He
quickly pressed the release and tugged open the panel.
At the first crack of its opening Queex turned with one of those bursts
of astounding speed and clawed for admittance, its protest against the
men forgotten. And it squeezed through a space Dane would have thought
too narrow to accommodate its bloated body. Both men slipped around the
door behind it and closed the panel tight.
The air was not as fresh as it had been when the plants were there. And
the vats which had taken the places of the banked greenery were certainly
nothing to look at. Queex humped itself into a clod of blue, immovable,
halfway down the aisle.
Dane tried to subdue his breathing, to listen. The Hoobat's actions
certainly argued that the alien thing had taken refuge here, though how
it had gotten through--? But if it were in the hydro it was well hidden.
He had just begun to wonder how long they must wait when Queex again went
into action. Its clawed front legs upraised, it brought the pinchers
deliberately together and sawed one across the other, producing a rasping
sound which was almost a vibration in the air.
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