AMERICA ONE - Return To Earth (Book 4)

by T I WADE

“I’m going to reverse the tank once I have a good-sized bubble of air around me and see if the atmosphere stops penetration,” VIN said. Ryan nodded and after a few more minutes, and with the air escaping the tank as fast as was safe, VIN closed off the air and turned the tank around. Slowly he aimed the bottom of the tank into the wall and easily slipped through.

  “These guys are so much more clever than we are,” VIN said over the intercom.

  “Yes, Mr. Noble,” replied Ryan. “So would we Homo sapiens be if we stopped fighting with each other. These Homo whatevers certainly show us up, and how stupid and how uncivilized we are.”

  Then VIN tried a new trick against the shield. He handed the whole bottle to Ryan and at the same time slowly walked through the shield. Nothing changed, even though he had just walked out of a massive bubble of perfect atmospheric air, through the shield wall and into the vacuum of space. He was expecting shiny bubbles of air to be on the outside fabric of his suit, but both he and Ryan couldn’t find one minute bubble. He had come out totally dry.

  His next test was to spray a few bubbles of the valuable air into space. As usual the bubble flew out of the nozzle and immediately began dispersing outwards. Then he returned through the bubble with the tank slightly open and back into the large bubble of air slowly floating upwards. This tank had been stored inside the cylinder and was still warmer than the blankness of outer space. The top of the inner shield area, like an upside-down swimming pool was filling up with the captured, warmer air.

  Also something different was happening to the shield. The shield wall above, and inside the bubble of air was beginning to glow brighter, just as the metal walls in the cavern had done when they had powered more electricity through it.

  “Wow!” he stated. “It is sure going to be pretty in here once the atmosphere is in.” He was standing inside the bubble and the tank was again spreading more bubbles into the empty vacuum spaces. “If we could fill the shield around America One, we could haul the pool outside, form a beach with some sand and live outside,” VIN continued.

  “I think grow more hops, and vines, like in California,” suggested Jonesy’s voice in his helmet.

  “You playing with space sharks or with Saturn Jones up there, Mr. Jones?” inquired VIN.

  “No, just earning my paycheck. Maggie is doing the playing in the rear cabin, and flying around this little ball like my mother used to ball wool. I wish they had made this darn planet a little bigger. These orbits are making me want for hard liquor, in gallons…”

  “Mr. Noble, I watched as you went through the wall,” Ryan interrupted. “You had the air spurting out and it just kept spurting as it went through. The bubble flow didn’t stop, which shows that the shield is holding the vacuum outside and an atmosphere inside. I think we have just hit pay dirt, and our experiments have worked. Leave the bottle in there and come out and help me drag these nine frozen bottles out here into the shield and let them warm up. We might as well empty the first bottle and open two more. Mr. Jones can haul out the remaining bottles from his cargo bay outside while we pressure up the shield. And, I think giving the shield an atmosphere around America One is a great idea. It will take about a year or two of air production once we find more water, but we should have that atmosphere for as long as we fly America One around the solar system. Maybe we could put out an outside pool and beach somewhere. We’ll find the water, but I wonder if there are any beaches and sun chairs and umbrellas out there anywhere on the moons we are going to visit? I think maybe Portugal, or the beaches in Florida might have the closest deck chairs once we return.”

  Chapter 14

  Smelly astronauts

  Just before the first rotation of scientists was about to take place, VIN ventured out into the shield with Ryan and Fritz. Jonesy was about to leave America One, high above them at an altitude of 120 miles. In order to orbit DX2017, a tiny pebble of planet, the mother ship had to continually adjust its altitude. DX 2017 was not the ideal planet to orbit.

  The last cargo delivery included the second load of air which VIN was pumping into the shield. The heat slowly increased in the brightly lit blue dome with the dissolution of the vacuum of space. Although heat from underground could have been released into the dome, Ryan and Igor, in the mother ship, were still conducting a scientific experiment; they were recording the time it took the shield to become warm and what temperatures it would reach. The tanks contents were always released extremely slowly, so as not to explode or become a danger.

  The first three tanks were warm, having been stored underground for a few days. Twenty-four hours after VIN released the first batch, the temperature inside the shield rose by 31 degrees to minus 144 Fahrenheit. All of the others in the first batch had been stored on the planet’s surface, and were well below freezing when VIN carried them, one by one, into the shield.

  The second load of 24 tanks that Jonesy brought down was offloaded outside the shield, and VIN moved them inside the dome, still cold. The second batch of tanks took 96 hours to empty. In those four days the temperature had risen to minus 60 degrees; it seemed it would take forever to rise enough for VIN to have his helmet detached and breathe in the new atmosphere.

  VIN remembered minus 163 degree temperatures in orbit around Earth, but as they orbited farther and farther away from the sun it was getting colder. It had been colder on the frozen areas of Mars and warmer in the crater, but overall the temperature was already more than ten degrees colder, and he knew it was going to get worse. Fortunately, the temperature didn’t matter to VIN inside his cozy space suit which fully protected him from temperature extremes.

  The air pressure was finally equal to 3,000 feet above sea level on Earth, and was exactly the same pressure as underground. The atmosphere in the shield was clean, virgin air produced in the mother ship, and until it was mixed with the dry, slightly smelly air from underground, it would be perfect. The docking port was the only thing separating the two unconnected atmospheres.

  A small amount of water was always mixed into the air tanks; it appeared as a light snowfall, glistening on the planet’s surface inside the shield. The quarter-inch thick frosty layer was a strange sight in the middle of nowhere. Even Captain Pete, watching through the telescope from high above, mentioned how bright and light blue the inside of the dome looked.

  The purpose of the water was to add humidity, as dry air with zero humidity was just as dangerous as no air. The general humidity would be around 50 to 55 percent, and increased for plant growth. Some of the cubes, those housing tropical plants, had upwards of 65 percent humidity, and the plants themselves were actually increasing the humidity in two of the cubes.

  The time had come to exchange scientists. Ryan, who was returning to the mother ship, wanted to leave wearing his overalls, not a clumsy space suit. The charged suits would remain for the newcomers, saving a lot of time and trouble.

  VIN checked his suit’s temperature readout for the third time. The temperature inside the dome was minus 13 degrees Fahrenheit, warm enough to go winter skiing and take off his helmet. The pressure was good and the air mix perfect, just very dry. He had played with snow globes as a kid on Earth and, standing 100 feet outside the wall of the shield dome, it looked like the snowy winter wonderland of one of those snow globes come to life.

  VIN and four others wearing space suites unloaded Jonesy’s ship, and the supplies were taken in through the docking port. Vitalily helped Jonesy unload, and VIN and Fritz sent the dozen canisters down through the docking port. Jonesy mentioned how much brighter the shield looked when he came in; one could already distinguish a difference between the permanent shield and the one activated by the incoming craft.

  Fritz and Vitalily went back inside the cavern with Jonesy, who collected Maggie and little Saturn to return to America One. Maggie wasn’t needed as a backup pilot anymore, and enjoyed the tranquility of the cylinder with her daughter. They even spent the last day underground, but Saturn was still not very happy about wearing her spacesuit.
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  Once Jonesy and family were away, life got down to clearing supplies, figuring out sleeping arrangements and associated human territory arrangements. The biologists would work in one room and the chemists and electricians in the others, until they needed to swap.

  The rear cavern was off limits for overnight accommodation, and several of the scientists decided to sleep in the rooms they were working in. With all doors permanently open, every snore, or grunt could be heard by everyone.

  VIN, Suzi, Mars and Ryan elected to sleep in the command center. Fritz was happy to sleep in the power room; he said that he seemed to get a buzz in his mechanical leg from the energy in there. Everyone else slept in the forward cavern, including one man who slept upstairs on the walkway, saying that it was warmer and more peaceful. The rear cavern held the supplies, the cooking facilities and a few of the plastic fold out camp chairs that had been brought down. The canisters were also packed with a couple of small foldup tables, fifty gallons of water, a water recycler, an air recycler, a food waste recycler, air purifiers, a refrigerator, and an infra-red stove, but no washing machines or dryers.

  A shower had arrived, but it would take three days to piece it together. Anyway, there was still not enough water for bathing; water would be on the next flight. The first rotation of scientists was certainly going to be happy to return to the mother ship where they could clean up and enjoy the luxuries aboard.

  Jonesy would have been happy to stay. There was a five-gallon glass jar of vodka, the same of beer, and a third that held the ship’s own house-produced red wine. There were also fresh eggs, frozen chicken, vegetables, potatoes and the first pasta that was still being developed in space.

  All in all, the crew were happy workers for the first few days. One thing that surprised many of them was how unaccustomed they had become to the normal sounds people make, particularly snoring. After living in almost complete silence aboard ship, communal life was teaching them new things about each other. Martha Von Zimmer was the worst snorer and Mr. Rose, in the same biology lab, was the second worst. Sometimes it sounded like a middle school battle of the bands, accompanied by Dr. Bloem who spoke constantly in her sleep, often in languages no one had ever heard.

  After three nights, VIN and Ryan agreed they were lucky to be in semi-isolation and perhaps the doors to the biology lab should be closed at night.

  During the first few days, a great deal of work was carried out using every sort of instrument found in laboratories everywhere: microscopes, Bunsen burners, and test tubes were abundant in all three rooms. It was quieter when the crew worked, than when they were asleep.

  VIN was not able to test out the new form of volleyball, as the ball and net had not yet arrived, so he worked out with his normal exercises, and also tried to run around the caverns. Unfortunately, to everybody’s dismay, especially his wife’s, his personal scent became less than alluring. By day four, some of the ladies hinted that a bath would be a good idea. By day eight they were complaining out loud about how badly VIN smelled, and by day ten they were thrilled that VIN was going out to check the shield’s temperature. The night before, even Suzi had moved her bed and the little cot Mars slept in far away from smelly daddy.

  “SB-III to DX2017, do you copy? Over.” VIN heard Jonesy’s voice over the intercom which also blasted out on the single radio inside the command center of the cavern for the same purpose.

  “Reading you, Jonesy,” VIN replied a second before Ryan echoed the same.

  “Two minutes to overhead, ten miles out, at 7,000 feet. Partner, you outside?”

  “Yes, General Jones, sir!” joked VIN. “Awaiting Your Majesty and your flying carpet, and especially the water for the shower. My wife doesn’t like me anymore.”

  “She is joining a growing group,” Jonesy joked in return. “Co-pilot doesn’t have helmet on, only me. Will Maggie need to have her helmet attached? Over.”

  “Negative,” VIN replied, “but you might need skis. It is frozen and a little slippery inside the blue dome; temperature is 13 degrees below freezing, Fahrenheit. Suggest that Maggie wrap up before opening the cockpit to the cargo compartment, and since you are going to lose warm cockpit and crew cabin air, turn up the heat in SB-III a little.”

  “Not only must I fly up and down like a yo-yo, I’ve got to warm you guys up as well. Turning up heat to maximum.”

  “I hope you have your coats with you,” Jonesy relayed to the passengers.

  “Any wind down there, partner?”

  “Only yours,” VIN replied.

  “Thank you for letting me say something, heads of Security and Astronaut departments,” Ryan joined in. “Mrs. Jones, all are unfavorably disposed to the nose down here and are looking forward to the mother ship’s showers. Mr. Jones, we are ready for boarding. The new crew will need to be helped across the ice by Mr. Noble, one by one. Mr. Jones, open up the forward cargo bay, the crew can disembark, and then we can embark through the new roof door and stairs. Mr. Noble, open up the docking port when you have the first crewmember to send down, and our air down here will help warm up the dome. We are prepared for an arctic blast down here.”

  Jonesy came in slowly, touching the top of the dome, which activated the second shield. They still hadn’t figured out how to make the shield permanent. Suzi and Mr. Rose wanted an atmosphere in the second dome one day so they could plant more vegetation in it.

  SB-III touched down gently. VIN was still outside in the second shield to make sure that Jonesy parked correctly. The shuttle needed its forward cargo bay inside the first dome and the rear cargo bay with all the supplies in the second one.

  Jonesy was a few inches out, but the two cargo doors were where they were supposed to be. VIN knew what would happen when the cockpit hatch and the new crew cabin door opened. The air inside would be much warmer than the negative readings outside; condensation would be interesting. He slowly walked through the dome walls to watch as Jonesy activated the forward cargo door.

  “I’m not opening the side hatch, partner,” Jonesy said. “I’m coming through the front cargo bay door to help you unload. We have seven crew aboard. Kathy and Lunar didn’t come since the boss is returning to the mother ship. Maggie and Saturn will stay in the cockpit while we unload. Over.”

  “Roger that, Chief Astronaut Jones, and leave that cantankerous old dog in you inside with the copilot, I certainly don’t need it out here.”

  “Well said, Mr. Noble,” smiled Ryan from below, much to Maggie’s chagrin.

  It was a pretty sight watching the warm air mix with the cold; it made VIN think of a visit to New York when he watched clouds of condensation rise upwards from the manhole covers. The blue glow inside the dome made the condensation clouds blue and lent an air of tranquility. It was as if they were back on Earth.

  The large roof door of the shuttle opened outwards into the thick, moist condensation and a ladder was thrown out. As VIN climbed up the ladder on the side of the shuttle he appeared to be climbing up the side of a large boiling pot of water. The eerie shape of the first person was waiting for him dressed in a warm coat. Wearing space suit gloves to keep his hands warm, Max Burgos followed VIN down the ladder and together they helped each other across the icy surface to the docking port.

  “We could do with some salt out here,” VIN commented.

  “It’s just temporary, Mr. Noble,” replied Ryan. “Just walk slowly and don’t fall, not that you are in any real danger, except freezing to death.”

  Max couldn’t speak to VIN, since he was not wearing a spacesuit or helmet, only the gloves; they communicated through hand signals to get to the docking port. The port had been pre-programmed to open both doors; VIN pressed the outer control and the hatches opened together. Max indicated that he could feel the warm escaping air. He turned around, found the rungs inside the chamber with his feet and began to descend. When VIN hammered the rungs into the planet’s wall, he made sure that they were aligned to the rungs in the port. As Max disappeared into the dense fog, VIN c
losed the outer hatch, and went back each to assist the next crew member. One by one the seven new crew members disappeared down the shaft, enveloped by masses of condensation.

  The inner cargo bay of SB-III must have cooled as the condensation there had ceased.

  “Temperature has risen four degrees, to minus nine, Boss,” VIN reported over the intercom. “We could be seeing a snowmelt in the dome soon.”

  “Roger,” replied Ryan. “Get the rear cargo bay unloaded and make sure everything is in the dome. The cold of the outer walls of the canisters and air tanks could lower the temperature again.”

  The shuttle carried the same cargo as it did on the previous trip; twelve heavy canisters which Jonesy and VIN carried over to the shaft one at a time and lowered down. They could hardly see for the escaping condensation each time the port was opened. Next, they unloaded twelve more tanks of air and the emergency supplies; these were left in the dome to warm up to the 130 degree difference between the first and second dome.

  Finally, the departing passengers climbed up the ladder one by one, and were helped across the white ground and up the stairs to the docking port.

  “Reminds me of being a baggage handler at JFK,” VIN commented.

  “And the aircraft crew who opened the doors for boarding,” added Jonesy. I never got this quality of service aboard any aircraft, especially when I flew to Denver during that Sequester period, or whatever they called it, several years ago. It was utter chaos.”

  They were the only two chatting. When they helped Ryan to board, they bowed in fake reverence as he climbed up the ladder against the side of the shuttle. He had no helmet on and was robbed of a chance to land a good retort.

  With the eight departing crewmembers aboard, Jonesy went up the stairs to secure the shuttle and try to get some warmth into it.

  “Next time wear a bathing suit, Mr. Jones. It could be a toasty seventy degrees in here,” VIN said. “The temperature is only three below freezing.”