They waited out the attack. Wispy shreds of smoke thinned as the Leviathan healed its internal ruptures, damming the torrent of air. The remaining skysharks glided with easy menace over the Leviathan's skin, but did not rip and gouge it. They ignored the periodic rings of plant life around Leviathan's middle. Apparently these thick-skinned, ropy growths had developed poisons or other defenses, and were left to spread their leathery leaves to the sun, oblivious to the assault on Leviathan's body.

             The skysharks fed first on debris. Then they sensed Cley and Seeker and converged. 1 heir mouths gaped, showing spiky blue teeth. Clay felt ominous, silent presences in her mind, like the sudden press of chilled glass on her face. Seeker said, "Hate them."

             "You do?"

             "No, you hate them. That will protect us."

             ''Now. "

             She let go some of her bottled-in emotions, envisioning them as a sharp spear lanced directly at the nearest skyshark. This time she felt her transmission as a bright spark of virulent orange. The sky-shark wriggled, turned, fled.

             "Good. Do that whenever one approaches."

             "Why doesn't Leviathan keep them off this way?"

             "In packs they damp and defend against Leviathan thought patterns. But it taxes them greatly, for they are not very intelligent. When foraging among the helpless outgushed life, that defense mode is shut off."

             Already the skysharks were roaming further from the Leviathan, catching up with creatures and plant shreds blown away. Their angular bodies bulged, bellies still throbbing with the struggles of their ingested banquets. Fore and aft, appendages unfolded from their warty hides. Parabolic antennas blossomed and scanned with patient, metronomic vigilance. Cley suspected there were species which preyed on these sleek hunters, too, though to look at these mean, moving appetites, she could not imagine how they could be vulnerable.

             "So you think they're after us?"

             "They seldom assault a Leviathan; the losses are too heavy. Usually it is a tactic of desperation, when pickings elsewhere are lean."

             "Well, maybe it's been a bad year."

             "They were not thinned by hunger. No, they were directed to do this."

             "By the Mad Mind?"

             "It must be."

             Cley felt an icy apprehension. "Then it knows where I am."

             "I suspect it is probing, trying whatever idea occurs."

             "It killed a lot of creatures, doing this."

             "It cares nothing for that."

             Their jury-rigged bubble was clouding with moisture. Cley rubbed the surface to see better, forgetting the skysharks and beginning to wonder how they could survive for long out here. Mad Mind or no. Seeker seemed unbothered. It spread its hindquarters, assuming the posture which meant it intended to excrete, and Cley said, "Seeker! Not now."

             "But I must."

             "Look, we're going to suffocate out here unless—"

             Seeker farted loudly and shat a thin stream directly onto the nearest wall. "Take a deep breath," it said.

             Cley caught just a taint of the smell—and then her ears popped. Seeker's excrement had eaten a small hole in their protection. Vacuum sucked the brown slime away.

             Cley grabbed for the nearest wall as a gathering breeze plucked at her hair. Sudden fear darted through her and she sucked in air greedily, finding it already thinner. In the far wall a small hole shrieked its banshee protest. The wall shot toward her. She struck it, rebounded in the sudden chill. Seeker's fur abruptly filled her face and she clutched a handful.

             She would have demanded an explanation but that would have taken air. Seeker surged, carrying her along with muscular agility. Her ears felt as though daggers were thrust into her eardrums. Seeker dug its claws into the walls, wedging the two of them into a corner. She struggled to see what was happening.

             Their draining air made a thin, screaming rocket, thrusting them back toward the Leviathan. They passed into its shadow.

             She saw a raw wound in the skin nearby. A pale pink membrane slid out from its edges. The gouge looked like a majestically closing eye, hurt and red-rimmed. They were headed nearly directly toward the slowly narrowing rent.

             Seeker lunged away. This momentarily altered the direction of the jetting air. Then Seeker slammed against the far wall and the jet swung again. This midcourse correction took them straight through the closing iris of the gouge.

             They struck a large, soft fern and bounced among a confused net of branches. The pink membrane sealed shut above them, puckering along the seam.

             Cley could hold her breath no longer. She exhaled, coughed, and sucked in thin but warm air. She breathed greedily, blinking.

             Around them small scurryings and slidings began. The Leviathan had already begun to secure and revive itself.

             "How . . . how'd you do that?"

             "A simple problem in dynamics." Seeker yawned.

             They lived for two days in the segmented chambers of this zone. Armies of small, insectlike workers thronged everywhere, patching and pruning. The pink membrane thickened just enough to keep in air securely, but allowed in beams of sunlight which hastened re-growth. Cley found food and rested, watching the crowds of hurrying workers. Through the transparent membrane she could see the spaceborne life outside, and at last understood their role.

             Small crawler forms healed the torn skin with their sticky leavings. Others seemed to ferry materials from distant parts of Leviathan to the many lacerations. Strange oblong creatures scooted in from distant places, trailing bags of fluids and large seeds.

             She slowly caught the sense of Leviathan, its interlocking mysteries. The carcass of a skyshark, gutted by its own internal fires, became food for the regrowth of myriad plants. The armies which distributed skyshark parts showed no malice or vindictive anger as they tore the body to shreds, sometimes stopping to eat a morsel. They were intent upon their labors, no more.

             Though much could be repaired, clearly the great world-creature was badly hurt. Long chasms yawned where skysharks had ruptured enclosed pressure zones, spilling wealth. Whole regions were gray with death. The reek of bodies drove Cley and Seeker from the once-tranquil groves of ropy, banyanlike trees.

             But the true sign of the enormous damage came when Cley felt a slow, steady gravity pushing her toward the aft layers.

             "We're moving," she said.

             "We must." Seeker was carefully picking the briars from a pretty bunch of red berries. It assured her that the thorns were quite tasty, whereas the berries were poison; the bush was a master of sly deception.

             "Where to?"

             "Jove. Events accelerate."

             "Is the Leviathan dying?"

             "No, but its pain is vast. It seeks succor."

             "From this Jove thing?"

             "No, though it expends its fluids to take us there. It can receive the aid of its many friends as we travel."

             "Us? We're so important?"