Friday, 1 December 2017

Life In The Jovian Atmosphere

Life has not adapted to high Jovian mountain tops but has adapted to the upper atmosphere. On a very high mountain top, Theor sees swarms of flakes, grabs one, finds that it is lacy and star-shaped, touches it with his antennae, swallows it, then finds that, although it is oily and strange, his stomach accepts it. Next, hearing a whistle and turning around, he sees a vast, long-finned, fine-tendrilled whale-like organism "swimming" while eating the living flakes.

His people, dwelling in the dark depths, have never known of this upper life zone except as a legend. Theor is about to meet the Hidden Folk.
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4 comments:

  1. Sean M. Brooks1 December 2017 at 16:02

    Kaor, Paul!

    Wow! Now this is strange and fantastic!

    Sean

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  2. S.M. Stirling2 December 2017 at 22:16

    If life started in the atmosphere, I would expect it to colonize the surface from the mountaintops down -- analogous to the way life on earth colonized the land via tidal swamps and the like.

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