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“Where'd you go?” Clarity asked him intently.

“Hmm?” He blinked. “I've been right here.”

“No.” She smiled perceptively. “I know that self-inflicted stasis. You went somewhere. I'm sorry to break in, but I couldn't take it anymore. The silence, and the distance.”

“Sorry,” he apologized. “Something one of the Ulru-Ujurrians said got me to thinking.”

Her expression twisted. “I don't think I like the sound of that.”

“It just sparked a question,” he explained, a little too quickly, a little too disingenuously. “Not a solution. Just a question.” Looking past her, he nodded in the direction of the Krang's silent contact platform. “The only drawback is that I have to ask it of the machine.”

She looked around sharply, then back at him. “Again? If I didn't know you better and appreciate what putting yourself under those transparencies costs you in terms of physical and mental wear, I'd say you were getting addicted to the experience.”

He had to smile. “Hardly. It's every bit as tiring and draining as you say. But I don't have any choice. Even if we had access to the Terran Shell itself, the answer I need isn't available there. Or from any humanx knowledge resource.” His expression reflected the helplessness he was feeling. “I have to try, Clarity. It might be the last thing I can think of to try.”

She chewed her lower lip. “I wish you'd wait until the others are back.”

He shrugged. “Why? Would Bran somehow make the experience easier? Is Tru's presence going to lessen the strain? Can Syl find a way to keep me from burning axons?” He shook his head. “I'd rather do it and get it over with than have to listen to their advice and deal with their worries.”

Her tone was subdued almost to the point of inaudibility. “What about my worries?”

Reaching out, he did his best to reassure her. “This will be the least amount of time I've ever spent on one of those contact slabs, I promise. I'll just make contact, pose my question, receive an answer or a rebuff, and slip back out.”

She looked up at him. “You make it sound as harmless as requesting a zoning change on a piece of undeveloped property on Nur.”

“Okay,” he acknowledged, “so there's some risk involved.” He indicated their alien surroundings. “Look where we are. Consider where we recently were and what I experienced beyond the Rim. Compared to that and everything else you and I have been through, soliciting the answer to a single question from an alien machine I've already been in contact with counts as a minor diversion.”

She sniffed. “I don't know why I bother to raise concerns: you're going to do what you want to do anyway.”

He straightened. “I'm going to do what I have to do, Clarity. You, of all people, should know that.” Reaching up to stroke Pip, he started deliberately past her. As he headed down the wider-than-human aisle toward the distant dais, she watched him go.

It seemed like she was always watching him go.

As soon as the skimmer settled gently to ground and its loading ramp deployed just inside the entrance to the alien monolith, Truzenzuzex, Tse-Mallory, and Sylzenzuzex disembarked. Seeing the human female sitting by herself, Syl wandered over and proffered politeness.

“Sirrintt, Clarity. You are feeling well?”

“As well as can be expected, Syl.” She nodded past the thranx in the direction of the two senior scientists. “How did it go? Did you find the solution to everything—or anything?”

“I'm afraid not.” Settling back on all six legs, Syl used both truhands to pull down her right antenna and commenced preening. “There's certainly much to see and learn—there is an entire city to explore, after all—but we found nothing more remarkable than what was expected. As a xenoarchaeological expedition it has been a great success.” She gestured regret. “Insofar as finding something to use against the advancing threat, it has been a total failure.” Continuing to groom, she looked back over her thorax. “My Eighth and his companion try to exude optimism, but at hearts they are realists.”

Clarity nodded understandingly. “Well, as long as they search without