The Belly of the Beast

[WxMurray 0]

“What about the underside?”

 

“What?”

 

“What about the underside?”

 

Dickinson raised an eyebrow at Murray. It was a simple question.

 

Murray looked from Dickinson to the “thing” and back.

 

“What about it?”

 

Dickinson rolled her eyes. “It’s practically sitting on the floor. How are we supposed to scan the bottom of it?”

 

Murray stared at her dumbfounded, which translated to her as “Oh. Whoops.” It was a bit of an oversight. Nothing that was going to get them killed…she hoped.

 

Murray thought it over for a minute. “Right…well…um…yeah, I’ve got nothing. Suggestions?”

 

“Well, if we could get the sonic emitters low enough and at the right angle we could do it. But their casings won’t let them get that low.”

 

“Well, we could take them off the mounts,” Murray mused. “But we’d have to scan by hand, which would require some fancy computer work. Still, I think we can do it.”

 

Several hours later the scan was finished. Dickinson was lying on the floor with one of the sonic emitters in her hand, while Murray was working the computer. After a few minutes of fiddling, they finally got what they needed.

 

As Dickinson, Prell, and Rieve huddled around, Murray brought up his findings. The “thing” as they currently knew it was just the outer casing. But this also brought up a new mystery: what was inside of it?

 

Murray turned to look at Rieve. “I think it’s time we make use of that casing fracture you found, Lieutenant. Let’s crack this egg open.”