Lizzie switched over to the fishcam.
* * *Black liquid flashed past the turbot's infrared eyes. Straight away from the shore it swam, seeing nothing but flecks of paraffin, ice, and other suspended particulates as they loomed up before it and were swept away in the violence of its wake. A hundred meters out, it bounced a pulse of radar off the sea floor, then dove, seeking the depths.
Rocking gently in her balloon harness, Lizzie yawned.
Snazzy Japanese cybernetics took in a minute sample of the ammonia-water, fed it through a deftly constructed internal laboratory, and excreted the waste products behind it. "We're at twenty meters now," Consuelo said. "Time to collect a second sample."
The turbot was equipped to run hundreds of on-the-spot analyses. But it had only enough space for twenty permanent samples to be carried back home. The first sample had been nibbled from the surface slush. Now it twisted, and gulped down five drams of sea fluid in all its glorious impurity. To Lizzie, this was science on the hoof. Not very dramatic, admittedly, but intensely exciting.
She yawned again.
"O'Brien?" Alan said, "How long has it been since you last slept?"
"Huh? Oh ... twenty hours? Don't worry about me, I'm fine."
"Go to sleep. That's an order."
"But -- "
"Now."
Fortunately, the suit was comfortable enough to sleep in. It had been designed so she could.
First she drew in her arms from the suit's sleeves. Then she brought in her legs, tucked them up under her chin, and wrapped her arms around them. "'Night, guys," she said.
_"Buenas noches, querida,"_ Consuelo said,_ "que tengas lindos suenyos."_
"Sleep tight, space explorer."
* * *The darkness when she closed her eyes was so absolute it crawled. Black, black, black. Phantom lights moved within