Read Neptune Crossing (The Chaos Chronicles) for Free Online

course. ///
    He shuddered. Yes, of course. The events of the last hour were slowly coming back to him. /What the hell just happened?/ He'd been trapped underground...before all those dreams.
    /// We left the cavern. ///
    /Yeah. I can see that./ Bandicut peered out toward the horizon and tilted his head back to look at the black Triton sky and the great blue crescent of Neptune. He felt the dreams begin to resurface momentarily, and he shook, waiting for the feeling to pass. He felt bruised and beaten and exhausted. Turning his head, he saw the grounded buggy. He remembered his fall, and thought that it seemed a hundred years ago...if indeed it had really happened.
    /// It happened. ///
    He grunted. At least he was breathing, and apparently unhurt from his fall...
    If he didn't count the presence of an alien in his mind.
    He felt faint as he wondered, ridiculously, how he was going to report this back at base. Somehow that made him tremble again; there was something wrong in that thought.
    He grunted again and got up to walk toward the buggy. Just over the horizon, he glimpsed a small recon robot scooting in his direction. It appeared that he had been located. /We aren't going to have privacy for very much longer. Will you tell me how we got out of there?/ He watched the robot bob over a hillock and thought he recognized it.
    /// How did it seem to you
    that we got out? ///
    /What the hell—if I knew, would I have asked? I'm sure I didn't sprout wings and fly!/ He touched the buggy's front fender. The solidity of it was oddly reassuring.
    /// I didn't intend...sarcasm.
    I wondered about your perceptions.
    Anyway, it was the translation device
    that put us out here. ///
    /Translation device?/ His memory flickered like a bad holo. Of course. He had found not just this alien being that was occupying his thoughts; he had found an intact artifact—an alien machine. How could he have forgotten? And the machine itself lay underground, in a cavern just beneath his feet. And as quickly as he thought that, he felt a sharp pang in his thoughts—and remembered when the quarx had stopped him from calling for help. /You're not going to let me report this, are you?/
    There was a nervous stirring in his thoughts.
    /// I'm sorry. I wish I could.
    But it's just not...possible, yet. ///
    /Not possible. Right./ He thought he sensed the quarx about to speak again, but there was only silence. He thought about prompting the alien to talk, to explain the secrecy—then decided to drop the subject for the moment. He'd look for his opening to tell someone, when the time was right.
    He surveyed the area in front of the buggy, trying to find the spot where he had broken through the ice. There was no indication of any flaw in the surface.
    /// You won't find the break. ///
    /No,/ he admitted. /So how'd your translator lift me out of there?/ He was starting to feel like a pawn, and he didn't like it. It was one thing to be an agent of first contact; it was quite another to be a puppet on a string.
    The alien seemed puzzled.
    /// I won't force you to do anything,
    if that's your concern. ///
    /It's one of my concerns,/ he answered curtly.
    /// I hope to...reassure you.
    And to answer your question:
    we weren't lifted.
    We were translated...spatially.
    Do you understand the concept at all? ///
    He blinked, eyes unfocused.
    /// Your Einsteinian relativity— ///
    Bandicut interrupted, /You're going to try to explain that by relativity?/
    /// No, that's what I...
    it's not covered by your relativity,
    is what I meant.
    In your terms, I'm not sure how to... ///
    As the quarx's words trailed off, Bandicut shook his head and scowled at the patch of ice where the hole had briefly existed. He was thinking about the coincidence of that weakness in the ice being there just long enough for him to fall through—then disappearing again. Grunting softly, he turned to see how difficult it would be to free his buggy from the sinkhole that had started this