The weight Connelly experienced as her body was pressed into her chair was intense and she found it difficult to breathe. It was hard to believe that this acceleration was just a fraction of what would eventually propel them through the solar system and back to Earth…if they survived that long.

"Vertical thrusters!" Harris shouted over the cacophony of jolted metal joints and tumbling equipment throughout the ship.

"Vertical thrusters!" Choi returned.

Connelly saw Choi move as a blur. The thrusters engaged with a sudden upward motion that lifted them off the surface of the moon. The smoothness of frictionless travel instantly quieted the ship. The shaking was gone. The noise was gone. Peace had returned to the interior of the Surveyor, but outside—on Europa—was something else entirely.

The ice split open like a festering wound, a streak of red lunged out, launching toward Surveyor. The massive tendril had the thickness of a 747 and God only knew how much strength. Connelly was sure it would be strong and flexible enough to wrap around Surveyor like an anaconda and crush the life from her before dragging them all back into the Europian ocean below.

Connelly was about to scream, but Harris's voice cut her off. "Jettison the balloons!"

Choi didn't bother responding. She just acted. Connelly felt a sudden surge of upward motion.  She was feeling the Surveyor blast up, pushed by the detaching balloons. Each explosive detachment provided more lift to the Surveyor…and there were thousands.

As the Surveyor lifted further off the ice and away from the tendril, the balloons rolled forward across the ice like a horizontal avalanche. The tumbling balloons distracted the tendril. It snapped back down toward the ice, impaling one of the balloons and bursting several others beneath its weight.

The blackness of open space came into view as the Surveyor pulled up into the sky, approaching orbit. Proximity sensors revealed that the tendril had lunged up again, but missed the Surveyor's back side by thirty feet.

But there was no time to celebrate. "Incoming!" Choi shouted.

A cloud of charged particles shot out in front of Surveyor. It was just the beginning of a thicker, impenetrably thick mass that was sure to tear the ship apart. Harris yanked the controls to the left and the Surveyor leaned and continued to climb. "Damn this moon!" The first of the charged particles shattered against the outer hull, echoing concussions throughout the ship, but Surveyor continued to rise, pulling away from the barrage.

In less than thirty seconds, they were through the worst of it. Complete silence enveloped the ship. Connelly let her breath out. Not only had they traveled further than anyone had before…not only had they made the most important scientific discovery of all time…not only had they been attacked by a raw and powerful alien intellect.

They had also survived.

CHAPTER 34 -- HOME