Stephen Baxter - Xeelee by The Breeding Ground

Author:The Breeding Ground
Language: eng
Format: mobi, epub
Published: 2012-01-04T11:24:36+00:00

More long hours.

As its energy faded, Mari’s cloak grew still more uncomfortable — tighter on her muscular body, chafing at armpits and groin and neck. It was actually tiring for her to struggle against its elasticity. And, though she had been able to resist throwing up, the cloak was eventually full of her own sour stink.

Meanwhile, her back ached where she had been rammed against the emplacement bulkhead. That gash on her head, half-treated by the cloak, was a permanent, nagging pain. Mysterious aches spread through her limbs and neck. Not only that, she was hungry, and as thirsty as she had ever been; she hadn’t had so much as a mouthful of water since the assault itself.

She tried not to think about how much Kueht was slowing them down, what had transpired in the “factory.” But there wasn’t much else to think about.

She knew the syndrome. She was being given too much time in her own head. And the wrong kind of thinking was always a bad thing.

They came at last to another chamber.

As far as they could see in their cloaks’ failing light, this was a hangar-like place of alcoves and nooks. The bays were separated by huge diaphanous sheets of some muscle-like material, marbled with fat. And within the alcoves were suspended great pregnant sacs of what looked like water: green, cloudy water.

Jarn made straight for one of the sacs, pulled out her knife and slit it open. The liquid pulsed out in a zero-G straight-line jet, bubbling slightly. Jarn thrust a finger into the flow, and read a sensor embedded in her cloaked wrist. She grinned. “Sea water. Earth-like, salty sea water. And this green glop is blue-green algae, I think. We found what we came for.” She lengthened the slit. “Each of you pick a sac. Just immerse; the cloaks will take what they need.” She showed them how to work nipples in their cloaks that would provide them with desalinated water, even a mushy food based on the algae.

Mari helped Kapur, then clambered inside a sac of her own. She didn’t lose much water; surface tension kept it contained in big floating globules that she was able to gather up in her hands. She folded the sac like a blanket, holding it closed over her chest. The water was warm, and her cloak, drinking in nutrients, began to glow more brightly.

“Blue-green algae,” she murmured. “From a human world.”

“Obviously,” Kapur said.

“Maybe this is one of the ways you pay a Spline,” Jarn said. “I always wondered about that.” She moved around the chamber, handing out vials of an amber fluid. “I think we deserve this. Pass it through your cloak.”

Kapur asked, “What is it?”

Mari grinned. “Puhl’s Blood.” For My-Khal Puhl, the legendary pre-Extirpation explorer of Earth.

“Call it a stimulant,” Jarn said dryly. “An old Navy tradition, sir.”

Mari sucked down her tot. “How long should we stay here?”

“As long as the cloaks need,” Jarn said. “Try to sleep.”

That seemed impossible. But the rocking motion of the water and its swaddling warmth seemed to soothe the tension out of her sore muscles.

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