"What've you got there?" he asked listlessly.
"Some of our silvery little pets," said Gerrod cheerfully. "I'm studying them in their native lair. Have you looked at them under a microscope?"
"No."
Gerrod smeared a bit of the silvery mess on a glass slide and put it under a microscope. He worked busily for a moment or so, adjusting the focus, and then waved Davis toward the eyepiece.
"They're funny little beasts. Look them over."
Davis looked uninterestedly, but in a moment even his gloom was lightened by the interest of the sight he saw. The enlargement of the microscope was so great that only a few of the tiny animals were visible, but each of them was clearly and brilliantly outlined.
They were little jellylike creatures, roughly spherical in shape, with their bodies protected by almost infinitely thin, silicious shells that possessed a silvery luster. From dozens of holes in the fragile shells protruded fat, jellylike tentacles that waved and moved restlessly, forever in search of food.
Under the microscope the shells were partly transparent, and within the jellylike body inside the shell could be seen a single dark spot.
"That blotch in their shells seems to be the nucleus, or else their stomach. I can't quite make out if they're one-celled animals like am[oe]bæ, or if they're really complex creatures."
"Rum little beggars," said Davis without removing his gaze from the eyepiece. "They're separate animals, anyway. Odd that they should make a jellylike mass."