Curt sank down and let despair wash over him. Yet a thought, half-formed, struggled to emerge from the recesses of his mind; something he had noticed about that entity, Zemmd; an idea that danced away as he sought to remember.
He couldn't quite grasp it. It was maddening.
Such a weariness of body and mind came upon Curt that he fell into a fitful sleep. His last conscious thought was of the sentient entity, of which they were to become a part.
All would be over then.
Curt dreamed. A great arctic wind, alive as if with a snapping intelligence, seemed to roar about his huddled carcass. Far away a door whispered open and closed with a sigh. A stranger seemed to have entered the room, a great towering figure with silvery hair, who stood looking down at them and then paced away in the gloom like the going of a breeze.
Curt rolled over, mumbling in his sleep.
The wind crept back like a padding cat, whispering in his ears. It resolved itself into a voice, a human voice very real and urgent. Curt sat up abruptly. This was no dream, the towering stranger was still there.
Somehow he had passed through the electronic curtain across the doorway....
Curt leaped to his feet as he recognized George Landreth.