The Martian was lying motionless, face-down, at the base of the tower. Carter was already making his way, as fast as he could, toward the slender, prone figure.
"That was…exciting," Francis remarked as he pulled himself to his feet again, using his cane for leverage. "Are you boys alright?"
"Never been better," Lamont answered in a dry tone, standing unsteadily. He began to pick at tendril-like strands of oxygen that were still clinging to the mechanical parts of his vacuum suit. After a moment of lingering silence, he looked up and exclaimed, "Phobos!"
The Martian was lying motionless, face-down, at the base of the tower. Carter was already making his way, as fast as he could, toward the slender, prone figure. Then, all at once, Phobos lifted from the ground. The movement was uncanny, as if a marionette, having been discarded on a stage floor, was suddenly picked up again by the strings.
"I'm uninjured, Francis," he said mildly. "That was a most remarkable experience."
"I shouldn't have brought you down here," Carter growled. Lamont suspected from his tone of voice that fear and quickly transformed from relief into anger. A momentary vision of the stiff body of Rex Donovan passed before his eyes, and he physically shook his head to rid himself of it.
"On the contrary," Phobos objected, placing a gloved hand on the captain's shoulder. "I'm glad I took the time. I have never encountered a sensation quite like that."
"I have," Lamont said. "It felt like what happens when we step into the lift in the tower. Only much stronger and on a much larger scale."
"There's a common theme, then," Carter observed, turning away from Phobos to look at the tower. "Ever since we encountered this structure, it's been demonstrating an apparent power over gravity, or some form of magnetism that is indistinguishable from gravity."
"Is that surprising?" Lamont asked. "After all, we make our own gravity on Westward. So the Martians knew how to do that."
"Not exactly," Phobos said. "On Westward, we use electrified carbon plates treated with a—that is, subjected to a treatment that simulates gravity at a fixed density. This structure appears to be able to control and manipulate gravity in very targeted ways. For example, drawing oxygen out of the moon's crust and into the tower. It's very sophisticated technology."
"More sophisticated than Martian?" Lamont asked.
Phobos thought about that. "Different, at any rate," he concluded.
"The real question is, where did it all go?" Carter added. He picked his way back toward the base of the tower, peering down at the rocky ground from which it emerged. "The oxygen must have been drawn into the tower, but I don't see any obvious point of ingress."
"I was wondering the same thing," Phobos agreed. "It occurs to me that we don't know how far—"
"Exploration party, this is Lazarus. Do you copy?" The voice of the pilot interrupted the Martian's thought.
Carter tapped a control on his wrist to open the corresponding channel. "This is the exploration party. We copy. Was there a disturbance where you are too?"
"I don't know about a disturbance so much as a—development," Lazarus replied. "I'm on my way to your location now and will be there in five minutes."
"What kind of development?" Carter asked. "Is the mining expedition finished already?"
"They're finishing as quickly as they can," the pilot replied. Lamont noticed that his voice sounded a bit shaky. "Sir, there's something here that I think you're going to want to see."