As he gazed at the glare of the sun dancing off the robot's reflective body, Jack recalled how the robot rolled on its own out of the cargo compartment after their rough landing.
The droid resembled the popular 20th-century toy, the "Rubik's Snake." Jack had received the toy from his great-grandfather, so he kept it as a special message of the previous century from his famous ancestor. Handing the toy to a nine-year-old Jack, his father solemnly explained that the Rubik's Snake is a symbol of the eternal change experienced by all things living and non-living, the symbolization of constant evolution.
At first, little Jack treated his dad's present coldly, but in a few days, he was amazed by the toy's fascinating and endless possibilities of transformation. Left alone, immersed in childlike thoughts, he could rotate and fold the hinged elements for a long time, transforming the Snake into intricate shapes. Later, while he was studying at the Academy, Jack remembered that he would transform that Snake into different animals more than anything else.
Even then, he had been drawn to working with living systems. He dreamed of flying on interplanetary shuttles before he entered the Academy. Jack believed that true paradise existed, one hidden among the colorful celestial bodies. Space excited Jack with its unpredictability and mystery, but what he was interested in most were the interactions between objects. For example, he loved speculating about how far his shuttle would be carried by Jupiter's Great Red Spot or how flattened a sea turtle would be by the high-pressure atmosphere of Venus, a planet still yet to be colonized.
On top of it all, Jack liked complex molecules. The combinations of atoms reminded him of the many transformations of the Rubik's Snake. This was probably the reason he chose to study bioengineering at the Academy.
Unlike the prisms that made up the Rubik's Snake, the robot's parts resembled truncated pyramids with trapezoidal faces. Safely balanced on the supporting platform, the robot confidently used two trailing manipulator segments, which were splayed in different directions. It was about 1.5 meters in height, but if stretched out to its max, it would be even taller. Each trapezoid was covered in a perfectly smooth grayish-white glaze with a few thin dark brown stripes at the bottom and on the right side. The upper right part was constantly twisted, clearly reminiscent of a snake's head.
When Jack saw the robot for the first time, he was simultaneously astonished, a bit scared, and yet charmed by the engineered creation. He had never seen such robots before. He only looked at pictures during the classes on spaceship equipment, and those pictures looked far less impressive.
The robot twisted in a loop several times, waving its "limbs," causing Jack to think of a huge bird on Earth that was preparing to take flight, and then the robot extended itself, forming what looked like a long snake made up of dozens of segments. The trapecrawler rolled across the blueish-green sand of the steppe desert, which spread around the pavilion, and where the robot touched the ground, bright spots on the motor mat lit up as grains of sand clung to fibers on the robot. Formed from plastic composite materials, the fibers could modify their own structure, density, and shape. It allowed the robot to immediately change direction. In certain situations, the trapecrawler could lift its central part up and walk on its side segments as if on a pair of stilts.
Jack tried to keep up with the robot, but every time he picked up his pace, he couldn't refrain from mentally exclaiming, "It's the damnedest thing!"
When they approached the shuttle's tail, which lay about 700 hundred meters from their recently built pavilion, the trapecrawler lifted its side segments and folded them above itself. Looking at the carelessly-lying colossal mass of the 12-meter long shuttle, Jack was struck by the thought that this landing was not only the first but the last flight of this spacecraft.
Just a couple of weeks ago, while he was on board the Avant Light, he couldn't stop admiring the sleek, graceful construction of the shuttles. The apparatuses reminded Jack of a long fish body with neat barbed needles on its tail. Their thin smooth lines inspired a thermonuclear explosion of different emotions inside him.
Before departure, his curiosity compelled him to watch how ship's engineer Frank Warple conducted a final inspection, going around each shuttle, carefully looking under the side stabilizers, and examining the tail section, which included a crawlspace for the cargo compartment. And it wasn't a nod to tradition. Usually, an automated diagnostic system carried out equipment checks.
It seemed to Jack that the captain was distraught by something, which explained why he entrusted Frank to do an extra equipment check manually. Back then, the young lieutenant chalked it up to the captain's conservative ways of going about ship's business, but now he didn't think like that anymore.
Jack pulled aside the badly damaged hatch blocking the crawlspace to allow the robot to continue forward. The trapecrawler gracefully rolled through the opening into the shuttle. Jack climbed in after it.
As he climbed inside the cargo compartment, he noticed thick layers of light cyan dust, sometimes glowing green and blue, that covered the floor and containers near the hatch. This sight greatly annoyed Jack. It seemed to him that the dust was alive and wanted to blanket the entire shuttle, stranding them forever along on this strange, cruel planet. Jack ran to the hatch and nervously tried to scrape the dust off the compartment floor with his boot.
Abruptly, Jack remembered the purpose of his visit, so he barked out a voice command to the robot to find and collect all food provisions. In the cargo compartment, there was a lot of medical equipment tightly packed into metal containers. The boxes were scattered around the floor of the compartment. Shifting a container aside, Jack glanced at a different hatch, the one that led to the darkened shuttle cockpit. The dull white and orange emergency lighting was still switched on like before.
Jack went inside the cockpit, trying not to look at the sharp, broken edges of the smashed control panel. It evoked memories colored by blood. He remembered how he and Anne lay there for several hours after crashing. At one point, he thought she was already dead. He had already forgotten how he had to extract a massive glass shard from her neck and how he struggled to stop the bleeding. A brownish-black pool of dried blood next to the pilot's chair served as an ominous reminder of that morning.
Jack cringed, recalling how he scrambled about the shuttle like an embarrassed schoolboy trying to find some way to help Anne. He didn't like to think about it as such behavior was unforgivable for an officer. However, he had to take his mind off the matter. Now Anne's present condition worried the lieutenant more than anything else. He swore to himself that he would do whatever it took for her to survive.
When they were on the ship orbiting the planet, they hadn't been close friends. If anything, Jack thought of himself as an outcast. He was the youngest, least experienced member who, to some crew members, might have seemed pathetic.
More than once, Anne gave him stern looks, calling him an idler. At that time, he could have cared less, but now he was ashamed of himself. Jack understood he was only on this expedition because his father was a famous doctor, and his best friend Sam's father was the director of the Space Agency's Interstellar Missions Department.
Looking at the trapecrawler, which was cheerfully loading the containers of water and provisions onto the central segment, Jack smiled and fist bumped the robot's frame.
"Maybe it's not so bad, buddy?" he commented to the robot.
The lower half of the central robot flashed waves of light in response. The trapecrawler was happy to see his commander.
Jack remembered how they had been told about these devices at the Academy. This particular robot, a tracked "Trapecrawler 2188A," was produced by the Space Agency's Robotics Division 45 years ago to perform such tasks as unloading, sorting, and building. For missions to explore Earth-like planets, such robots were a godsend. Thanks to their segmented structure that allowed parts to split and rejoin, the robots could easily navigate difficult terrain like rocky landscapes.
During its time, the Agenc
y relied on them a great deal when they tried to settle Mars for the fourth time, but, to the great disappointment of the whole of humanity, the attempt failed like its predecessors. Mars was a hard nut to crack for Terrans, at least for now. However, Jack believed that one day humanity would settle Mars and he would visit with the entire family, including his wife Gladys and their children (and maybe also grandchildren), to go on excursions around spectacular locations filled with green flora and transparent blue seas. After another failure at colonizing and terraforming Mars, rumors spread that the Agency would stop funding such programs, but in the end, nothing came of it. If something had, Jack would have never been sent to Nereus.
The Agency saved a few tracked trapecrawlers, bypassing the ban on their use, and now one of them was in the process of helping Lieutenant Sallenge. Jack knew that due to the bans imposed on machines with AI, the robot could never be extremely intelligent, but the trapecrawler was still able to understand simple commands, monitor head gestures, and track eye movement. It was also programmed to assist humans in case they got themselves into difficult situations.
Alan, the Captain's XO, used to tell many times how "trapes," as he nicknamed them, were always the ones giving astronauts a helping hand (if it could be called as such). They dragged people out of holes and craters or carried individuals who were too fatigued to continue.
Having finished dealing with the majority of equipment, Jack decided that he would make one final trip later on for the remaining items. While climbing out of the shuttle's hatch, Jack adjusted the electrophotonic plasma rifle slung over his arm. It was Anne's. During the first couple days when she was still in the shuttle, Anne pulled out the weapon from a secret safe next to the pilot's seat and handed it to Jack.
Jack looked around and saw occasional spots of vegetation strewn about the sandy area.
The officer felt a cool wind, reminiscent of a sea breeze, sweep over him from head to foot. The hum of the lonely wind nipped at his ears. He couldn't see any animals or big plants nearby, but the landscape was pleasant, if not soothing, to look at. In the greenish-yellow daylight of the star, which tenderly warmed the planet, the blue sand of the steppe plain looked almost cyan. The boulders sparkled in the light like massive semi-precious jewels, and the rocky mountains loomed in the distance like frozen dark blue giants. The planet's landscape was spectacular, even elegant, in its own manner of wonderfully chosen cold colors. Yet Jack couldn't rid himself of the thought that despite the elegance of the blueish-green tones, there lurked a deadly, harsh soullessness and isolation.
Holding his weapon at the ready, he slowly advanced across the plain, reaching the small rocky ridge and passing giant boulders. He set off towards their new home.
A gentle wind weaved through his dark-blond hair. By and large, most grains of sand were big, and each step allowed thin greenish-blue or milky purple trails of sand rise to the surface. Once again, Jack observed that the gravity on Nereus really was less than on Earth. He felt like a 15-year-old teenager eager to jump. Even though he should have become accustomed to the new force of gravity on the planet, his brain still anticipated Earth's gravity, causing a disconnect between what he saw and what he felt.
Silence, warmth and dryness, a weak gust of wind, the rustle of sand beneath his camouflage boots. This was what surrounded the officer. Only a little farther was left until the pavilion.
He reached the small rocky ridge whose sloping cliffs invaded the steppe landscape, forming an almost perfectly-shaped curve. Apparently, the height of the largest hill was no more than eight meters, and the length of its base was around nine. Some were really narrow at three or four meters in width. Clusters of five or six ridges were neighbored by solitary rocky giants that towered over the half-empty plain.
When Jack reached the nearest ledge, he heard a rustling sound ahead. He listened carefully only for the rustling to stop. Craning his neck, he examined the peak. He let one of the starfish go ahead while he held back the second, which was moving and twisting its nine legs, itching to get free and do what it was designed for. Jack sat down and placed the star on the sandy surface. It immediately started crawling somewhere along the ridge. It inched closer to the edge of the rocky outcrop when suddenly the rustle was heard once more somewhere near one of the cliffs to its left. Jack stood, holding the plasma rifle at the ready. The rustle sounded again, almost like a hiss. Jack froze, carefully listening in turn to the sound behind the rocky ridge and to his own heartbeat. Weighing his options mentally, he slowly crawled away from the ridge to give himself some room to maneuver in case of danger.
5
When the star reached the edge of the ridge where it began hiding behind the rocky hill, the rustling stopped for a moment. Besides the light humming sound in his ears, there was silence until suddenly the starfish flew out from behind a rock as if it had been tossed away. There was a distinct thump. A ball-shaped creature with two legs and huge rocky-looking warts leapt out from the cliff face. There was a shrill roar. The starfish managed to recover and get its bearings. It sprinted back to Jack as if seeking protection. Shallow dents could be seen on its sandy surface, but Jack paid no attention to it.
The creature quickly shifted its focus from the star to Jack. Its round, almost half-meter body moved surprisingly quick despite its thick legs, likely due to the low gravity. An encounter with one of those stony growths on its body threatened to leave Jack injured or dead. Lieutenant Sallenge's eyes shot open from fear and surprise, his body frozen stiff. The only thing he could think of doing was raising the rifle and firing it. A bright flash of light flew from the plasma rifle, a spherical orb of electrophotonic plasma that struck the creature in its right limb.
The creature had nearly reached Jack, but the shot caused it to fall with a loud roar on its side, sliding until it was centimeters away from him. Another flash of light and one more spherical orb of plasma shot out. The automatic targeting system spotted another creature. This time the shot hit the area where the head met the main body with the shell of pointy growth stones, a spot slightly above where Jack hit the previous creature. The second monster was sent tumbling backwards. It tried to right itself, helplessly waving its legs and short tail in the air.
Recovering from the scare, Jack remembered one of these creatures had been dragged away by some predatorial beast the previous night. He knew about these creatures beforehand thanks to visuals provided by the captain.
The photonic electroplasma didn't kill wartstones. It only temporarily stunned them. The rifle was fixed to Jack's sleeve by two rings that monitored the officer's pulse, blood pressure, and psycho-emotional tension using sensors. They analyzed the lieutenant's condition and determined how powerful the next shot should be and how it should fire. This time, the sensors settled for medium strength shots that discharged before reaching their target, thereby only injuring the beasts with the resulting shock wave. Such a blast likely wouldn't cause much harm to creatures protected by a thick layer of skin.
While the second wartstone tried to right itself, Jack carefully moved towards the first, which had an injured leg. Now the creature's roar was sorrowful, not threatening as it had a few minutes before. Its right leg was severely deformed, and its left was dislocated. Four narrow dark-blue eyes moved up and down. The creature looked frightened and intimidated. For a moment, Jack imagined that the wartstone was pleading for mercy, apologizing for its impulsive aggressiveness. Grabbing the starfish, Jack ran towards the shuttle to grab the regenerator. He knew that they were sent here with the aim of doing research, not injuring the local fauna.
"What's up?" he heard Anne's worried voice ask as he ran into the pavilion to fetch the regenerator sitting on the table in front of the panoramic window.
"Two wartstones," Jack briefly responded as he grabbed the regenerator and returned to the rear cargo compartment.
"Are you hurt?" Anne cried out after him, sitting up in bed slightly.
"I'm not but they are!"
He bolte
d out of the pavilion and rushed to the ran out of the pavilion's portal and rushed to the rocky ridge.
A thought flashed in his mind for a second.
"Isn't this madness? Why am I rushing to help some monster? It's insane."
Once he was only 150 meters away from the ridge, he saw the wartstone that was flipped over had disappeared, leaving behind the injured one. Jack carefully moved closer to the creature, his rifle raised at the ready just in case of attack. The wartstone wasn't groaning, but its small eyes, hidden within narrow slits, dashed about in terror. Using its good leg to push off, it was trying to crawl to the side. Jack placed the regenerator on the injured creature's limb. The device spent a lot of time at first trying to calibrate for the different tissue before it began its work. When the tiny spade-like tentacles inserted themselves into the wartstone's burn wound, it flinched, giving a long roar, before abruptly calming down and falling silent, relieved of pain.
"This must mean we resemble each other in terms of molecular and cellular structure," Jack observed in a mildly cheerful tone, with his left hand holding the regenerator in place and the right with the rifle at the ready.
According to protocol B-414z, Jack was only allowed to collect cellular and molecular biomaterial. During his short mission briefing before departure, Jack was informed their landing zone was located in a safe place with no aggressive creatures inhabiting the local environment. Additionally, no hazardous biological or radioactive particles were detected. Jack's primary mission objective was the analysis of genetic material collected by the starfish drones. However, the protocol didn't prohibit approaching creatures in the landing zone so long as the life forms were not hostile.
Expedition Nereus Page 3