It was some sort of giant, mottled egg. There it levitated, floating in pitch darkness, with a V-shaped crack at the base. An unholy yellow-green gas spilled out brightly from this crevice, looking like something you wouldn’t want to inhale, on this or any other planet. Below it, there was a floor of sorts, a latticed grill made of some unhealthy-looking, bonelike material, and a little of that same poisonous light reared up at the back.