Morten aimed for the center of the body and pressed the button. The charge burst from the tube with a small speck of light that flared against the soft flesh and was swallowed by it.
There appeared to be no effect. From his side, Free pressed the firing button on his rifle, and Morten aimed and fired again and again.
A score of missiles entered the soft flesh with no apparent effect. Morten stared down at the creature in disbelief. The charges were designed to collapse the synapses of any cellular organism.
The tentacle tightened its grasp of the ship’s hull and with a swift burst of motion encircled it completely. The central body was almost directly below Morten. Something that seemed to resemble a mouth or a deeply set eye flicked open and shut with a puckering motion in the center o
