch sighed open and Muzorawa stepped through, sucking in big chestfuls of air, oily liquid still dripping from the tip of his nose and running in thin rivulets down his neck and arms.
Kayla Ukara threw a blanket around Zeb’s shoulders.
“Thanks,” he said, shivering visibly. “This is the first time I’ve felt warm since we went into the soup.”
“Are you all right?” Grant asked.
“Yes. I believe so. No injuries. How’s Irene?”
“Don’t know,” Frankovich answered. “We ran her down to the infirmary. Patti’s working on her.”
“What happened?” Ukara asked.
Zeb shook his head. “I’m not certain. We had entered the ocean … at least, the sensors indicated the outside environment was in the liquid state.”
“Who was on duty?”
“We all were. Krebs wanted us all connected to the ship’s systems until we were cruising at our first depth objective.”
“Irene was connected, then?”
“Yes,” said Muzorawa. “Everything seemed completely normal, but she suddenly gave a scream and doubled over, almost into a fetal posture.”
