Relief flooded him. He smiled at her. “Thank you, Lonlea. It is much appreciated. Put them in the women’s quarters. They will appreciate them more.”

    He could have kissed her. Once she’d made the offer, the other women disappeared and brought back some of their prized possessions. To his mind, the accommodations still looked less than inviting, but he decided it would do. It was enough to make it appear that they’d made an effort to offer hospitality.

    After some consideration, he decided to send the droids to escort their ‘guests’ to the observatory. Given the reaction of the humans to their appearance, he thought it might be best to allow them as much time as he dared to come to grips with it.

* * * *

    The hours that Sybil had spent in confinement had done very little to calm her. It had given her way too much time to think of unpleasant things that she might have to face and not nearly enough to accept that she would have to if and when the time came. The appearance of the creepy little gray beings, therefore, sent her spiraling toward panic.

    “We are to escort you to the observatory. Please to accompany us without struggle.”

    Sybil stared with pure horror at the creature that had spoken, wondering if she was the main attraction of the ‘observatory’.

    Try to preserve what dignity she had left, she wondered?

    Or throw caution to the wind and try to fight her way out of her predicament, knowing she didn’t have a chance in hell of winning?

    She swallowed convulsively several times and struggled to get up from the bunk she’d retreated to and had her answer. She was so weak with fright she didn’t think she could manage even a token resistance. That being the case, maybe she should just focus on trying to put up a good front and meet her fate with what dignity she could?

    It seemed like cold comfort, and yet, since there didn’t seem to be an alternative anyway shouldn’t she at least make the attempt not to shame her entire species by showing her cowardice?

    She thought they were going to have to support her. Her legs felt like rubber and her knees like water and her upper body felt too heavy to support. She managed, by grim determination, and a horror of being touched by the things, to walk unaided. Her relief was so profound when they reached their destination, however, that she nearly collapsed. Spencer appeared to be unconscious, but Kushbu and Rains were there already and appeared to be unharmed-badly shaken, but alert-and Powell was escorted into the room even as she arrived.

    Resisting the urge to burst into tears of relief, she moved as quickly across the room as she could and practically threw herself into Rains’ arms as if they were bosom buddies instead of bare acquaintances. Holly hugged her as tightly, conveying the desperation they both felt. “Thank god you’re alright!”

    “What happened to Spencer?”

    Holly Rains pulled away and looked down at the man. “We don’t know. He was lying on the floor when we got here.”

    At that comment, Sybil finally lifted her head to survey the room. She didn’t know what to think once she’d examined it. If it was an observatory, where were the windows? For that matter, given the fact that she’d been sure it would be some sort of torture chamber where the aliens could ‘observe’ while they were dissected, where were the gurneys?

    “It doesn’t look like I expected,” Holly commented.

    Sybil sent her a questioning look and the other woman shrugged. “They said it was an observatory.”

    “I’m guessing both of you thought the same thing I did,” Powell said wryly. “Alien abductions leapt to the forefront of my mind, which translated to… unpleasant medical examinations.”

    Sybil was about to point out that they still didn’t know that wasn’t the case, that they might’ve merely been brought together to wait, when a sudden noise distracted all of them. Glancing around fearfully, they discovered panels along the rounded end of the room were moving, both at the ceiling and upper wall.

    Sybil and Holly clutched at one another again, staring wide-eyed as the panels opened slowly wider and wider. Sybil found herself holding her breath, as if that would protect her from deadly gasses. She didn’t even realize she’d instinctively sucked in a breath and held it because she’d thought they were about to be flushed into space until it dawned on her that the panels were revealing windows. Beyond the windows a landscape was unfolding before them that was starkly beautiful and breathtakingly deadly.

    It hadn’t occurred to her that they might be on the surface of Venus, though why it hadn’t she had no idea. It should’ve dawned on her immediately when she saw the other crewmembers.

    The realization thawed her and, after a moment, as if by unspoken consent, she and Holly released each other and crossed the room to stand staring out of the wall of winds that offered a wide vista of the planet Venus. On the far horizon, the thick layer of clouds veiled the rising sun. They could clearly see the demarcation of the spreading light as it spilled across the virtually flat plains of Venus, unmoving. It took her several moments to recall that Venus’ rotation was so slow that it took almost a full year, Earth year, to rise and set. The building where they stood was on the dark side, facing Earth. When she’d searched the sky for it, she thought she detected the tiny blue globe that was home.

    She wasn’t certain if she actually had spotted it or if it was wishful thinking. The cloud cover was still thick enough to make visibility of the sky poor. Redirecting her gaze to the landscape outside once more, she studied it with all the wonder of seeing a sight never seen before-at least by her. She’d seen images, of course, but that wasn’t the same as actually seeing it-particularly since there was an enormous structure of some sort blocking the southern view.

    Sybil studied it, knowing what it had to be, and yet it might have been most any kind of factory she was familiar with. Disappointingly, there was no way to tell anything about the technology represented within the structure… beyond the fact that it was incredibly effective.

    Even giving them that, though, she thought there must be more. Maybe it was just because she was having a hard time swallowing just how advanced they were, but she couldn’t accept that one plant would be sufficient to terra-form on such a massive scale in so short a length of time.

    She could see that the planet was cooling. No doubt it was still blistering hot outside, but she could see the thin trails of lava flow in the distance cooling and solidifying along the edges. Steam rose from newly formed lava rock, making visibility even at ground level spotty. After a while, though, she noticed movement. Drawn by that discovery, she saw a vehicle slowly creep into view. Directly behind it were several others. The vehicles stopped on a nearly perfectly flat plateau maybe a half mile from the building where she stood and shadowy figures emerged.

    She thought at first that they must have gone out to take samples and readings, but she realized after a while that they were beginning some sort of construction.

    “Clearly they aren’t worried about us seeing anything now,” Powell murmured after a time. “No idea what that might mean to us, but I’m thinking it isn’t good.”

    Cold washed over Sybil. She moved away from the observation window abruptly, rubbing her arms up and down her bare arms. It was the first she’d noticed that she was the only one of the group the next thing to naked. The others were still wearing their suits-minus the helmets, but

    Was that because she was the only one that had been transported via a particle beam? Or had they done something she couldn’t remember?