Her helmet had rims of ice crystals. But why did she not feel cold all over? Then she realized that the buffeting was resonating through her, playing her like a drum. Her teeth chattered in resonance with it. She felt the drogue’s pull, maybe half a grav. Muscles ached, strummed.

The ice-white streamers around her thickened and darkness gathered in. Fat, dark boils below loomed and she plunged through them, into… night. It must be cold here, she thought, but she felt warm. The heat from the first, fast friction had protected her.

But… she felt queasy. In the dark she could feel herself begin to spin, arms trying to fly out. The parachute would get fouled if she went into a gyre.

But how to stop? She spread her arms, giving way to the centrifugal.

Now she could navigate by the pressure against her, since that was down. She flexed her legs to steer and got slammed around by twisting winds. All in the whirling dark.

Violent gusts rattled her. Lifted her… then not. Gravity returned—which meant she was rising, punched upward by winds that fed the cloud core.

Pang went her faceplate. Lesser hammer blows rang along her body. What? In a dim silvery glow, she saw hailstones bouncing off her suit. Rocks of ice, some as big as her fist. They came at her from below, slamming up into her. But she still felt less gravity, so she was rising toward the cloud summit. Some huge hurricane was hammering the hail upward. A crisp, white burst of light seared her vision. She closed her eyes, letting them recover.

Falling. Breathing, yes. She looked down a vast dark tunnel burrowing through the center of the cloud. A white lightning bolt twisted across this tunnel, showing her feet as apart, arms flapping. Whirling. Head rapping hard. Dark above. Tunnel below. Dark above again. Tunnel—then it snapped off, leaving her in complete black oblivion.

She looked at her helmet timer: 16.27 minutes elapsed.

It seemed like hours. And the ground was somewhere below. Plus storms.

Smoke collected on the belly of the storm. Like a parasite crawling, she thought. She had never seen such lightning-bright weather near the ground. The cloud world flashed all around her, lit by tangles of lightning—thick blades like liquid swords. Then they snapped off—and the thunder came. She did not hear it. Instead, she felt it, like a deep note that her body hummed.

Winds poked and pried at her, whipping her arms around. She curled up, head toward what she thought was down—and found in the next blue-white lightning flash that she was looking up. Or thought she was.

A giant hand snatched her around. Her lungs wheezed out all they had. The hand had her by her back—and then she realized that her chute was spinning her like an ornament.

She turned to check, and lightning lit the parachute canvas. A beautiful domed cathedral over her. Almost enough to make her religious. Then the thunder hit her and she vibrated again. If there was a time to pray, this would be it.