11.30b

continued:

Watson clamped his limbs to his shell and settled slowly to the ground.

"And if we're not alone, we certainly have to ask the obvious question: who?"

"Who, Sherri?"

"No, who is out there?"

"Yes, who is it?"

"That's what I'm trying to ask."
"No, that's what I'm trying to ask."

Sherlock whirled and saw Watson crouched in the silt, eyestalks working feverishly. "Not here, Watson. Well, here, but not here. You know what I mean."

"I'm afraid I don't follow."

"Well, this is a monumental find." Sherlock slowly rotated over the giant hulk. Black as the deepest night, the giant, rock-like mound stretched into the distance. It was easily three to twenty times the length of his own body, and possibly larger. It was hard to tell, as a large portion of it was submerged in the silt. The substance was hard and smooth and cold. It was, in short, inexplicable. Sherlock had seen things that were black, and things that were smooth, and things that were cold. But never had he seen such a large combination of the three. He wiped off the flank of the thing near the edge and exposed the part that Watson's scuttling obscured. The sharp, clean contrast between black and white played with his fingers. There were six large shapes that stood out bright from the blackness. His only conclusion was that the shapes had to have a creator. He had no idea what they were, or why the maker of the shape had decided to put them so far from center.

Sherlock swooped Watson up and swam away at speed. "If I'm correct about the trajectory of this evidence, there should be more over . . . Aha!" His tail flashed and he slowed over a shining lump.

Watson peered over Sherlock's hand. What is it?

It was then that Sherlock said the three most frightening words that Watson had ever heard.

"I don't know."