Connelly held her fingers up and measured the colorful streak. Her lips moved as she whispered the calculations to herself. "Putting it at the farthest reaches of BUD, one hundred yards, that would make it…" Connelly's eyes widened. "…fifty feet long!"

Robert broke from Connelly's stare and continued watching the flowing creature, which he now knew could swallow them whole if it chose too…if it had a mouth at all. Robert began to laugh, but stopped suddenly as he noticed the streak was growing larger. Not only that, five more streaks, then seven more, twelve total joined the first. Thirteen streaks glided through the water, growing larger and heading straight for them.

*   *   *   *   *

Leaning back in his chair, Harris tried to relax. He gazed up at the clear ceiling of the control center and admired the view of Jupiter, watching as the largest planet's other moons slid past, casting dark spotted shadows on the gas giant's surface. It was a sight no other human beings, outside of this crew, had ever seen before.

He thought about how every landing, every discovery, every meal eaten from the time they arrived until the time they returned to Earth was history in the making.  And what they had already discovered dwarfed all of the moon landings.

They had traveled further and had employed new technologies with a degree of success unheard of in any previous space mission. The moon missions had all been marked by near disasters. They were ultimately success stories, but the fates of their crews were often at risk.

Is that where we're headed? Harris thought. The attack on Peterson—and that's what it was, an attack—had him rattled. But Peterson was contained and the mission was back on track.

We're back on track. We'll stay on track.

He willed it to be true, but wasn't completely buying it.

Why?

He'd manned the control center for two landings now and on both occasions had little more to do than confirm the scheduled check-ins from the ground crews. He'd already heard from Choi, who was having great success at harvesting new Europhid samples, and Willard, who informed him that Dr. Connelly and Dr. Samuels had reached the Europian ocean.

History in the making. And he was in charge.

Then why am I worrying?

Peterson.

It had been a little while since he'd checked on him. He brought up the security camera feed from the med-lab and gawked at the empty room. He checked to make sure the feed was live.

Is that vomit on the floor? he wondered.

It was.

Peterson who appeared to be ill, had somehow unlocked the doors and broken quarantine. "Great."

That's when he noticed the ceiling above him. The hull had turned solid again, the view of Jupiter gone.

"I hope you don't mind," Peterson said from the entrance of the control center. "The view was making me dizzy."