But despite the soundness of their logic, Ogby’s numbers had shown no such trend. The only way to test it, she knew, was to dig down to minus 2.8 kl and see what happened. But at the rate she was going, it would take more than her lifetime to get that far.
Although… what had Roov said about the excavations Above? They were digging up there, too, but that was rock. And you couldn’t melt through rock.
A milliflex later she was out of her web. Boro was already long gone, so she began cantering towards town. A new rain of bubbles had just fallen; pools of methane and carbon dioxide lay in the low valleys. She deflated her bladders and skidded across a small airpool, enjoying the smooth sensation on her feet.
Soon she came to the largest airpocket in the city. This was the primary local factory, much larger than any of her personal airlabs, but similar in concept. It had taken forever to dig the huge hole, let alone fill it up with carbon dioxide, but the goods produced here had already paid back its cost many times over. This factory specialized in plastics and steel, and trade with other cities brought in more exotic items.
With a long-practiced move she stepped onto the enormous bubble, inflated her bladders to maximum, and then inverted herself. It was a sensation that bothered many Rygors, but it felt perfectly natural to Ogby. Fully inflated, her bladders were so heavy they acted as anchors from which she could pull herself downward. Her ankles flexed 180o, and then she was dangling upside-down inside of the air pocket, barely touching the water with her five feet. The trick was mental reorientation: she told herself that she was actually standing right-side-up, her feet floating on the surface of the water. It was a ridiculous image, but it enabled her to avoid the unpleasantness experienced by many of the others.
It was unpleasant not being able to breathe, but Ogby was better than most at holding her breath. Only six or seven times each work period did she have to duck her head in the water tanks. And being in the air pocket allowed for other benefits. She began to refresh the stale air from her bladders, first from her central cavity, and then one foot at a time. It felt good.
But she still had to find Boro. Walking along the surface of the water Ogby presently arrived at the smallest forge, where Boro spent much of his time. She climbed up the stairs, opened the hatch, and there he was, just closing the thermal shielding around the primary steel cauldron.
“I’m surprised to see you,” Boro chromed.
Ogby skipped the small talk. “Those excavations Roov is doing Above. He’s not melting through, like we do. He’s actually digging?”
Boro rippled a ‘no’. “Blasting, I think. You know about those new compounds they’re making, over in High City? I think he’s using those, setting them off from a distance.”
Ogby stood stunned for a moment. She had thought explosives were still in the research phase. Roov was already putting them to use? Science was progressing so fast these days that she couldn’t even seem to keep up.
“Well,” she said at last, “why can’t we use them, too? I’m sure it would speed up the dig. Maybe we could even blast down far enough to test my calculations.”
“Do you have any idea how much those things cost?” Boro replied.
“I don’t need many to start with. Let’s buy a few, give it a try in Deep 4.”
Boro looked concerned. “If you really want to blow the last of your research money.... Oh sure, why not. I’ll pilot the ship again, if you’d like.”
“I’m piloting,” Ogby chromed with a literal flash of defiance.
“You haven’t piloted since we broke 800 lengths. You’ve just had a minor breakdown, and—”
“I can handle it, Boro.”
Boro stared at her for a long time before responding. “Okay. I think I believe you.”
Ogby flashed a contented pattern, then turned to leave. A strange noise made her stop, though, and when she looked back around she saw that Boro was soning her through the air. She was surprised; soning in air was incredibly painful. If he had simply wanted to get her attention....
“I wanted to tell you,” Boro chromed, “it’s good to have you back.”
Ogby felt a sudden wave of attraction for Boro, the first such wave in many flexes. Was it her season already? She checked her specialized fingers on her third foot, somehow already knowing what she would find.
“What is it?” Boro asked.
Ogby wiggled her third foot at him enticingly. “I don’t think we’ve ever done it in the air before.”
He didn’t look pleased. “Not now, Ogby.”
Ogby was stunned. How could he resist…? But of course. There was no water to carry her scent. She walked over to him, reached for his third foot with her own, and made the transfer directly.
Boro put up no further resistance — not until he ran out of breath and desperately leaped into the emergency water tank. Ogby followed him right on in.
***
Deep 4 was the largest excavation in the ocean, far from the nearest city. Here the ice naturally dipped to half a kilolength below standard ground, and the entire valley would have been below air if not for constant maintenance.
Currently most of the crew was cowering in the generator shelter, but Ogby wanted to be outside when the package landed. Boro stood next to her nervously, along with three of the braver technicians. The lip of the circular excavation was just a few lengths away.
“It should have reached the bottom by now,” chromed a tech. “I don’t—”
At that moment the blast hit. Even with the pads over Ogby’s sonar receptors, even with the explosion over a kilolength below, it felt like a series of body-blows.
Boro shuddered after the waves had passed. “Next time I’ll be in the shelter,” he chromed unhappily.
Ogby shook off the sensation and pushed Boro toward the edge. She was worried that the explosion would propel fragments of ice up in their direction. “Look down, see if there’s any debris coming this way. I’m getting into the ship.”
Now that the blast had arrived, every microflex counted. It was cold in the deeps, and only artificial heaters kept anchor ice from filling in the hole. Ogby had to get down there quickly if she was going to wire up the new heaters.
She started to close the ship’s hatch, making sure everyone was at their stations. A final glance at Boro confirmed that no debris was going to endanger her. Thanking him, she shut herself inside and ran a cursory check of the equipment. Fuel, batteries… check. The comm light was on, but she never trusted it blindly. She activated the microphone with her first foot.
“TEST,” she soned into the mike.
She looked out of the port window at the giant spool of cable, 2.3 kilolengths long, which connected her ship to the shelter. Fortunately the sound was converted to electrical signals, or else the communication would have been unbearably slow. After a moment the words “test received” sounded from the ship’s speaker. The cable was operational.
Now came the scary part; going over the edge. Ogby positioned herself in front of the controls and began adjusting the ship’s buoyancy. After lifting off the ice, it only took a single thrust to position herself directly over the hole. It was a long way down, Ogby knew, but that was exactly where she had to go.
“DROPPING,” she soned into the mike, while simultaneously shifting the plunger controls to negative buoyancy. In a moment she was plummeting into the cold, watery depths.
“FIRST HEATERS OKAY,” she told base control as she passed the glowing devices. Aiming the ship’s outer lights, she saw that the powercord was still firmly attached to the walls of the pit. Everything looked fine. She tipped the spotlight downward and continued her descent.
The view out of the lower window was the first indication that something was wrong. The bottom of the pit was still beyond the power of the ship’s lights, but instead of trailing away into darkness, the depths suddenly turned a foamy white. And the whiteness was rising, fast.
Uh oh, was all Ogby had time to think before the first jolt hit the ship
.
She was tossed to one side, and her head collided painfully with the cabin wall. After a moment the acceleration stopped, and Ogby quickly strapped herself into her seat.
What’s happening? she asked herself. Debris from the explosion? No, any debris would have arrived with the original blast. It must be a second explosion, she decided, but how was that possible? They had only dropped one package—
Another, stronger jolt shook the ship, but the straps held. Then another, and another, and Ogby began to worry about the ship coming apart at the welds.
The view out the window offered little information. A dark froth of water and ice swirled past meaninglessly. “HELP,” she soned, hoping the mike could pick up her voice from across the cabin. “EMERGENCY.”
The buffeting continued, for ages, but just as she thought she could stand it no longer, cabin stopped shuddering. Now the window lit up with a brilliance she had never imagined possible. She narrowed her eyes, averted her head, but light was too strong, too painful.
And then, with a massive jerk, came the largest jolt of all. Ogby felt the straps cut into her body, and a tiny ‘ping’ sounded from the speaker just as gravity turned itself off.
The light from the window was slightly more bearable now, but she barely noticed. Down here gravity wasn’t infinite; it was zero! The bladders in her feet felt no force at all; it didn’t matter whether she clenched them or not. She didn’t know how this was possible, but it was the discovery of a lifetime. She looked up toward the microphone…
…and her heart broke. The light was off. That ‘ping’ noise; it must have been the cable snapping. Communication was now impossible. Whatever was going to happen to her, whatever she encountered, she now had to face it alone.
Movement through the window caught her eye and she stared through it, amazed. The scene was bright, but no longer too bright. There was no water. Instead she saw a beautiful icy landscape, covered with fractures and lines. The colors were remarkable; new minerals shouted to her with their unique spectra, arrayed in branching linear patterns. And the whole landscape was growing, filling the window with its details, coming closer and closer…
A sudden crunch of metal, a terrible pain, and all went black.
***
Ogby regained consciousness slowly, vaguely aware that the water around her was cold. Too cold. Ice was already beginning to form in the upper corners of the ship.
She almost drifted back to sleep, almost content to die to this way. Then her curiosity got the better of her.
Even before unstrapping herself, she noted that gravity was pulling her to the bottom of the cabin with just as much force as ever. Perhaps the zero-gravity moment had only been a dream.
The pain, however, was real. Wincing as she moved her bruised body, she stepped over to check the controls. The batteries still had some power left, and the heaters were nearly on full. So why was the water so cold? She maxed out the heaters and moved over to the window.
The outside view was so strange that it took her a long time to parse it into something she could understand. The ship apparently lay on the underside of a giant, bright, icy plain; she had probably crashed into it from below. The ship must be buoyant here, she realized, as if she was inside a giant air pocket.
Her mind reeled with questions. Had she penetrated the ice, broken through to the center of the ocean? Why was there no water here? Why was it so bright? What was this place?
Closer to the ship, she saw that the icy plain was scarred, rippled in a circular pattern. And into the center of the ripples snaked a black line, coiling around itself until it disappeared into the ice.
The cable!
Her mind started to piece together a story. Something had sucked her down through the ice. Her ship had come flying through, launched down into the air pocket, stretching the cable tight. The cabin had jolted as the cable had snapped. Then the ship had reversed direction, and crashed upwards into the ice. But why? None of this made any sense to her.
Still, that cable… that was her link to a world that made sense. If she could reconnect it to the ship, she could call for help. There might even be enough slack to reach. But the only way to do it was to go outside, and the only way to go outside was to open the hatch, spilling out most of her water. She’d never survive long enough to be rescued.
Still, the ice in the cabin was continuing to spread — if she didn’t act soon she’d be frozen solid, and no one would ever know what had become of her. Making a run for the cable would surely be better than that.
Steeling her resolve, she began to hyperfunnelate, readying her system for what lay ahead. She knew that the area outside must be very cold — the evidence was quickly crystallizing all around her — so she spent a few moments hunting for something to wear on her feet. But the only free objects were the plastic seat-cover slabs. She grabbed three of them with three feet, hoping they’d provide enough insulation.
Ice had already started to form on the hatch, but she broke it free with the plastic slabs and started turning the primary release wheel with her two free feet. One turn, two turns…
Without warning the door flew outward, pulling Ogby with it. Water spurted out around her, erupting into a frenzied boil. Panicked, she clung to the wheel, feeling the water rush past her as it left the ship.
She had been wrong about the temperature. If the water was hot enough to boil, she would be roasted alive in seconds.
But even as the water frothed around her, she noticed that it was quickly freezing onto the surface of the icy plain. Could it be cold after all? Her body was becoming uncomfortable, first aching all over, and now flaring with pain. Then she noticed that her air bladders were inflating on their own accord, and she had to clench them tightly to keep them under control.
Gravity wasn’t infinite here, she suddenly realized. But the pressure was very low — maybe even zero. Zero pressure meant infinite volume, and her own bladders were struggling to obey that particular law of physics. Ogby recalled the evacuated chambers from the airlabs, and quickly guessed that she had just entered an enormous vacuum.
The water from the ship had now emptied completely. A quick glance inside told her that everything else had frozen solid. There would be no reserve to breathe later. And if she was in a vacuum, she knew there wasn’t much time. She had to get to that cable quickly, before her body could no longer contain the pressure inside of her.
It wasn’t far to the cable, only about thirty lengths. And now that she was out of water, the weak gravity pulled her upwards, directly toward the ice. She glanced in the other direction…
The view below nearly made her faint.
Directly beneath her, visible now that she was out of the ship, sat an enormous brilliant sphere, banded with swirling colors as if it were chroming to her in another language. A smaller yellow sphere floated on top of it, casting a shadow on the large sphere’s misty surface. The large sphere also had a second shadow, although Ogby couldn’t tell what was casting it. There must be an even brighter light source somewhere else....
Distractions, she told herself. She had to concentrate on the cable if she was to survive. Still, those spheres looked so far away that her vertigo was starting to kick in.
With a flash of insight she decided to try the reorientation trick she used in the factory. That’s not down, she told herself, still staring at the spheres. That’s up. The ice is down.
She positioned her legs accordingly, touched the three plastic slabs to the ice, and let go of the wheel. In a moment she was trotting across the surface towards the free end of the cable.
Yes! she mentally cheered herself on, imagining the world turned upside-down. I’m running on the ice, on top of the ice, on the outside…
Outside. Even as she approached the cable she knew it was true. She wasn’t inside the ocean at all. The light source casting those shadows wasn’t visible, so it had to be on the other side of the ice. The second shadow might even be her entire world!
She pic
ked up the cable, her mind so busy that she barely appreciated the connector was still intact.
If she was Outside, then her entire worldview must be wrong. What she considered “up” was actually toward the center of her world; Roov’s excavations through the rock could only break through to the other side of the ocean. The Cities were on the outer edge of the ocean, and the Rygors spent their lives with their feet pointed outwards and their heads pointed to the center. Yes, the ocean was a spherical shell, but it wasn’t curved in the way that everyone had assumed.
Ogby was almost back to the ship now, her body ablaze with pain. The plastic slabs were already freezing in her grip, but she wouldn’t let them go. She pulled more of the slack in her direction, shifting the cable connector in her grip, and at that moment her second foot exploded.
Agony flooded through her nervous system. Her airbladder was broken, in tatters, and she watched numbly as her juices quickly oozed out of the wound. Some corner of her mind knew that this was the end, this was where her internal pressure would equalize with the vacuum of this alien space. She had been so close…
But she wasn’t dead yet. Ignoring the pain, she clenched the fingers on her second foot, applying pressure to the wound as best she could. She felt her second leg shudder, but the oozing slowed to a halt.
Somehow she reached the ship, plugged in the cable, climbed through the hatch. Her first foot did all the work, locking it shut behind her and moving over to the buoyancy controls.
Ogby needed pressure fast, and the tanks of compressed air were her only hope. Normally the air was released into the flexible buoyancy chamber, not the main cabin, but a few flipped levers rerouted the valves. Even as she felt her life slipping out of her second leg, her soning receptors began to pick up the unique noise of hissing air.
She rested for a moment as the pressure built up, feeling the pain in her foot subside. There was ice in the bottom of the cabin, but she knew she would never breathe again. All she had left to accomplish in this life was to communicate her findings down below.
Science Fiction by Scientists: An Anthology of Short Stories (Science and Fiction) Page 3