by C. Gockel
Bix nodded. “What do you need?”
“A repair crew. I’d like five fresh space-able bodies, including somebody who knows how to do large-scale ceramic bonding in zero gravity.”
“See who we’ve got, Cat,” said Bix.
Even as she called up the list, Catharin objected. “There are good reasons not to wake up a whole repair crew unless you’re sure they can do the job—and the whole Checklist can be completed—on time.” It was day sixty-three. The Checklist languished in the upper fifties.
Becca asked levelly, “Reasons like what?”
“Those remaining in stasis are safer.”
Bix said, “That’s not a good enough reason.”
Reluctant, Catharin explained more of the medical situation than she would have wanted to. “Revived from stasis, the body goes back to biological time, meaning that the consequences of damage at the molecular level unfold at the normal, biochemical rate. And damage there is. Medical modeling predicts an elevated incidence of cancers and of multi-systemic diseases in which the autoimmune system malfunctions. Blood disorders as well.” Sensing ripples of disquiet in her colleagues, she continued, “We can combat such illnesses with the medical science we brought with us. But that means reviving medical specialists, who will be at risk for the same problems they’re needed to cure. The medical problems might even outpace our human resources to deal with them.”
“But without more people, we won’t be ready to make planetfall.” Becca ran a hand through her hair.
Bix said, “I’ll take what you’re saying under advisement.” Then, “Torres, are we ready for more people?”
“Only if some of them are plumbers,” Miguel replied glumly. “If we put a load on the life support systems, including plumbing, problems will crop up. Not dangerous problems, but people will be needed to fix them.”
Bix said to Becca, “Can you pare down the list and make do with a skeleton crew to repair the hull—like three?”
Becca nodded. “That makes sense, I guess. But I’ll be darned if I can see any sense in plowing on like this with too few people for the job! We’re like an egg, sealed up with all our nutrients, which are finite. It doesn’t do a chick any good to stay in the egg too long. It’ll die if it doesn’t get out of there.”
Joel chimed in, “We’ve got to go to the planet and hatch. Let’s have some fresh reinforcements and get the job done!”
Becca said, “At least, I do need a ceramic technologist. Without that much, forget it.”
Bix grunted assent. “Cat, who’s the lucky guy?”
“One mission specialist is cross-trained. But to expect ‘fresh’ reinforcements may be too optimistic. I think that so far we’ve been luckier than the odds dictate. There’s a note in this man’s medical history about allergies. Almost half of all people have identifiable allergies of some sort—it was impractical to disqualify people on those grounds—but my gut reaction in this case is that’s a bad omen. I’m almost certain that if we revive him now he will be incapacitated.”
In the act of running her hand through her hair, Becca clenched her fingers in frustration. “Isn’t there somebody else?”
“Almost certainly. Among the passengers. Shall we breach the protocol to revive them?” Catharin looked at Bix.
Bix cursed. Then, “Around the table. I want to hear advice. . . .” He placed the stubby fingers of each hand against each other. “I want opinion against waving off. As in, tell me exactly why we have to break our necks in order to make planetfall the first time around?”
Joel, at Bix’s right, said promptly, “Any solar system’s a dangerous place. After we swing around the sun we’re in the ecliptic, and speaking of collisions, the ecliptic’s more hazardous than the whole rest of the trip. Besides planets and moons, this system has asteroids and interplanetary debris.”
Becca nodded. “The Ship is as fragile as an egg in collisions with bodies like that.”
Miguel chose his words with care. “This Ship is designed to be a starship with everyone in stasis, everything shut down, and a nitrogen atmosphere; or else, an orbiting city that provides an Earthlike environment for the population. In between shutdown and fully habitable modes, its operation is more problematic.”
Lary said, “I think we ought to loop around for a while. Study what we’ve got here.” There was a disapproving stir from Becca and Joel, and Lary insisted, “It is asinine for us to be in too much of a hurry to ‘hatch’ on Green. Green isn’t isolated. It’s got Blue, as close as Luna was to Earth. But Blue’s six times the size of Luna, with a vigorous magnetosphere and God knows what other features—none of you realize how much we don’t know about Blue! Believe me, we should be—”
“I see your point,” said Bix. “Cat?”
Catharin answered, “‘First, do no harm’ is the rule of my profession. I do not want to harm an unwitting and innocent passenger.”
In a sharp tone, Becca said, “The Ship is more important than individual people. Check the passenger lists for a ceramic technologist with experience handling Dup-Dow fourteen to thirty-five.”
“I’ve found two,” Catharin retorted. “One is over fifty and probably won’t have the stamina to handle an outside repair anytime soon, given the effects of stasis on older men. The other is a much younger man, married, with wife and two children and a brother, all of whom—and these may be the only people he knows on the whole Ship and in the whole universe—are scheduled for revival in the third decade of the colony. Am I to tell him that he may not see them for thirty years?”
Sounding grim, Bix said, “Revive him anyway.”
Catharin felt drained. She could not face the stasis vaults yet. The scuff of her shoes on the corridor floors echoed. She climbed up the blue well toward the axis, out of the sway of the Ship’s spin-gravity. Zero gravity did not really ease her exhaustion, but rather masked it like a drug. She could still feel the exhaustion in her bones. Floating, she waited for the ‘vator to come, not knowing where she would ask it to take her.
She was too tired and too strained to keep the truth out of her mind. The whole truth. We went so fast that time dilated. One thousand years for the Ship took us almost two thousand light-years and three millennia from the Earth we knew.
Catharin found that she had taken the ‘vator to the flight deck. Through the window, she stared out at the star-blasted hull. They were almost at perihelion, nearest approach to this new sun. Vividly illuminated, the hull of the starship had turned into a savage chiaroscuro, black shadows in the craters, blinding light reflected from undamaged areas. Catharin was mesmerized by the sight of the hull. It told the predicament of Aeon: the brilliance of a civilization that could imagine crossing the stars—and succeed—juxtaposed with nature in its most final and uncompromising aspect: death.
Behind her, someone entered the flight deck with a faint scuff of shoes. “Can we talk?”
Catharin feared that Becca would ask about the ceramic technologist. “I’m not in the mood.”
Becca moved between Catharin and the window. Silhouetted against the ruin of the hull, Becca said, “Then listen. I did not mean to hurt your feelings. If I did, I’m sorry.” She added, “I’d be lying if I said I wasn’t worried about the hull. It’s my job. At the same time, I believe—”
The Ship’s ongoing spinning suddenly framed the sun in the window. Near, redder than the sun of Earth, its fiery light poured over Becca and made her tousled red hair blaze. Becca quickly turned away from the glare. The blazing effect of the backlighting on Becca’s hair underscored her words in a way that Catharin would never forget. Becca said, “We had the dreams and the technology and the courage to come this far. Now there’s a good green world waiting for us. We’ll make it. We’re meant to. Go ahead and revive the passenger.”
Miguel went with Catharin. Together they took the ‘vator down-Axis, into the serried ranks of passenger stasis vaults.
Wearing a coldsuit, she heard only her own light breathing. The soundless stasis
vaults offered nothing for her suit’s external microphone to pick up. The intersuit two-way was voice activated, with nothing but silence there either, unless Miguel spoke.
Catharin verified that the remote assessment displayed at the Life Systems station matched what registered on the instruments here. Then she directed the machinery to revive the ceramic technologist. Miguel stood by. His solid presence made Catharin profoundly grateful.
Initiating the revival sequence was a simple act. The machinery itself would deliver the passenger, inside a capsule and still in the limbo of cold semi-life, to the recovery room up-Axis. She watched the instruments report the first stages of the procedure.
“Has any thought been given to funeral rites for those passengers who have already died? Will you revive a priest soon?” From Veracruz, Mexico, Miguel was Old Roman Catholic.
“There was that ceremony on Earth, before we left,” she reminded him. However, it had been exceedingly ecumenical, designed to accommodate all religions as well as secularists and naturists at the same time.
“That was not a funeral.” Miguel paused. “Or perhaps it was. But it was a funeral for the Earth.”
Still waters run deep, Catharin thought. “For now, we have to keep the stasis unbroken. It has a great deal of stability that we can’t afford to compromise. I think there will be an official mass funeral sometime after planetfall—when many more people, including clergy, are awake to mourn for the deceased.”
“So we live with the dead for a while,” said Miguel.
“Does that bother you?”
“In Mexico, one day a year is El Día de Los Muertos, the Day of the Dead.” His Spanish accent blurred the edges of the words in a way that Catharin found pleasant to listen to, even through the two-way. He paused. Catharin had the impression that he was mentally shifting Spanish ideas into English words. “The Day of the Dead is done to make us remember, realize, that every day of life is lived in the company of the dead who used to walk and talk and work in the same places where we, the living, do now. No. I am not bothered.”
Catharin turned off the instrument monitor. “That’s all, let’s go back.”
Miguel asked, “Would you come with me to do a site check?” When she agreed, he went on, “Can we walk? I need exercise.”
She reviewed the readings on the controls of her coldsuit. Oxygen and power packs showed solidly in the green—vital in a cold nitrogen atmosphere. Both suit two-ways checked out in good working condition. So also her electric undersuit and visor defogger. “Let’s.”
Here in the broad central levels of Aeon, ramps spiraled out from the zero-gravity Axis all the way to the full-gravity environs just inside the hull. They took a ramp instead of the quicker ‘vator route down to the substation, in bounding strides, uncoupled: first Catharin found herself a bound or so ahead of Miguel, then a bound behind him. The spin-gravity increased. They settled into a long-strided walk. Catharin’s legs felt rubbery. Her muscles had not been prepared for this jaunt, and would be sore tomorrow. Miguel’s breathing was harsh enough to activate the voice-sensing circuit of the two-way.
The ramp swooped down to the level of Outtown’s tallest buildings. Outtown was an entire city, albeit a compact one compared to the urban sprawls in Earth’s open air. It had been planned as the capital in orbit for the new colony, the vantage point for the terraforming of the new world. Catharin and Miguel continued downward through an interstice between the crowded crowns of barren high-rise buildings. They stepped off the ramp at the bottom, plaza level.
One future day the plaza would be fully civic, with shrubbery, a row of flags, and fountains. Now it was empty, blank. Miguel set off down the main avenue and turned two corners. Catharin followed. She was lost here without a map. And without other human company, she would have been half out of her mind with the eerie, blank feel of this place. Only a dream, not a pleasant one, could have depopulated a city so thoroughly. But this compact city was not truly depopulated; it was unused.
A stairwell set into the sidewalk took them down to the undertown through which ran the Ship’s circulatory system. Miguel slipped an electronic key into the slot by the door of an environment systems substation, which opened to reveal a control room. He activated the control Intelligence, evaluated its self-checks, and, satisfied that the Intelligence was in good order, used it to check the local subsystems.
Catharin wandered around the substation, finding it perfectly well appointed with instruments and bolted-down furniture but devoid of the usual workplace signs of human usage. There was no clutter or grime, nothing fastened askew to the walls, no coveralls hanging on the rack appointed for such. Lying solitary in a corner, a small box-end wrench caught Catharin’s attention. She brought it back to show Miguel.
“Centuries ago, a workman must have forgotten to count his tools when his job was done.” He had a masculine voice that sounded gentle even in this bare, clean place. “And that is the only thing amiss. So one more detail in the Checklist is accomplished. Thank you for coming with me.”
One of the high-rises in Outtown had no apex. Instead, it extended all the way up to the Axis, this tower that one day would be called City Center and house the government of Outtown. Catharin and Miguel rode up the ‘vator in the heart of the tower.
“Let us stop to admire this city.” With a flick of his fingers on the control panel, Miguel stopped the elevator at the observation point, where just above the tallest of the other structures in Outtown, the sides of the tower and ‘vator were glass. They surveyed the panorama of Outtown, its unoccupied skyscrapers, the blank streets far below, and the distant, surreal curves of the ramps to the Axis.
Miguel pointed to one sector below, not as geometric as the rest, with empty grooves and round depressions. The depressions puzzled Catharin until she remembered the pools and fountains in the planned city park. Miguel said, “Someday, and soon, those streets below will be alive with the people that you have brought out of stasis. And there will be air to breathe. Landscaping with plants absorbing carbon dioxide, emitting oxygen; and in the park, water, pools, a fountain, beautiful to see, and part of the closed loop of life support in this place. People inhabiting a small but hospitable world.”
Catharin welcomed Miguel’s reflective mood. Today he seemed more like himself, expressing thoughts beyond the work at hand. Miguel leaned on the railing inside the ‘vator wall, an oddly ordinary pose for a man in a coldsuit. “When I went to the University in Mexico City, I studied, besides engineering, anthropology. It interested me—especially the cultures and religions of the many peoples who lived in Mexico in the old days.” Through the faceplate of his suit, she discerned the convex bridge of his nose, and coal-black fringes of hair. He had more than a drop of the blood of the ancient tribes. “Every culture, with its land, was its own world. And for every culture-world, there was an origin myth. This place needs one also. Would you like to hear it?”
Coldsuits did not lend themselves to subtlety of communication. Reflections on the faceplates made it hard to see expressions; the two-way tended to divest words of emotional overtones. One had to be verbally explicit. “I don’t know what you mean, but tell me if you wish,” said Catharin.
“It is a re-creation myth. A small world has been lost for ages in a winter colder than ice. The people are brought back to life by a lady, a goddess. It is another god’s work to make the place for the people, to surround the people with air and water, green plants, and to bring food out of the metal flesh and bones of the world.
“These two deities. They make the world. She is called the Queen of Stars.” Behind the reflections on his faceplate, Miguel seemed to smile. “His name is—” Miguel pondered. “God of Water’s Course. Because a life support system depends on the right circulation of water. Most creation myths start with a pair, male and female.”
He was completely revived now, Catharin decided, sexual interest and all. “And in most creation myths, the two have children,” she said. “What about this one?�
� It was veiled challenge: would he presume to answer in the affirmative?
His somber reply surprised her. “Only the High God knows.”
The ‘vator resumed its ascent up to the Axis. Arms crossed, Miguel was not seeing the level indicator lights even though his gaze was fixed on them. “What of the molecules in our bodies, Catharin? Our stasis was terribly long, and it was known that stasis would result in some damage at the molecular level. But the longest and most fragile molecule is the DNA, such as that in our chromosomes. I have thought about this. It worries me on account of future generations here.” He hesitated long enough for the ‘vator to pass several levels and the reflections of the indicator lights to march upward on his faceplate. “You have not asked me for any sample of a certain kind.”
“Others are at higher risk of cellular damage than you. You were only frozen once.” In truth, she had not asked any of the men for sperm samples. But she could not put it off any longer.
8 Planetfall
The blue planet loomed in the Big Picture, but it was just a simulation. The Intelligence presented the sim imagery without regard to astronomical observations of the world, which in actuality was still distant, and presented it as a glazed blue ball.
Bix said, “Begin braking sequence. Attitude thrusters. Turn us around.”
The thrusters fired to orient the Ship for its trial by atmospheric fire. The smoother, less scarred southern hemisphere had to hit the atmosphere first. “Firing, firing badly.” Joel scowled. “I embedded real test-firing of the thrusters in the sim. And they’re not doing so good!”
“All systems are ready for aerobrake, Captain.” Becca was serious, all boisterousness ruled out of her even tone.
Joel shook his head. “Real bad firing.”
Bix snapped, “Post-sim action item: schedule a detailed thruster check.”