by Ben Bova
(I couldn’t fail to notice the grin that crept across Sam’s face as he spoke. Neither could the judges. Either he was not telling it exactly the way it had happened or he was downright pleased that this “act of God” had pointed him squarely at Europa.)
I called the DULLards on Europa again and gave them a complete rundown of the situation. Recorded my message and had the comm system keep replaying it to ‘em. They didn’t respond. Not a peep.
I had nothing to do for several hours except feel good that I didn’t have all those damned tubes poking into me. But even though I could get up and walk around my luxuriously appointed bridge and take solid food from my highly automated and well-stocked galley, my brain kept nibbling at a question that’d been nagging at me since before I hit Jupiter.
Why did DULL insist on keeping the whole Jupiter system off-limits to outside developers?
And why did the IAA agree to let them do that?
All of a sudden my comm system erupted with noise from Europa. They started screaming at me that I wasn’t allowed in the Jupiter system, I can’t land on Europa, I’d better haul ass out of there, yaddida, yaddida, and so on. Threatened me with lawsuits and public flogging and whatnot.
I told them I was on a mission of mercy and two human lives depended on my grabbing some of their ice. Three lives, come to think of it. My butt was on the line, too.
But even if they heard me they didn’t listen. They just kept screaming that I wasn’t allowed to land on Europa or be anywhere in the Jupiter system. Different faces appeared on my comm screen every fifteen seconds, seemed like, all of them getting more and more frantic as I came hurtling closer to Europa’s ice-covered surface.
“I hear what you’re saying,” I told them. “I’m not going to disturb your little green lichenoids. I just need to grab some ice and, believe me, I’ll be out of your way as fast as a jackrabbit in mating season.”
I might as well have been talking to myself. In fact, I think I was. They paid no attention to what I was saying.
A really nasty-looking lug come on my comm screen. “This is Captain Majerkurth. I’m in charge of security here on Europa. If you try to land here I will personally break your balls.”
“Security?” I blurted. “What do you need security for? And what army are you a captain in?”
“I am a captain in the security department of Wankle Enterprises, on loan to Diversified Universities and Laboratories, Limited,” he replied evenly—an even snarl, that is.
“Well, if I were you, mon capitain,” I said, “I’d start getting my people under shelter. My spacecraft is accompanied by about a hundred or so rocks that’re going to hit Europa like a meteor shower.”
That was the remains of my heat shield, of course. Most of the rocks had ablated down to pebble size, but at the velocity we were traveling they could still do some damage. Europa’s icy surface was going to get peppered and there wasn’t anything I could do about it except warn them to get under shelter.
Well, to make a long story short (the judges all sighed at that) I landed on Europa nice and smooth, a real gentle touchdown. With Clementine still dragging along beside me, of course. The meteor shower I promised Captain Majerkurth didn’t harm anything, near as I can tell: just a few hundred new little craterlets in Europa’s surface of ice.
So I’ve got Clementine chewing up ice and storing it in her holds. Bypassed her dumbass mass spectrometer, otherwise her computer would’ve stopped everything because it couldn’t figure out what elements were going into which bins. Didn’t matter. It was all ice, which added up to hydrogen for Jokers fusion torch and oxygen for the Twins.
I expected Majerkurth to show up, and sure enough, I hadn’t been sitting on Europa for more than an hour before this flimsy little hopper pops up over my horizon, heading my way on a ballistic trajectory. For half a second I thought the hardass had fired a missile at me, but my computer analyzed the radar data in picoseconds and announced that it was a personnel hopper, not a missile, and it was gonna land beside Joker.
I buttoned up Joker good and tight. I had no intention of letting Majerkurth come aboard. But the space-suited figure that climbed down from the hopper wasn’t the security captain.
“Mr. Gunn, this is Anitra O’Toole. Permission to come aboard?”
I stared at the image in my display screen. You can’t tell much about a person when she’s zipped into a space suit, but Anitra O’Toole looked small—maybe my own height or even a little less—and her voice was kind of... well, she sounded almost scared.
“Are you one of Majerkurth’s security people?” I asked.
“Security? Goodness no! If Captain Majerkurth knew I was here he’d...” She hesitated, then pleaded, “Please let me come aboard, Mr. Gunn. Please!”
What could I do? I could never refuse a woman asking for help, and she seemed to need my help pretty desperately. It was like the time I—
(“Please stick to the facts of this case!” the chief judge demanded.)
Yeah, okay. So I let her in. Anitra O’Toole turned out to be young, kinda pretty in a cheerleader way, and very worried. Oh, and she was one of the three biologists among the DULL team on Europa.
And she was scared, too. She wouldn’t say why, at first, or why she wanted to come aboard Joker. She just fidgeted and blathered about her husband waiting for her back on Earth and how she was afraid that her marriage was coming apart because they’d been separated so long and her career might be going down the tubes as well.
I only had a few hours to be on Europa, but while my brain-dead Clementine was ingesting ice I tried to be as hospitable as possible. I sat Anitra down in my quarters, just off the bridge, and programmed the galley to produce a gourmet dinner of roast squab, sweet potatoes, string beans—
(“Mr. Gunn!” growled the Toad.)
All right, all right. I popped a bottle of champagne for her. Joker has the best wine cellar in space, bar none.
Now, don’t get me wrong. I don’t try to seduce married women, even when they tell me their marriage is in trouble. Especially then, as a matter of fact. Too complicated; too many chances for lawsuits or grievous bodily harm.
I was more interested in her saying that her career might be going down the tubes. One of three biologists on Europa, working on a newly discovered form of extraterrestrial life, and her career was in trouble?
“Why?” I asked her.
Anitra had these big violet eyes and the kind of golden blonde hair that most women get out of a bottle. Sitting there beside me in a one-piece zipsuit, she looked young and unhappy and vulnerable, like a runaway waif. I stayed an arm’s length away; it wasn’t easy, but I kept thinking about the Twins as much as I could.
“The adaptation isn’t working,” Anitra said, miserable. “All this planning and genetic engineering and they still won’t reproduce.”
“What won’t reproduce?” I asked.
She sipped at the champagne. I refilled her glass.
“Could you take me back to Earth?” she blurted.
I started to say no, which was the truth. But long, long ago I had learned that the truth doesn’t always get the job done.
“I’m heading back to the belt. My company headquarters is in Ceres,” I said. “I could arrange transportation from there.”
She clutched at my wrist, nearly spilling my champagne. “Would you?”
“Why do you want to leave Europa so badly?”
Those violet eyes looked away from me. “My husband,” she said vaguely.
“Won’t DULL set you up with transportation? They have regular resupply flights, don’t they? You could hook a ride back Earthside with them.”
“No,” she said, barely a whisper. “I’ve got to go now, while I’ve got.the chance. And the nerve.”
“But your work here on the lichenoids ...”
“That’s the whole point!” she burst. “It isn’t working and everybody’s going to find out and I’m going to be ruined professionally and nobody will wan
t me, not even Brandon.”
I figured Brandon was her husband.
(“Is there a point to all this?” asked the chief judge, frowning.)
The point is this. Anitra O’Toole told me that the lichenoids DULL was studying are not native to Europa. They were engineered in a biology lab in Zurich and planted on Europa by the DULL team.
THE COURTROOM ERUPTED. As if a bomb had gone off. Half the spectators jumped to their feet, shouting. The Beryllium Blonde and her four cohorts were screaming objections. The chief judge was banging the stump of her gavel on the banc, demanding order.
But what caught my eye was the look on the splotchy face of the Toad.
Weatherwax was staring at Sam as if he would have gladly strangled him if he’d had the chance.
It took a while and a lot of whacking of the stump of her gavel, but once order was restored to the courtroom, the chief judge fixed Sam with a beady eye and asked, “Are you maintaining, Mr. Gunn, that there never were indigenous life-forms on Europa?”
Sitting in the witness chair with his hands folded childlike on his lap, Sam replied courteously, “Yes, ma’am, that’s exactly what I’m saying. The whole story was a subterfuge, engineered by the people who run DULL”
“This is outrageous!” Weatherwax roared. Everyone in the courtroom realized that he was the man who ran DULL.
The chief judge was a little more professional. She turned to the prosecution’s lawyers, who were still standing and fuming.
“Cross-examination?”
The Beryllium Blonde stalked out from behind the table like a battle cruiser maneuvering into range for a lethal broadside.
She stood before Sam for a long, silent moment while the entire court held its breath. He stared up at her; maybe he was trying to look defiant. To me, he looked like a kid facing the school principal.
“Mr. Gunn,” she started, utterly serious, no smile, her eyes cold and calculating, “the allegation you have just made is extremely serious. What evidence do you have to support it?”
“The testimony of Dr. Anitra O’Toole, of Johns Hopkins University’s biology department.”
“And where is Dr. O’Toole? Why isn’t she here at this trial?”
Sam took a breath. “As far as I know, she is still on Europa. They won’t let her leave.”
“Won’t let her leave?” the Blonde registered disbelief raised to the nth power.
“She’s being held prisoner, more or less,” Sam said. “That’s why Wankle put a security team on Europa: to see that the scientists don’t talk and can’t get away.”
“Really, Mr. Gunn! And why isn’t her husband demanding her return to Earth?”
“Because, as far as he knows, she’s on Europa voluntarily, placing her career before their marriage. Besides, my sources tell me the guy’s shacked up with a certain blonde lawyer.”
Her eyes went wide and she smacked Sam right in the mouth. Hauled off and whacked him with the flat of her hand. The crack echoed off the courtrooms stone walls.
A couple of spectators cheered. The judges were so stunned none of them moved.
Sam ran a thumb across his jaw. I could see the white imprint of her fingers on his skin.
With a crooked grin, Sam went on, “He’s here in Selene City. I could have him subpoenaed to appear here, if you like.”
The Blonde visibly pulled herself together, regained her self-control by sheer force of will. She put on a contrite expression and looked up at the judges.
“I apologize for my behavior, your honors,” she said, in a hushed little-girl voice. “It was inexcusable of me to allow the witness’s slanderous statement to affect me so violently.”
“Apology accepted,” said the Toad. The chief judge’s brows knit, but she said nothing.
So the Blonde got away with slugging Sam and even made it look as if it was his own fault. Neat work, I thought.
She turned back to Sam. “Do you have any evidence of your allegation about the lichenoids, Mr. Gunn?”
“I have Dr. O’Toole’s statement on video. I activated Jokers internal camera system once I allowed her on board my ship.”
“Video evidence can be edited, doctored, manufactured out of computer graphics—”
“Like the slides of the Europa lichenoids we saw earlier,” Sam countered.
“You are defaming scientists whose reputations are beyond reproach!” the Blonde exclaimed.
“Nobody’s reputation is beyond reproach,” Sam said hotly. “You oughtta know that.”
Turning to the judges, he went on without taking a breath, “Your honors, none of these scientists were trying to hoodwink the public. They were drawn into a plot by the people who run Wankle Enterprises, a plot to stake out a monopoly on the resources of the whole Jupiter system!”
The chief judge answered sternly, “How can you make such an allegation, Mr. Gunn, without proof?” But I noticed she was eying the Toad as she spoke.
“Look, this is the way it worked,” Sam said, ignoring her question. “DULL’s operation on Europa is funded by Wankle Enterprises, right? Wankle’s people went to DULL more than five years ago and suggested an experiment: they wanted DULL’s scientists to engineer terrestrial lichen to survive in the conditions of Europa, living in the watery slush at the bottom of Europa’s mantle of ice. The idea was to see how life-forms would behave under extraterrestrial conditions.”
“Which is a valid scientific project,” the Blonde said.
“Yeah, that’s what they told the scientists. So the biologists engineer the critters and they send a team out to Europa to see if they can actually survive there.”
The chief judge interrupted. “You are contending, Mr. Gunn, that there were no native life-forms on Europa?”
“No native life-forms on or in or any way connected with Europa. If they’d found native life forms they wouldn’t have had to engineer this experiment, would they?”
“But DULL announced the discovery of native life-forms.”
“Right!” Sam exulted. “That’s when our slimy friend here sprung his trap. They announced that the scientists had discovered native life-forms on Europa, instead of telling the media that the lichenoids had been engineered in a bio lab in Zurich.”
“That is utterly ridiculous,” said the Blonde. I noticed that the Toad was slumping more than usual in his chair.
“The hell it is,” Sam snapped. “The poor suckers on Europa were caught in a mousetrap. They were stuck on Europa, dependant on DULL and Wankle for transportation home. Dependant on them for air to breathe! They couldn’t get to the media; they were surrounded by three dozen DULL public-relations flacks and a Wankle security team. Even if they could blow the whistle, it’d look as if they were in on the fraud from the beginning. One way or another their careers would be finished. DULL would never let them sweep the floor of a laboratory again, let alone practice scientific research.”
“Monstrous,” muttered the chief judge. Whether she meant Sam’s allegations were monstrous or DULL’s actions, I couldn’t figure out.
“Meanwhile, DULL’s communications experts are putting the pressure on the scientists to go along with the deception. After all, once the lichenoids adapt to the conditions under the ice on Europa they’ll really be extraterrestrial organisms, right? The scientists could announce their true origins in the scientific journals in a year or two or three. Who’s going to notice, by then, except other scientists?”
The Blonde stamped her lovely foot for attention. “But why go through this subterfuge? It’s all so pointless and ridiculous. Why would reputable scientists, why would the directors and governors of
DULL, go through such an elaborate and foolish subterfuge? Mr. Gunn’s wild theory falls apart on the question of motivation, your honors.”
“Not so, oh temptress of the heavenly spheres,” Sam replied. “Motivation is exactly where my theory is strongest.”
He paused dramatically. Two of the judges leaned forward to hear his next words. Weatherwax l
ooked as if he wanted to be someplace else. Anyplace else.
“Once DULL’s public-relations program announced that native organisms had been found on Europa, what did the IAA do?” Before anyone could reply, Sam went on, “They roped off the whole Jupiter system—the whole damned system! Jupiter itself and all its moons, sealed off, embargoed. No commercial development allowed. Forbidden territory. No go there, bwana, IAA make big taboo.”
“Mr. Gunn, please!” said the third judge.
“No commercial development allowed in the entire Jupiter system,” Sam repeated. “Except for the company that was funding the Europa research station. They were allowed ‘limited resource extraction’ to repay for their funding the Europa team. Right?”
The chief judge murmured, “Right.”
“Who was funding the Europa station? Wankle Enterprises. Who was allowed to develop ‘limited resource extraction’—which means scooping Jupiter’s clouds and mining its moons? Wankle Enterprises. Who has a monopoly on the thousands of trillions of dollars worth of resources in the Jupiter system? Wankle Enterprises. Surprise!”
“Limited resource extraction,” snapped the Blonde, “means just that. Limited.”
“Yeah, sure. What does ‘limited’ mean? How much? There’s no definition. A billion dollars? A trillion? And what happens if the environmentalists or some other corporation or the Dalai Lama complains that Wankle’s taking too much out of the Jupiter system? Wankle simply announces that the lichenoids on Europa weren’t native life-forms after all. Ta-daaa! The scientists get a black eye and Wankle has established operations running all over the Jupiter system. That gives them the edge on any competition, thanks to the monopoly the IAA mistakenly granted them.”
Weatherwax stirred himself. “We’ve listened long enough to these paranoid ramblings,” he rumbled. “I haven’t heard a single iota of evidence to support Mr. Gunn’s ravings.”