[he stares in its general direction, then shakes his head, reinforcing it with a little burst of returned feeling; disinclination to chase it, and a sort of inarticulate apology for the disgust]

We'd better keep going. We can always come back and check out our weird tentacle mystery another time -- or on our way back, possibly.

[if they can't find anything below the vents, then why not check out this other new mystery?]