Free The Magister (Earthkeep) by Sally Miller Gearhart Page B

holocorder to the edge of the pod's transparent upper half.
    "We are at the trench and rigged for diving," Maiz reported, "in explore pattern alpha two, preparatory to our vertical descent." 
    Thirty seconds later, after confirmations from the Seadrome, she said, "Beginning vertical descent."
    No one in the pod spoke as Maiz eased the phaeton across the cliff's edge, letting it sink gradually into the deeps. 
    Reggie held Enrique's hand, her eyes only half as big as his.  Ria lay supine in her passenger cup, holocorder poised at the disappearing cliff's edge above them.  Then she sat up to focus upon the smooth rock wall that was rising past them even as it plummeted for miles beneath them.
    "Great Gifts of the Goddess!" she muttered, closing off the microcorder.  "If only I could be outside, showing how we look as we go down!"
    Precisely, thought Zude, and in an instant, as if from 50 meters away, she saw exactly how they looked: a silver saucer, outlined against a gray-blue wall and surrounded by a hazy aura, drifting aimlessly down into a measureless abyss.  The image disappeared as quickly as it had come.  Zude blinked.  She was back in the pod again.
    Ria panned over the nondescript ocean around them in an ambience shot.  "It's already clear to me," she observed, "that our most dramatic display of the destroyer will be from beneath it.  Shooting up toward the surface."
    "The feeling is totally different from that angle," Maiz agreed.
    "Mami, you're glad we came?" Regina was grinning.
    Ria reached out and touched her daughter's cheek.  "I am, precious.  Just like you are."
    The phaeton sank straight down in the silence, occasionally moving out to avoid protuberances or shelves that jutted from the cliff, only to smooth herself back into the sheer vertical drop. 
    Tiny Nauru's voice from the control room shook their reverie.  "Report, Sojourner .  Are you at 389.2?"
    "Affirmative, Mariner. The destroyer is inferior by 100 meters.  We have just passed the Holiness Fissure and expect to sight the ship in another two minutes."  Maiz continued to control the helm, moving her hand over the steering orbs with practiced subtleness.
    Regina was on Zude's lap now.  "Why is Tiny's voice so funny?"
    "Because it's bouncing off a ricochet trough," Zude answered.  "Jass explained that, preshi.  Remember?  How the trench wall blocks the sound?"
    "What's that!" Enrique pointed at the wall beyond them.
    Maiz paused the phaeton, letting her hover gently at the level of Enrique's interest.  "Magister, bring a light to this, if you would."
    Zude obliged.  The beam struck a fluttering strand that seemed to explode and disappear, taking with it Zude's light.  Now the shaft of light that Zude controlled was cut off clean a few feet from the ship.  Zude moved the beam away from the wall, and the shadowy strand reappeared.  So did the full shaft of light.  "Amazing," she breathed, experimenting again and again with her beam, always with the same effect. 
    "It swallows the light," Reggie said.
    "It's a Swallower," said Enrique.
    Zude blinked.  Something stirred at the edge of her memory . . . that name.  But Maiz interrupted her thoughts. 
    "A tiny black hole perhaps?" their pilot speculated.  "I regret that we have no probes on this pod so we could reach out to it." 
    She released the hover and eased the phaeton away from the cliff.  They started slowly downward again.
    "Maybe the holofilm will show something," Ria mused, pausing the holocorder and staring back at the disappearing Swallower.
    Maiz was addressing the comunit.  "420 and still on descent."
    "Are you dawdling again, Sojourner ?" chided Tiny's voice. 
    "Affirmative." Maiz smiled.  "I suggest you expect an unusually long silence from us when we go under the destroyer some minutes from now.  We have inquisitive passengers, and our holo-artist wants to experiment with both figure and color."
    She glanced up to catch the Magister's smile.  Ria grunted