At least Rudolph was prepared to share his food—though he really didn't have much choice. We had lots of ship rations, but his supplies were a good deal more portable and more easily prepped in the field.
Floyd didn't have a backpack to carry any of this stuff, but that, it turned out, didn't matter, either: Rudolph had one that fit him perfectly. Of course, he only had one large pack. The other was a lot smaller. Big surprise. Floyd was definitely going to have to watch his momentum at the edges of those big cliffs.
I will give Rudolph points for one thing. Iapetus really is spectacular, and he picked the best destination, the equatorial ridge.
Iapetus is a weird moon, looking as though something a long time ago squeezed it hard. The pressure squirted up an enormous ridge right around its equator, so tall that on Earth an equivalent mountain range would jut all the way through the stratosphere with a lot to spare. That's where the biggest of the big mountains tend to be.
Rudolph wanted to pick the highest part and hike the crest.
“What?” I said, “Is he nuts?”
“Shush,” Floyd said.
But I was already looking at the map. The ridge wouldn't be flat on top; nothing that tall is flat on top. And there were bound to be places where the footing would be like sloping ball bearings. It's an airless world, so the regolith was going to be all crunched up by micro-meteorites, producing a lot of loose stuff that would accumulate on the steeper slopes. Not to mention that most of the ridge passes through Iapetus's dark side, which would add to the scree.
The dark side isn't called that because it's always night (it isn't). Rather, it's because it's on the leading side of the planet as it moves around Saturn, allowing it to have swept up all kinds of dark junk from somewhere or other.
Because several of the other moons are also dark on their leading faces, the prevailing theory is that a long time ago, something that's no longer with us got really clobbered by something else, and fragments wound up all over Saturn System. Maybe the dark stuff is the core of the deceased moon, or maybe it's fragments from whatever it was that hit it. Or both. For what it's worth, I can write sims that make any of those work.
There's another theory that says the whole ridge is debris from a prehistoric ring that collapsed onto the surface, then congealed like some kind of volcanic ashfall from space. I can write a sim that makes that one work, too, though it doesn't explain why the ridge is perfectly normal Iapetus ice, with the dark stuff ladled over it like charcoal-colored dust.
Then there's the theory that says aliens built it. If so, they've been slow to explain why, but maybe they're extinct. Or maybe they really are out there in the Oort Cloud tossing rocks at us, hoping we'll go away.
And maybe I've been watching too many vids.
What I do know is that I've read enough mountaineering stories to know that rock climbers have a term for such stuff: rotten rock. And even if we didn't fall off a cliff, fifteen klicks is a long way to tumble.
“Don't do it,” I said. “He's crazy.”
“Quiet!” Floyd hissed. Then, “Sorry, not you.”
Rudolph raised an eyebrow, but didn't say anything.
“Damn it,” I said, surprising myself. I don't usually use language like that. But then I don't usually get angry, either. “I'm part of this, too. Why the hell can't he acknowledge it?”
At least Floyd didn't ignore me, too. “Excuse me a moment,” he said to Rudolph, then turned away from him. “Can we talk about this later? Maybe it's just habit with him. Or perhaps he doesn't know what to make of you. Most people have never met a sentient AI, so maybe he just thinks of you as a really good interface. Hell, maybe he doesn't like women. Who knows? It's his problem, not yours, but he's the client, so let's see if we can get him what he wants without killing ourselves, okay? Trust me. I've seen the pictures of that ridge crest, too.”
We settled for a base-camp trip. That reduced the load, allowed Floyd to return occasionally to sleep in the skimmer, and meant there'd be no long-distance ridge walking.
Unfortunately, it also meant that when we were at the skimmer we'd have to share it with Rudolph, since it was a lot bigger than his tent. Me, I'd have rather stayed outside in the suit. But as Floyd pointed out, I didn't have a nose and had never itched from anything other than curiosity.
From our base at the skimmer, we would try to climb the ridge, which nobody had ever done before. I thought Rudolph would like that, since a first ascent would get him all kinds of press on the climbing nets. But he was pretty grudging about giving up his trek. “Okay,” he said at last, “But I don't want to just bag peaks. I want to cover as much ground as possible.”
Floyd didn't comment, and for once I managed not to ask what the hell, then, we were doing.
* * * *
The first attempt, we got nowhere near the top. But Rudolph didn't seem to care.
We'd decided to start in the Trench, the deep valley that separates the Ridge's two parallel crests. From there, it wasn't quite as big a climb as from the plains on either side. Floyd had expected an argument, but Rudolph simply grunted, pointed at the map, and said to pick a place somewhere in “that” vicinity. Then he left it to us to choose a summit.
Iapetus is well mapped, but not for hiking and certainly not for mountaineering. Still, flying over, it was an easy thing to take stereoscopic images and convert them to contour maps. Easy enough for me, anyway. That let us pick a nice collection of peaks with climbing routes, which, on a twenty-meter topo at least, didn't look too deadly.
We set down near the easiest-looking summit, a mere ten thousand meters above us: three times the height of Mt. Everest above its base, though at least it looked as though we could scramble up without having to dangle from any cliffs. I'm sure Rudolph's climbing equipment was top of the line, but I was happy not to have to put it to the test.
We set out with the bubble tent and seventy-two hours’ supplies. At first, we made good progress, but after the first few klicks, Rudolph kept stopping to poke at rocks, especially in the densest drifts of the loose, dark stuff that gave the dark side its name.
Whatever it was, he loved it. But he wasn't acting like any geologist I'd ever heard of. Rather than putting samples into carefully labeled bags, he'd grab a handful here, a handful there, and another elsewhere, and shove them all into the same sack.
We did that all through the first twenty-four hours, pausing only for a sleep break. At least Rudolph slept, in his bubble tent. The next day, Floyd was getting frustrated. “Are we climbing or prospecting?” he asked, quietly enough that the question had to be directed to me.
“Darned if I know.” By this time Rudolph had acquired, by my estimate, thirty kilos’ mass in rock—enough that it was starting to affect his balance like the backpack was affecting Floyd's. “But if he finds anything valuable, he'll never know where it came from.”
“Yeah,” Floyd said. “I noticed.” Then he spoke up. “That bag's getting pretty full, T. R. Do you want a hand?”
Rudolph barely looked up from his current patch of scree. “If I want help, I'll ask for it.”
Floyd raised his hands, defensively. “Whoa. Just offering.”
But Rudolph was looking at the ridge, still thousands of meters above. “We aren't going to make the top, are we?”
“Not if you want to breathe on the way down,” I said, but not on the radio. If Rudolph wasn't talking to me, I wasn't talking to him, either.
Floyd was more diplomatic. “Probably not. We have to turn back in...”
“Seven or eight hours,” I supplied. “Give or take.”
“Four hours,” Floyd said. “But at least we now know a route that looks like it might work.”
“Fine.” Rudolph barely glanced at the summit we'd not obtained. Nor did he spare much attention for the view opening out over the valley below. “I don't suppose we could go back by a different route?”
“Not the best idea,” Floyd and I chorused, though of course, Floyd was the only one h
e could hear.
“Thought so.” Rudolph was already turning around. “Oh well.”
* * * *
Iapetus is tide locked to Saturn, and its day is seventy-nine Earth days long, so nothing much had changed by the time we got back to the skimmer.
“Let's go for a walk,” I said to Floyd.
“Isn't that what we were just doing?” His voice was quiet, but in the stillness of the skimmer there was no way Rudolph couldn't tell he was talking to me. Long ago, spacers had learned the value of silence. If humans are trapped with it 365 per annum, anything that squeaks or hums can drive them nuts. Silence, on the other hand, can always be covered with a personal sound system.
Unfortunately, Rudolph had no problem with silence. That meant that while I could talk to Floyd privately, it was hard for him to respond once he'd taken off his suit.
“Tell Rudolph you want to take sunset pictures,” I added.
“Sunset's got to be at least ten or eleven days away.”
Sometimes, I swear, Floyd is deliberately obtuse. But this time he was just tired.
“Can't you tell me about it in here?”
“No.”
He sighed. “Okay.” Then, to Rudolph. “I'll be back in a bit.”
“'S long as we start on time tomorrow.”
Rudolph's eyes were shut, but I couldn't tell if he was thinking or nearly asleep.
Floyd didn't say anything more until he'd put on his suit and the airlock was cycling. “We could have just used the suit headset.”
“Yes, but I want to talk about him without having to see him.”
Of course, I was monitoring the skimmer's telemetry, so I could still see him, but this felt different. Rudolph was now awake, feeding bits of black scree into the mini-Spektrum. I wondered if he knew I was watching. Or if he cared. If I was merely a thing to him, it might not matter.
“What's he want with all that stuff?” I asked.
“What, the rock and dust he's collecting?”
“Yes.” Though I could also have asked about the mini-Spektrum and everything else.
“Maybe he's looking for something.”
“For what? Besides even I'd have no clue where it came from.”
“Good point.” The airlock had finished its cycle and we stepped out. “Do you remember when Mt. Rainier erupted and blew half of Seattle to hell?”
Remember wasn't quite the word, but I'd read of it. “Yes. Though it wasn't anywhere near half. More like a couple of suburbs.”
“Yeah, but afterward people collected the ash and made all kinds of things out of it—sasquatches and grizzly bears and totem poles and Space-2-Needles and things like that.”
“So you think Rudolph is planning to set up a curio stand? What's he going to call it? ‘The remains of Planet X?'” What classical beast vanished into thin air? Oh yes. “Or ‘Tails of the Cheshire Cat?’ Assuming this stuff has anything to do with a destroyed moon. Maybe it's just Ring dust.”
As long as we were outside, Floyd really did start taking a stroll. “I didn't say it was something I'd do. Just that people tend to collect stuff like this, so you can't read too much into it.”
Some of the few pieces of equipment of his own that Floyd had picked up on Iapetus Base were trekking poles. He'd suggested that Rudolph buy a pair, but Rudolph had merely scoffed. That's because Inner System ground rats tend to hop when they try to walk in low gravity, wasting energy by bouncing up and down rather than going forward. A flatter trajectory is more efficient, especially if you can stabilize it with poles.
It works best on flat surfaces, like the Trench. Occasionally, Floyd had to dodge large rocks, but in low gravity, poles are better for that than legs, and while he hadn't had poles on Titan, he knew how to use them. He struck a rhythm, and soon the skimmer disappeared beneath the curve of the horizon.
We went on like that for about fifteen minutes. There wasn't much to say, and neither of us said it. Floyd is an athlete at heart, and I knew he'd be lost in the rhythm of motion and breathing. Me, there's no way I can understand that stuff, except intellectually. I was lost in the view.
Before us, Saturn stood above the Trench in bands of pastel, the Rings almost but not quite edge-on, cleaving the heavens like knife. The sun hung slightly off to one side behind us, low enough that shadows limbed the ridges’ steeper slopes, making cliffs look even worse than they were and creating the illusion of cliffs where there weren't any.
Titan had had dramatic landforms, too, but they'd been blurred to a smoggy murk that distorted contours, hid the sky, and created a uniform orange pall. Here, everything stood out in crystalline detail.
Eventually, Floyd stopped and surveyed the vista in silence. Then he sighed. “That felt good,” he said. “It's different when it's just us. And it's nice to actually move, rather than making like a pack mule. But we better be getting back.”
“I've got something I'd like you to listen to first,” I said.
“Sure. Though I really don't think T. R.'s as bad as you believe.”
“It's not him.” At least, not directly. Without Rudolph to distract Floyd and leave me with a lot of time to fill, I might never have found myself at this point.
Suddenly, I was afraid. Not with the fear that comes from thinking of dangling from giant precipices, but with a fear that, if anything, struck deeper.
“I call it ‘Iapetus Air,'” I said.
“There's not a lot of that around here.”
“Ha, ha. No, an air is kind of like a song without words, usually done on a violin.”
“You want to play me a piece of music?”
I wasn't sure what I detected in his voice. Floyd doesn't listen to a lot of music. Maybe this was a mistake.
“Yes.” I was more nervous than ever. “It's short. And Celtic.” Not that Floyd would particularly care about that. But even though the Celts came from a green country, it was stark and rocky around the edges, and I thought they might find something familiar in this landscape.
I suppose I could still have backed out. Instead, I put everything I could into it: the bleak landscape; the untouched and so-far-untouchable peaks; the loneliness of being ignored, of watching but not participating, seeking but not finding. When it was done, Floyd was silent for long enough I was sure my worst fears had materialized, though when I checked it was only a few seconds.
“Is that a recording?” he asked.
“What do you mean?”
He paused again. “I guess I'm asking where it came from.”
“I wrote it.”
More pause. “Now?”
I'd been thinking about it all day, but the final composition had been done in real time. Improvisation, they call it, though of course I've got a considerable ability to time-shift my perceptions and cheat.
“Yes,” I said, because it was the simplest answer.
“Wow.” He paused again. “Like, really wow.” Still another pause. “What brought that on?”
I had to think about that a bit because there were plenty of other things I could have done in my free time, including sampling the vids I'd collected back at the base.
“I really want to make it to the top of one of those things,” I said.
Which wasn't really an answer. What I wanted was ... something. That's what the music had been about. The summit was just a symbol. I only wished I knew of what.
* * * *
The next two attempts were like the first. A day of intermittent slogging while Rudolph collected endless samples. A camp where he slept in comfort and Floyd didn't. Then a few more hours of not getting anywhere close to the top, a descent, and another camp in which I tried to figure out what it was that the summit meant. Whatever it was, Rudolph didn't share it. Both times, he targeted a new peak, squandering whatever route finding we'd done and never particularly exerting himself to reach the top.
The fourth attempt was different. Rudolph left his sample bag and looked up, rather than at the ground. “Is it really true that nobody's eve
r climbed one of these?”
Floyd didn't even bother to ask me to check. “Yes.”
“Then I suppose we should remedy that. After all, that's what we're here to do, isn't it?”
* * * *
Now that we were finally committed, it would have been easy if the sun hadn't been getting low, creating huge shadows. Saturn light and reflected glare from surrounding slopes softened them a bit, but human eyes weren't made for this. It wouldn't have been a problem if Rudolph had included a couple of good pairs of contrast-reduction goggles somewhere in that enormous pile of equipment, but the ones he'd brought were designed for Mars, where there's an atmosphere to soften the light.
That left me. I could see perfectly well by doing my own contrast-adjustment on the view from the cam Floyd had mounted for me on his suit. But when I tried feeding that back to his headset, the parallax messed up his depth perception enough that he kept tripping over things. Eventually, I showed him the enhanced display when he asked for it, but mostly I just gave directions: It's not as steep on the left of the big cleaver, or, go right unless you want to get boxed. That kind of thing.
I thought about sending the enhanced image to Rudolph, but he was the one who'd squandered all the good light before we needed the goggles he didn't have, so I figured he'd just have to trust us. Or Floyd. Somehow I felt no desire to show off to Rudolph. Was that a form of maturity? Or would Floyd say I was sulking?
As we neared the top, the slope abated along with the shadows. And then we were up.
“What's the name of this peak?” Rudolph asked, taking the lead just in time to be first to reach the highest outcrop.
“It doesn't have one,” I said.
“Whatever you want to call it,” Floyd said. “We can register it with the...”
“—Interplanetary Commission on Nomenclature,” I supplied.
“—proper authorities, when we get back to the skimmer. Mons Van Delp?”
* * * *
We camped on top, which isn't as big a deal as it sounds, since this wasn't Earth, where mountaintops are exposed to all sorts of nasty weather. Here, it was simply a convenient flat spot. For once, Floyd didn't seem to mind being outside. He parked himself on a convenient boulder, looking toward Saturn. To one side the view fell into the Trench. To the other, the drop was even bigger, onto a plain bounded by a crater-etched horizon that was either too close or too far, depending on your point of view. Rudolph would find it cramped. Floyd would find it big, almost like being in orbit without a ship.
Analog SFF, June 2008 Page 3