Crystal Universe - [Crystal Singer 03] - Crystal Line Read Online Free PDF

the short passage into the larger chamber.
    “Hey, there’s light ahead,” Lars said, and turned off his beams. “A sort of blue radiance,” he went on, gesturing for Killa to extinguish her lamps.
    The light source did not actually illuminate the passage, but the glow was sufficient to guide them to its source.
    As they entered the big cavern, they were both speechless for a moment. Luminescence cascaded in flinders of brilliance—like sparks, except that theydidn’t shoot out of their parent substance. The material that arced across the high ceiling seemed to flow, dark blue and dark green and then silver.
    “I am not there,” Brendan reminded them politely.
    Lars turned on his helmet light, and immediately the radiance was quenched. Where the helmet beam touched, the material writhed with bands of black and dark blue and dark green. Almost, Killashandra thought, as if rushing blood to heal a wound. Did light on this lightless world constitute a threat or injury? She wondered if the sun’s rays—unfiltered, with no atmosphere to reduce ultraviolet and infrared—penetrated the cavern to the jewel? For jewel it appeared to her, one graceful long sweep of jewel, a living necklace across the vault of the cavern. Or was it a tiara?
    “It’s the most beautiful thing I’ve seen in a long time,” she murmured. “And I’ve seen some magnificent crystal.” She paused, frowning. “I also don’t know why or how, but I agree with Trag, Brendan. This jewel junk is alive. Who knows about sentience—but definitely a living organism!”
    “I agree with that,” Lars said quietly, then began to examine the chamber while Killashandra concentrated on the gem cascade.
    “It’s grown, too, Brendan, since the team was here four–five years ago. It’s made a complete hoop across the ceiling from floor to floor,” Killashandra went on.
    “And down into the next cavern, if there is one,” Lars added, kneeling to shine the pencil-thin line of his forefinger light where the shimmering opalescent seemed to penetrate the floor of the cavern. The jewel itself darkened and seemed to contract, to retreat from the light source.
    “To the basement level for housewares and utensils,” Killashandra recited in the tone of a robotic lift device,feeling a need to dispel the unusual sense of reverence that the chamber evoked in her.
“No!”
she cried in sudden fear as she saw Lars reach out to touch the narrow descending—tongue? facet? finger? probe? tentacle?—of the opalescent.
    Lars turned his helmeted head toward her, and his white teeth flashed a grin. “Let’s not be craven about this. If the symbiont protects me, it protects me. After all, I’m suited …”
    “Use an extendable,” Brendan said in a tone remarkably close to command. “The material of your suit is only guaranteed impervious to
known
hazards.”
    “Good point, Lars,” Killashandra added.
    He gave a shrug and snagged a tool from his belt. A light pass of the instrument across the coruscating extrusion gave no results. Then he prodded it gently—and suddenly jerked back his arm.
    “Wow!”
    “Report?” Killa reminded him.
    First he looked at the tool. “Well, I’m glad you stopped me, Bren.” He turned the implement toward Killa. She tongue-switched the magnification of her visor and saw that the end had melted, blurring its outline.
    “Hot the material is, but it gave on contact,” Lars said.
    “Pliable?” Brendan asked.
    “Hmmm, flexible, maybe, or able to absorb intrusions,” Killa suggested. “Or is it semiliquid, like mercury, or that odd stuff they found on Thetis Five?”
    “So far, except for your observation that the, ah—” Brendan paused. “—semiliquid has spanned its cave in the four years since discovery, you have trod in the same path the geologists did. They also melted a few instruments trying to probe it.”
    “I know, I know,” Lars said, “but I like to draw my own conclusions.” He passed his gloved hand