Fantastic Voyage - By Isaac Asimov Page 0,64

it was quite useless. She might as well have tried to dig her heels into the ground in order to stop an avalanche.

She was heading, she knew, for a section of the organ of Corti, the basic center of hearing. Included among the components of the organ were the hair cells; 15,000 of them altogether. She could make out a few of them now; each with its delicate, microscopic cilium held high. Certain numbers of them vibrated gently according to the pitch and intensity of the sound waves conducted into the inner ear and there amplified.

That, however, was as she might have considered it in some course in physiology; phrases as they might have been used in the universe of normal scale. Here what she saw was a sheer precipice and beyond it a series of tall, graceful columns, moving in stately fashion, not all in unison, but rather first one and then another as though a swaying wave were rippling over the entire structure.

Cora went skidding and spinning over the precipice into a world of vibrating columns and walls. Her headlight flashed erratically as she went tumbling downward. She felt the pull of something on her harness and swung forcefully against a firmly-elastic object. She dangled -head downward, afraid to struggle lest whatever projection had stopped her would give way and let her fall the rest of the way.

She spun first this way, then that, as the column against which she clung, a microscopic, cilium on one hair cell of the organ of Corti, continued to sway majestically.

She was managing to breathe now and heard her own name. Someone was calling. Carefully, she made a pleading sound. Encouraged by the sound of her voice, she screamed as shrilly as she could. "Help! Everybody! Help!"

The first devastating shock had passed and Owens was bringing the Proteus under control in a still-turbulent sea. The sound, whatever it was, might have been intense but it had been sharp and quick-dying. That alone saved them. Had it continued for even a short time ...

Duval, cradling the laser under one arm and seated with his back against the wall and his legs pressing desperately against a bench support, shouted, "All clear?"

"I think we pulled through," gasped Owens. "The controls respond."

"We had better leave."

"We've got to pick up the others."

Duval said, "Oh, yes. I had forgotten." Carefully, he rolled over, got one hand beneath to steady himself and then carefully made it to his feet. He still clutched the laser. "Get them in."

Owens called, "Michaels! Grant! Miss Peterson!"

"Coming in," responded Michaels. "I think I'm in one piece."

"Wait," called Grant. "I don't see Cora."

The Proteus was steady now and Grant, breathing heavily, and feeling more than a little shaken, was swimming strongly toward its headlight. He called, "Cora!"

She answered shrilly, "Help! Everybody! Help!"

Grant looked about in every direction. He shouted, desperately, "Coral Where are you?"

Her voice in his ear said, "I can't tell you exactly. I'm caught among the hair cells."

"Where are they? Michaels, where are the hair cells?"

Grant could make out Michaels approaching the ship from another direction, his body a dim shadow in the lymph, his small headlight cutting a thin swath ahead of him.

Michaels said, "Wait, let me get my bearings." He flipped quickly, then shouted, "Owens, turn on ship's headlight wide-angle."

Light spread in response and Michaels said, "This way! Owens, follow me! We'll need the light."

Grant followed Michaels' quickly-moving figure and saw the precipice and columns ahead.

"In there?" he asked uncertainly.

"Must be," returned Michaels.

They were at the edge now, with the ship behind them and its headlight spilling into the cavernous file of columns, still swaying gently.

"I don't see her," said Michaels.

"I do," said Grant, pointing. "Isn't that she? Cora! I see you. Move your arm so I can be certain."

She waved.

"All right. I'm coming to get you."

Cora waited and felt a touch at her knee; the faintest and gentlest sensation, like that of a fly's wing brushing against her. She looked toward her knee but saw nothing.

There was another touch near her shoulder, then still another.

Quite suddenly, she made them out, just a few-the little balls of wool, with their quivering out-thrusting filaments. The protein molecules of the antibodies ...

It was almost as though they were exploring her surface, testing her, tasting her, deciding whether she were harmless or not. There were only a few, but more were drifting toward her from along the columns.

With the headlights from the Proteus shining down, she could make them out clearly, in the glittering