The light seemed to squeeze down, then it blinked out, leaving them in absolute darkness.

The door closed and it was gone.

“That was our chance,” said George.

Hutch pressed her palms against the wall. The thing was moving away.

George’s light blinked back on. He was in front of the door, looking for a way to open it.

“We can burn our way through if we have to,” she said. “But I think we should just stay put for a few more minutes. Give the whatzis time to get clear.”

“And then,” said Tor, “we might want to get back to the lander and skedaddle.”

Nick was silent, and Hutch suspected he agreed. But she heard George draw a long breath and knew what was coming. “Hutch can take you back if you want to go, Tor.”

Tor hadn’t yet moved. “I think,” he said, “maybe we should all go back.”

George was rising up in righteous outrage. George, who had hidden with the rest of them while the whatzis at the door looked into the chamber. “We haven’t seen anything yet,” he said. “What do we do? Go back and tell everyone how we were inside an alien ship and saw an empty room?”

Hutch found the manual, which was another oval stud, and opened the door, simultaneously dousing her light. The conversation died while she stepped outside. “I don’t see it,” she said.

“I’ll make a deal,” said George. “Let’s continue the way we’ve been going, and check down the corridor a little bit. If we don’t find anything, then we go back.”

Hutch smiled in the dark. George was every bit as scared as the rest of them.

They joined her in the passageway. “Your show,” said Hutch, and she waited for him to lead the way.

They opened several more doors, and found several more empty chambers, and George pressed on. Just a few steps farther. Look at one more room. Hutch held her peace, leaving it to Nick or Tor to raise a complaint. But they, too, were reluctant.

THE SIXTH ROOM contained the werewolf.

It was standing in the dark when George’s light, or someone’s light, swept across it. Tor heard someone yowp, and they scattered back the way they’d come. It was strictly gangway from that moment, and they were well down the passage before they realized the thing wasn’t pursuing them. Tor took a long look back before coming to a tentative halt.

The corridor was empty.

The door stood open. He played his light across it, waiting.

The others continued on another ten or fifteen meters before slowing down enough to look behind them.

“Where is it?” demanded Nick.

“I don’t think it was real,” said Hutch, smothering an impulse to laugh.

“Why’d you run?”

“Reflex.”

Tor returned toward the doorway. He kept the beam from his lamp aimed squarely at it, watched the circle of light shrink as he approached. The others waited at a respectful distance while he leaned around the edge and looked in.

The werewolf hadn’t moved.

There were voices on the circuit. “What is it, Tor?”

“What’s going on?”

“Is it alive?”

“No,” he said. “It’s an idol.”

It was half again as tall as Tor. It had red eyes, long vertical slices of cool ferocity that blazed when the light hit them. And a snout that looked more reptilian than vulpine. But it was covered with fur.

It stood erect, gazing across the room with malicious intelligence, fangs just visible in a cool smirk.

The others had moved in behind him, but nobody had much to say.

“It looks like wood,” Tor said, casually, enjoying his moment.

“Nice Fido,” Hutch whispered.

He advanced into the chamber, flashed his lamp around quickly to make sure there were no surprises, and gazed up at it.

It stood behind a table.

The table was made of stone. Six carved legs ended in clawfeet. Vines and leaves were sculpted into its skirts. Neatly laid out on it were a bowl, a cup, and a dagger.

George, maybe still unsure, nevertheless came forward. Hutch put the cutter away, and Tor realized he’d forgotten he had one. Lot of help he’d have been if the thing had been alive.

It was like no creature he’d seen before. It was lean, well muscled, with an expression that was pure venom. Its skull was flattened, covered by a wedge of black fur, thick in back, narrowing almost to a spike in front. Its irises were red against white pupils.

All that would have been sufficiently unnerving on its own. But the thing wore a white dinner jacket, a fluffy blue shirt, and a pair of pressed gray slacks. It was the clothing that had touched a primal nerve somewhere, and even now kept Tor thinking werewolf.

This was not a plain chamber carved out of rock, like the others. The walls appeared to be wooden, were partially covered with canvas, and were decorated with drums, flutes, stringed instruments, an array of spears, tridents, daggers, and slings, and plates and necklaces and masks. Everything was scaled for the creature.

The plates were stenciled with flowers. “They’re quite pretty,” said Hutch.

A red cloth had been arranged atop the table.

Hutch stood a minute or two examining it, then leaned across it and touched the werewolf. Tugged gently on its slacks. “It’s stuffed,” she said.

George was looking around the room. “That was a bit of a scare,” he said, trying a laugh that came out sounding like a cackle.

Hutch held part of the slacks out so everyone could see they were real. Then she tested one of the arms. The claws. “Razors,” she said. “You wouldn’t want to stumble around here in the dark.”

“What is this place?” demanded Nick.

The cup and the bowl on the tabletop were ceramic. The dagger appeared to be iron. Several other weapons had silver hilts and all were quite large. They would have fit nicely in the werewolf’s hand.

George approached the creature and stood mesmerized by it. “You don’t think this is what they look like, do you?”

“Probably,” said Nick.

“My God.”

Hutch played her light across the overhead. It also was made of wood. There were beams, and it was lower than in the other chambers. “The place might be a chapel,” she said. “Although I can’t imagine what it would be doing in a remote part of the ship. Where it wouldn’t be readily accessible.”

“What does that have to do with the idea that this is what they look like?” asked George, whose illusions about aliens were apparently well on their way to being shattered.

“If it’s a chapel,” said Hutch, “this is the god. Most intelligent species think of themselves as designed in God’s image.”

“Oh.” George could not break away from the figure. Tor was forced to admire the man, who was clearly terrified. But he refused to give in to his fears. Instead he veered off and began walking slowly around the chamber, making sure he got pictures of everything. “We should take some of these back with us.”

Tor touched the goblet and was surprised to discover it had no give. “It’s attached to the table,” he said.

Hutch tried the plate. It, too, was securely fastened. Even the red cloth turned out to be an illusion: It was as stiff and unyielding as a piece of cardboard.

The objects mounted on the wall were high, almost out of reach. George could just touch some of the masks and weapons. They were also locked down.

“I guess it shouldn’t be a surprise,” said Hutch. “For a while I forgot where we were. But the ship has to maneuver without throwing everything around.”

They went back out into the passageway. George turned to his left, deeper into the ship. Good man, thought Tor. He’s not going to back away. Even though Tor would have preferred going back to the lander.

“One more,” he said.

They stopped before the next door.

THE CHAMBER WAS ruined.

Furniture was smashed; the walls were water-stained on one side of the room and scorched on the other. A large pot had been dropped into a fireplace. Half a dozen windows looked in on the room, through which (when they aimed their lamps) they could see forest, dark-hued trees with bony fingers reaching toward a pair of moons, and large ominous blossoms folded for the night, resting on purple bushes with leaves like scythes.