Return to Krell

"Damn it," she grumbled, kneeling by the landing pad and brushing away a few stray leaves with her hand. "It should have returned by now. There have been no massive storms, and even then, the balloon should have carried it above the weather. Maybe it couldn't find the landing pad through the cloud layer..."

Sleethe couldn't provide any advice, and merely stood beside her, watching as she puzzled over the missing drone.

"Oh well," she sighed, finally giving up and rising to her feet. "Let's get some sleep."

CHAPTER 11: RAPTURE OF THE DEEP

The next morning Lena awoke feeling refreshed and eager to continue her work, rousing her sleepy partner with a few sharp prods and encouraging him out of their sleeping pit. Once she had made a cup of MRE coffee and had eaten a breakfast of cereal bars, she was ready to face the day.

The more she learned about the Brokers and their odd behavior, the more intrigued she became. She had deciphered the Krell language, along with the history that was recorded in their murals, and she had even been able to interview someone who had actually lived through the war. Having uncovered the jealously guarded secret of the relationship between the two species, now one unanswered question stood out to her.

Why had the Brokers stopped their war in its tracks?

She was out of leads, and besides randomly scouring the swamps for more scholars, only one option remained. There was something at the bottom of the lake outside the village, some kind of structure that resembled the Broker installations that Rahee had described during his war story. Lena had seen it on her sonar when she had surveyed the waters. Was there some way to reach it? Could it hold further secrets that the Brokers had assumed to be out of her grasp? Arrogance seemed to be their greatest weakness, they had repeatedly underestimated her scientific and deductive abilities up to this point.

There was a rebreather in her duffel bag, another military issue device that she had scavenged from the surplus supplies before leaving the Pinwheel. It was a tool that was usually used to protect support personnel from the toxic gases often employed as weapons by the Bugs, the Marines being equipped with helmets that could accomplish the same task.

She rummaged in her bag and retrieved the device. It resembled the mask that a handyman might wear to protect from dust, or maybe the masks that the citizens of overcrowded cities tended to wear, but it was made primarily from hard plastic and it could seal over the wearer's nose and mouth. There were two small cylinders that extended up past the cheeks, one containing a battery that powered the device, and another that contained a limited chemical oxygen generator to compensate for any leakage. It could recycle oxygen from her exhaled CO2 if it detected that there was none present in the atmosphere, but only for a limited time. It was designed for cases like fires and decompressions, where the oxygen content in the atmosphere might drop before the user was aware of the danger. It should also allow her to breathe underwater for a certain amount of time.

She was no diver however, and oxygen was the least of her concerns. While the lake was fairly warm at the surface, it would get progressively colder the deeper it got, and if the temperature dropped low enough then it could very quickly result in hypothermia. She had no diving suit, and the only reason she had a rebreather was to navigate environments that might potentially harbor dangerous gasses or plant spores. There was also the issue of pressure, and while the mysterious underwater structure had not appeared to be too far below the surface, it could still cause problems. Scuba divers breathed a special mixture of gases, usually oxygen, helium and nitrogen. She new that the 'bends', otherwise known as decompression sickness, was common at greater depths if the proper equipment and procedures were not observed.

She wouldn't know her limits unless she tried, so perhaps a test dive was in order.

"Hey Sleethe, feel like taking a bath?"

***

Lena dipped her toes in the lake, the warmth of the morning suns beating down on her skin. She was starting to get a tan at this point, her porcelain complexion bronzing almost imperceptibly. There was a splash as Sleethe slid into the water on his belly, submerging himself and floating away from the shore. He rolled over, exposing his pale underside to the suns, seeking to warm his cold blood no doubt.

Lena had brought a few things down to the lake in her backpack, the soaps and shampoos that she had made part of her morning routine, and the rebreather with the intent to test it out. She slipped off her shorts after ensuring that they were alone, then waded into the lake to join Sleethe, pouring body wash into her hand from a plastic bottle as she went. One nice thing about this planet was that she could leave her belongings lying around without fear of them disappearing. The Krell were not overly curious, and so far none of them had interfered with her equipment. She stuck the bottle into the mud on the shore, and then proceeded to waist-height, lathering herself with the soap as she went.

The water was cooler than the humid air, and it was a great feeling to be able to clean all of the dirt and sweat from her skin, if only for a short while. She washed her hair as Sleethe circled her, swimming slowly with lazy, powerful strokes of his tail. When she was done bathing, she returned the bottles to her bag and retrieved the rebreather, securing it over her face with a strap and turning it on. Immediately the padded cushion around her mouth and nose sealed up, creating an airtight lock, and the stench of rotting vegetation that had been the norm since she had arrived was suddenly blocked out. She had almost grown used to the smell over time, and its absence was very noticeable.

Lena returned to the lake, this time submerging her head beneath the water. She was hesitant to open her eyes, worried that some native bacteria would make them their home, but she was equipped with ample medical supplies and so there should be no such issues. She blinked beneath the surface, her vision adjusting to the water, and eventually the scene came into view. Besides the silt and mud that she was kicking up, it was much clearer than it had initially appeared. She couldn't see very far, but far enough.

Fighting against her every instinct, she took a breath, finding that the rebreather was doing its job. In the absence of oxygen that could be siphoned from the air, it would recycle her own breath, the CO2 scrubbers extracting as much oxygen from her exhalations as they could before feeding it back to her. The waste elements would be stored in a compartment for later disposal. It was a stopgap measure, intended only for emergencies, but it should buy her at least a few minutes in which she could be safely submerged. That was another thing that she wanted to test, how long she could last before she started to suffocate, and she rose briefly to the surface to use her wrist computer. She opened up the stopwatch function, giving the rebreather a moment to return to its normal filtering mode, and then activated the clock before diving down again.

She glanced at the orange glow of the timer on her forearm, watching the seconds tick past, and then began to swim deeper. There were all manner of shells lining the silt on the bottom of the lake, this must be where the females came to gather them when they made their necklaces. Lena had left her jewelry in her pack for fear of losing it during the dive. She let herself sink a little, walking along the bottom and examining it through the clouds of mud that her footsteps kicked up. She was quite buoyant, and so she had to make an effort to prevent herself from rising towards the surface.

There were a few small fish swimming back and forth, tiny, silvery creatures that darted out of her path as she swam by them. Before long a dark shadow loomed over her, and she looked up to see Sleethe coming to investigate. He seemed fascinated by her previously undisclosed ability to stay underwater for any length of time, and she tapped her mask with her finger as he examined her, her mane of blonde hair floating about her head like a straw-colored cloud.

He seemed to understand, and he spun on his axis, dancing gracefully in the water as she laughed at him. He was pleased with himself, apparently able to recognize her smile through her eyes, even with her face mostly covered. He was so fast and agile underwater, it was a stark contrast to how cumbersome he sometimes seemed on land.

Lena proceeded deeper, Sleethe hovering nearby as she swam, the water growing darker and cooler. It was a welcome reprieve from the heat of the surface, but she knew that prolonged exposure to cold temperatures would quickly become dangerous without protective gear. Still, it wasn't as cold as she had anticipated. She should be able to go deeper than this without any immediate problems.

The bottom of the lake continued to slope downwards, the bare silt now giving way to plant life, forests of weeds and submerged grasses floating idly in the currents. There was more animal life here, shoals of larger fish weaving between the greenery, and Lena was reminded of the large blips that her sonar had picked up. Hopefully she wouldn't encounter anything large and predatory...

Sleethe swam by her like a green torpedo, playfully scaring away the fish and sending the shoals scattering in all directions. This was his domain, and Lena was only a guest here. It was a fascinating look at a part of his life that, until now, she had never been able to experience first hand.

She waded into the forest of water weeds, their long, sinewy stalks rising ten or more feet above her. There were floating sacks attached to them to keep them upright, like kelp or seaweed, their fleshy leaves reaching for the surface in order to catch as much sunlight as they could.

Lena remembered being terrified of seaweed as a child. Her parents had taken her to a beach in Rügen when she had been very young, an island off the coast of Germany that was located in the Baltic sea. Initially entranced by the rolling waves and the frothing surf, little Lena had quickly been sent packing by the slimy, ghastly seaweed that the ocean deposited on the sands. Her father had carried the tearful girl back down to the water's edge, showing her that the weeds were not alive and could not harm her, but despite his reassurances she had retained a fear of the stuff.

Now she was more than twenty feet beneath the surface of an alien lake, watching as the plants waved back and forth as if under the power of a slow and gentle breeze. She was becoming adept at suppressing her squeamishness, no longer would she be afraid of slimy weeds and mysterious creatures.

She felt more shells with her toes, the mud here cool and pleasant on her skin. She had half a mind to bring it back to the shore in handfuls and lather herself with it, wasn't it supposed to be good for the skin? There were little crustaceans too, the original owners of the shells, like hermit crabs as they scuttled out of her way carrying their spiraling conchs on their backs.

There was a strong current as Sleethe shot past her, flying above her head and blowing through the weeds like a gust of wind. He was chasing the fish, making the large shoals split up into a spreading cloud before they reformed again in a silvery mass. At this depth there was still a fair amount of light, but the ground sloped continually downwards, the water beyond her field of view murky and dark.

She checked her wrist display, three minutes on the clock so far, and she felt fine. No shortness of breath or lightheadedness. The cold was starting to get more noticeable, but it was still tolerable, no worse than getting out of bed on a brisk morning.

Sleethe was having a riot, apparently full of energy after basking under the suns, darting in and out of the kelp forest playfully as she watched him. He vanished between the stalks, and then a moment later he was back, now with something long and angry clutched in his arms. Lena fought the instinct to swim away as he 'landed' in front of her, kicking up a cloud of silt as he settled. Held in his muscular arms was a large fish, almost as long as Lena was tall, struggling ardently as he wrestled with it. He had brought it to show her, and she quickly raised her wrist computer, turning on the camera function and taking some video. This time she was sure to keep the camera facing away from her. The last thing she needed was her naked, painted body showing up in slideshows at universities across UNN space.

It looked a little like a big catfish, its streamlined body coated in smooth scales. It was tinted grey, with camouflaged patterning on its fins and back, no doubt to protect it from predators who might be attacking from above. Rather than the large dorsal fin that was common on so many Earth fish, its back was almost smooth save for a fluke near the powerful tail. There was a cluster of long whiskers protruding from its face, no doubt sensory apparatus that perhaps detected prey or predators. It had two beady eyes, black and glassy like those of a shark.

Lena looked to Sleethe, the intuitive alien apparently guessing what she wanted from her eyes alone, and he drew a little closer to her. She reached out a hand and ran it along the smooth side of the fish, feeling its muscles twist and writhe beneath the surface. She laughed into her mask, smiling up at Sleethe as she stroked the animal. It was magnificent, a prize catch for any fisherman. It must have weighed at least eighty kilograms.

Sleethe turned away from her and ejected the creature, the alien fish powering its flared tail and shooting off into the safety of the weeds. Lena gave him two thumbs up, and he rose from the lakebed, putting on a show of spins and loops for her before swimming out of sight.

Five minutes on the clock, Lena noted, glancing at the orange hologram on her wrist. Good job all of this UNN gear was waterproof, she didn't want to imagine what it must cost for a civilian to get their hands on tech like this.

A sound reached her ears suddenly, startling her at first, but then the harmonic tones entranced her. What was that? It sounded like whale song, if whales could actually write a decent ditty. Was it some lake monster? As if to answer her question, Sleethe emerged from the kelp, his attention focused away from Lena as he listened intently. He opened his jaws and gave a reply, and then Lena realized that the beautiful song was coming from the Krell.

It sounded like poetry being recited to the tune of a song, but in a language that she didn't speak. She rapidly hit the record function on her computer, hoping that the microphone would be able to pick some of this up through the water. Whatever language they were speaking, it wasn't Krell as she knew it, the translator didn't even recognize it.

Lena had known that they communicated differently underwater, but what tests she had been able to conduct had not yielded any results like this. When she had submerged herself in the Pinwheel's Olympic swimming pool and had instructed Sleethe to speak, all that he had done was loose some rumbling calls that were devoid of this artistry. Sound carried very far underwater, and it was the reason that the Krell had such powerful voices and were capable of such a large range of vocalizations. The mating call affected her so because it was designed to carry for miles beneath the water, the vibrations at such close ranges able to literally shake her in her boots. This was something else however, something new.

As she watched, another Krell appeared from the direction of the shore. This one was male, his scales a little lighter than those of her partner, indicating that he must be younger. He might be investigating the unusual activity, perhaps assuming that some kind of fishing expedition was ongoing. He had no necklace, and he wasn't mated judging by the absence of a red mark on his forehead. Beyond that she couldn't read the runes that were inscribed on his pale underbelly.

He seemed very interested in Lena, which was unusual for the Krell, they had largely ignored her unless there was some kind of ceremony going on. Maybe he had assumed that she was some kind of new fish, and was surprised by her presence here. After giving her a thorough look over he turned to Sleeth, who was now floating nearby like a giant, scaly blimp. The two exchanged another series of musical calls. The best way that Lena could describe it was like two dolphins singing a cappella, alternating between high pitched whistles and resonating roars that made her feel as if the very water around her was trembling.

Did they have an entirely alternate language for use underwater, or was this something else?

After a brief exchange, the young male proceeded into the forest of weeds. As soon as his tail had vanished between the floating stalks, Lena noticed that a red light was beeping on her mask. The CO2 scrubber must have run its course, and it could no longer recycle enough oxygen to keep her healthy. She began to swim up towards the surface immediately, glancing at her wrist display and noting that nine minutes had passed on the holographic stopwatch. So she would have nine minutes before her oxygen supply became critical, would that be enough to investigate the sunken Broker facility?

The corners of her vision began to darken, and she was beginning to feel a little dizzy. Worse, using her muscles to swim expended more oxygen, compounding her problem as she struggled to reach safety. Had she made a deadly mistake? Her thoughts slowed, and she began to become confused, no longer sure of where she was or what she was trying to do.

Suddenly she felt something lift her, and in a moment she was propelled from the lake with a monumental splash. She pulled the mask from her face, taking in a desperate gulp of air, her mind and her vision clearing almost the second that she filled her lungs. She was floating in the water, Sleethe carrying her in his scaly arms and letting her float gently on the surface of the lake, nudging her with his snout. She patted his nose apologetically.

"Thanks big guy, let's call that eight minutes..."

***

Sleethe returned her to the shore and deposited her gently on the mud. Despite her protests that she was perfectly capable of swimming back under her own power, the big lug had carried her all the way. She hadn't realized how cold she had gotten until she felt the warm mud between her fingers, the twin suns beating down on her face as Sleethe flopped down beside her. He rolled in the mud like a giant dog, before lying with his belly exposed, basking to warm himself. Now that it was later in the morning, many of their Krell neighbors were also warming themselves on the shore, or else floating on the water. As cold-blooded reptiles, it was the only way for them to control their body temperature.

Lena returned the rebreather to her pack, confident now that she could survive for about eight minutes beneath the surface of the lake. She fiddled with her computer, bringing up the three dimensional sonar image that her probe had taken a couple of days prior. It showed a wire frame map of the lakebed, along with a few large blips that might be large fish or perhaps submerged Krell. Judging by how big the scholar had been, it was certainly possible that one might show up on her scan.

She zoomed in on the Broker structure, discernible from the surrounding terrain by its harsh angles and smooth lines, obviously artificial in origin. It was at about seventy feet below the surface, perched on a sort of rocky crag, the actual depth of the lake far exceeding that at its lowest point.