Lundy saw them a long way off. For a moment he didn’t believe it. He thought they must be shadows cast by the fitful glare of the fissure. He braced himself against a building and stood watching.
Stood watching, and then seeing as the rushing current brought them closer. He didn’t move, except to lift his jaw a little trying to breathe. He simply stood, cold as a dead man’s feet and just as numb.
They looked something like the giant rays he’d seen back on Earth, only they were plants. Great sleek bulbs of kelp with their leaves spread like wings to the current. Their long teardrop bodies ended in a flange like a fishtail that served as a rudder and they had tentacles for arms.
They were colored a deep red-brown like dried blood. The golden flare of the fissure made their cold eyes gleam
