why do i get the feeling taking her helmet off is a bad idea?

Well she is about to get to experience the joys of oxygen toxicity, if she's lucky she'll just get temporary retinal damage

Wait.... her helmet started out smooth and round.... then when she pulled it off, looked somewhat deformed... she set it down and then it looked Really deformed... what the hell's going on?

The material that makes up the bubble is apparently able to deploy and retract, like some kind of electric stimuli making it harden. These suits are made to be really compact and high tech, IIRC.

Looking at the helmet I'm going to guess she's dead.

And then she melted.

I really gotta catch up with this series...

From what was mentioned earlier, the readout didn't say that the atmosphere wasn't breathable, but that the composition wouldn't be safe for prolonged exposure. "Limited exposure recommended" was what the suit reading told her, meaning it should be reasonably safe for her to take it off long enough to get something to eat or drink at the least. She's in more danger of what the unidentified 2% biological traces in the water are than the air at the moment.

It's also not unreasonable to think that she might be able to boil said water to kill some of the traces- but in this case, it's more than likely that she's so dehydrated that she needs to take this gamble now.

True, I do get the impression that she's desperate enough to take her chances rather than take the time to try and find the elements necessary to boil it first.

ABSOLUTELY NOT! you do NOT want to start a fire in that atmosphere, that's a fantastic way to die.

Wait, I've heard from a lot of people that there are certain poisonous metals that are apparently sweet... no clue where it came from, but still... hmmm...

I think the readout on her suit was something about there being too much air or too high pressure. Not good long term, especially if it's high enough to potentially cause the bends or something?

Still, dying of thirst or trusting that the water is pure enough to drink without getting seriously ill off the bat? I'd go with the water.

And then its revealed that she's been an alien all this time but didn't realize it due to not being exposed to this planets atmosphere. :D

Or is already dead.

Also possible! *nods* Both would be even better. :D

Course I'm a sucker for a happy ending so I'm really really hoping this all turns out to have been a hologram test to see how someone would handle a desperate insane situation like this and by the end she'll get a ton of money from the researchers, get back together with her s.o. and live happily ever recovering from her trauma with lots of shmultzy lovey dovey adorableness! :D Highly doubt that will be the case but I always like to dream. ^^

Personally I find the idea of accession into a deep one not so bad.

For me that would depend on whether or not individuality is at all maintained. >.> If the individual is just totally subsumed by the entity in the process, meh, a net loss.

Dammit girl, this is how you get Fish-Foxes! Is that what you want? a world full of Innsmoth Foxes???

Why not?

Crazy theory: She actually didn't escape the idol horror and this is just what her brain is tricked into seeing this after she is fussed with the creature.