The Black Gate (The Messenger #11) - J.N. Chaney Page 0,26
the image. Generally insectoid, with an internal anatomy that looked like a bunch of random blobs and tubes. He was no doctor, but he knew what things like hearts, lungs, and intestines looked like, and none of this looked anything like that.
“Uh, Dash? Benzel here. We’ve been analyzing a fragment of what we think was a Deeper missile, one it tried to fire when their ship finally came apart.”
Dash glanced out a nearby viewport, past the nearby Archetype, at the Retribution parked in orbit beyond. They’d left analysis of the hard tech, especially weapons, to Benzel and his people. “What’ve you got for me?”
“Sentinel just shared that image of the Deeper. She thought we’d be interested in it, and let me tell you. Interesting doesn’t begin to describe this,” Benzel said.
“You have my attention. Tell me what’s going on.”
“Picture and a thousand words, right?” Benzel replied. “We’re sending our imagery over to you now.”
A soft hum came from the data pad Leira kept slung on her belt. She thumbed the image to life and stared in surprise.
“Is this . . . the same picture?” Leira asked.
The image Benzel had sent was almost identical to the one now portrayed by Elois’s analysis of the Deeper corpse. There were differences in detail, but overall, they were almost the same.
“Benzel, did you guys inadvertently scan another Deeper corpse?” Dash asked.
“Nope, it’s a missile. I’m looking at it right now. We removed the warhead from it before bringing it aboard the Retribution. We figured the guidance system and other tech was safer to study right now—warheads and things that go boom could wait a bit, maybe until we get back to the Forge.”
Dash showed the imagery around. Everyone, including the xeno-biologists, agreed that it was virtually the same as the Deeper corpse.
It was Abillart who finally said what they were all thinking.
“So their missiles are alive?”
“Sure looks that way,” Dash said.
Abillart crossed his arms. “So Deeper technology is based, at least in a large part, on organic life. That’s fascinating.”
“And creepy as hell,” Leira said.
The corpse had begun to slump, collapsing in on itself, crumbling like a heap of gravel.
“Everyone back!” Dash shouted. “Elois, if you have an alarm, sound it!”
But there was no need for an alarm as the carcass disintegrated, falling into a pasty mix of gray dust and the odd mucosal blob.
Except for a single, blocky component that protruded from the middle of what had been its torso, there was nothing left.
Dash looked around the room at everyone cringing. “Well, as death-calls go, that one was an anticlimax.”
“I am perfectly okay with anti-climaxes.” Leira straightened from a half-crouch.
Dash moved to the gurney and stared at the Deeper remains. Something about that single block of metal made him uneasy.
“Elois, can you get that piece, that metal thing, out of there?”
“Are you sure that’s a good idea?” the xeno-biologist asked.
“I get asked if I’m sure of things a lot, and the answer’s almost always no.” He smiled. “But I think it’ll be okay.”
“Dash,” Leira said. “What are you thinking?”
Dash waited until one of the techs used a manipulator to retrieve the metallic component and drop it into a small airlock-like drawer. While she did, Dash asked for a pair of surgical gloves. Elois opened the drawer and, with a pair of big forceps, picked up the recovered piece of metal. She offered the forceps to Dash, but he just took the component in his gloved fingers, then turned back to the dusty remains of the corpse.
“The Golden were alien,” he said. “But they’d once been something we could understand, at least in their original state. These Deepers aren’t only alien to us, but I think they’re alien to our place.”
“What place?” Lomas asked. “You mean this part of the galaxy?”
“That’s for sure. But I think they’re also alien to our whole galaxy,” Dash said. Silence fell like a thick shroud.
Leira broke the gravid quiet with a small laugh. “Of course, they could be from another galaxy. Or dimension, for that matter.”
When Dash didn’t contradict her, Leira’s smile wilted.
“That’s what I’m afraid of,” he said.
“Okay, um, wait. I really wasn’t being serious.”
“I am,” Dash said.
“But—why? How? What makes you say that?” Leira asked, her voice tight with the alarmed tension that filled the lab.
Dash lifted the metal fragment and stared at it for a few seconds, then he rubbed it with a thumb. A powdery coating of residue scrubbed away, revealing a distinctive gleam, like liquid metal.