The Enceladus Crisis

by Michael J. Martinez

  “We good?” Hall asked as she floated down into her seat.

  “Board is green,” Shaila replied. “You want to give it a try?”

  Hall smiled that regretful smile again. “Not this time. You’ll stick the landing better anyway.”

  “You know, for a corporate stooge, you’re OK,” Shaila said, not for the first time. While the two weren’t particularly close, despite the close quarters and long journey, they developed an easy rapport that included its fair share of commentary.

  “And you’re not so bad for a slack-jawed space jockey,” Hall replied. “Besides, I need to get ready to do the real work once you chauffeur us down there.”

  “Roger that. I’ll keep the meter running.”

  Moments later, Conti and Stephane floated down into the crew compartment, the final bits of their equipment stored. Conti also brought with her six flags: those of the United States, Italy, France and the United Kingdom, as well as the United Nations and Joint Space Command. There had been some argument as to whether to plant a flag at all—Stephane particularly found it to be just more unabashed 22nd century colonialism—but Shaila felt it was a nice touch, especially since so many nations were represented. Besides, she thought, the Chinese sure as hell were going to stick a big red one in Titan.

  “All right, everyone,” Shaila said. “Buckle up. Armstrong, this is Lander One. Request permission to begin landing procedures.”

  Nilssen’s voice came on over the speakers. “Lander One, Armstrong. You are cleared for departure. Godspeed.”

  Nobody ever says Godspeed anymore, unless it’s in space, Shaila thought idly as she sealed off the airlock. “Good seal,” she reported. “Disengaging docking clamp.”

  With the flip of a switch, Lander One was free of Armstrong, hovering mere inches from the hull. Shaila teased the docking thrusters slightly and pulled away slowly from the ship. With a handful of small thruster bursts, she slowly navigated down the length of Armstrong’s hull. The ship looked surprisingly good after her long voyage; Shaila’s mind flashed back to the thin layer of red dust that covered everything on Mars, and was grateful she wasn’t there.

  “Armstrong, Lander One. Ship looks pretty. We’re good to go,” Shaila reported.

  “Roger that, Lander One. Dropping shields on my mark,” Nilssen said. “Three . . . two . . . one . . . mark!”

  There was no visible change to the view outside the lander’s windows, but Shaila knew that the electromagnetic energy field around the Armstrong would short out the Lander’s electronics, leaving it dead in space. So for each lander’s departure and arrival, the ship had to drop its protection for a moment. While there was always the off chance a few particles would get through, it wasn’t as though they were in orbit around an ice storm. They would, of course, do a thorough inspection before leaving Enceladus, and make any patches necessary. And the EM emitter was still active, too, which would take care of the bigger stuff anyway.

  On Nilssen’s “mark,” Shaila hit the ship’s engines and roared away from Armstrong, clearing the ship in mere seconds. By going in the opposite direction of the ship, Lander One would not only get clear faster, but also begin to slow down so that it could descend to the surface without the micrometeor and ice impacts Archie had worried over.

  “Decelerating rapidly,” Hall reported. “Looking good.”

  “Roger that. Starting our descent. I’ll try to aim for the t-shirt kiosk,” Shaila replied.

  The next hour was pretty quiet aboard Lander One as the four astronauts were more than satisfied to gaze out the windows at the icy moon below. At first glance it appeared smooth, but as the little ship drew closer, they could see an intricate pattern of valleys and gorges spread haphazardly across the surface, punctuated by the pock-marks left by asteroid impacts over the millennia.

  Shaila looked back at Stephane and took immense joy in seeing his rapturous face practically pressed up against his window. The fact that he was brilliant was unquestioned; she thought she deserved a bit of credit, though, for getting him to focus. Of course, the events on Mars probably had more to do with it, but she still staked her claim to his improvement, and he never denied it.

  Catching her watching, Stephane turned to her and said in a fake baritone, “That’s it. The Rebels are there.”

  Combined with his French accent, the impression was more comedic than perhaps intended. At least, Shaila thought with a smile, he was paying attention when she made him watch all those Star Wars movies. She always thought the 150-year-old originals were the best, but Stephane had been partial to the 2107-2115 holo remakes, probably from seeing them when he was a kid. But he was French, and there was no accounting for taste.

  “I don’t see a shield generator,” Shaila said gamely.

  “That is the system. And I’m sure Skywalker is with them,” Stephane replied, his Vader-voice dissolving into a chuckle.

  That lightened the mood considerably, and soon all four of them were talking about the things they’d do when they landed. Conti was particularly interested in her pet experiment, which would set up a laser drill that, over the next day, would melt enough ice to reach the interior ocean of the moon. From there, a handful of tennis-ball-sized probes would be dropped in—and the search for life would be on. She didn’t expect to find anything, but it would make for a very pleasant, and extraordinarily historic, surprise.

  On the topic of history, Stephane was surprisingly quiet about what he would say when he set foot upon Enceladus. From Neil Armstrong’s “one small step” speech to Yuna Hiyashi’s two-word statement on Europa—“Nice view!”—there was a proud tradition of memorable sayings. Part of Shaila was pretty happy that she hadn’t drawn the short straw, because everything she came up with during the voyage sounded awful and trite.

  “Lander One, Armstrong. You’re coming up on the landing zone. Looking good. Over.”

  Nilssen’s voice brought Shaila back to the present. “Roger that, Armstrong. We’re ready to roll. Over.”

  “Copy, Lander One. Good luck. Out.”

  Shaila began to descend more steeply now. Their landing zone was a good five kilometers away from the edge of the outermost tiger stripe, and had been selected using nearly a century of probe data. Of course, Armstrong was also running sensor sweeps of the area, and Shaila had to be ready to fire thrusters and get the lander up and out in case the ice there wasn’t the kilometer-thick crust they thought it might be.

  She needn’t have worried, however. The landing procedure was textbook, and the lander slowly settled down on the surface of Enceladus. It was a surprisingly long process—the moon’s gravity was barely 1 percent of Earth’s, so Shaila brought the ship to a halt five meters above the surface and cut the engines. It took a few minutes until the ship gently touched down upon the ice, and Shaila fired a very slow, gradual thruster burn in order to prevent the lander from literally bouncing.

  And then she cut the engines, and all was silent for a moment. Her heart racing, Shaila finally keyed the comm. “Lander One to Armstrong, landing procedure successful. Preparing to EVA,” she said, making sure each word was spoken with a steady voice.

  “Roger that, Lander One. Nice landing,” Nilssen said.

  “Thanks, Armstrong. Lander One out.” Shaila turned to her compatriots. “All right, let’s get sealed up and get out of here.”

  The crew put their gauntlets and helmets on, sealed them tightly and turned on their atmospheric units and individual visor HUDs. Shaila checked each suit personally, and had everyone check hers as well. Then, one by one, they went through the tiny airlock in the ceiling and out on top of the lander itself.

  Shaila was the last to leave, and found all four of them silently admiring the view. The horizon was impossibly close, and beyond it, the rings of Saturn spread out before them covering half the sky, with three-quarters of Saturn itself looming before them. To the right, the Sun shone brightly, though from that distance, it looked more like a very ambitious star than the blazing orb s
een from Earth.

  “All right,” she said. “Stephane?”

  She saw him look down at the surface, as if weighing exactly how to go about it. She walked carefully over to him—a wrong move would send her tens of meters straight up—and put a hand on his shoulder. “Go ahead,” she said quietly. “It’s all yours.”

  He turned and smiled at her, and they touched their helmets together. She found herself smiling like a giddy teenager in that moment. How many couples got to do something like this?

  Then she felt his hands on her arms . . . lifting.

  “What are you doing?” she asked, the grin instantly dissolving.

  “This,” he said simply. He picked her right up off the top of the lander—she weighed little more than a backpack in Enceladus’ gravity—and carried her to the edge.

  Then he dropped her.

  It took her a good five seconds to fall to the surface of Enceladus—enough time for her to wonder whether to kill him or kiss him.

  And then her boots hit the fine granular ice on the surface.

  “Armstrong, this is Durand,” she heard over her comm. “Change of plans. I have given my honor to Lieutenant Commander Shaila Jain. She is the first person to set foot in the Saturn system. Over.”

  There were a few seconds of silence before Nilssen replied, sounding amused, “Roger, Durand. Conti caught it on the holocam. Status, Jain?”

  Oh, God. Now I have to say something. “Armstrong, this is Jain.” She paused, trying to come up with . . . anything. “It’s a pretty little moon,” she stammered. “Let’s leave it the way we found it.”

  That sucked. That sucked so badly! She turned to look up at her colleagues, all of whom were smiling down at her. Stephane gave her a thumbs up; she resisted giving him the finger. “All right,” Shaila said. “Enough with the history books. Let’s get to work. And Durand?”

  “Yes, Commander?” he said, already floating down to the surface. He only ever used her rank to tease her.

  “You’re in serious trouble when we get back to the ship.”

  He landed in a little cloud of icy powder. “You’re welcome,” he grinned. “How many men can say they gave the woman they loved an entire world?”

  “Serious trouble,” she replied, his grin sparking her own.

  “Christ, you two, get a room,” Hall teased. “The suits don’t come with airlocks.”

  Before Shaila could retort, she felt a vibration through the soles of her boots. Immediately, her HUD lit up with sensor warnings. “Seismic activity,” she reported, immediately back to business. “Epicenter is six klicks ahead.”

  Stephane started tapping commands into the pad on his wrist gauntlet. “It is the tiger stripes,” he said. “They’re about to blow.”

  The four astronauts turned away from Saturn and watched as a plume of icy crystals erupted into the sky above them . . . and began heading their way with surprising speed.

  The night sky erupted in a blizzard. And with it came a tide that would envelop them all . . .

  Shaila shook her head, but the image—and the feeling of dread at seeing the cloud of ice—was all-encompassing.

  “Take cover!” she yelled.

  Sept. 15, 1798

  “These sails, Captain, they are treated with the typical admixture of mercury, sulfur and goldenrod, yes?” the young man—little more than an older boy, really—asked the captain of HMS Fortitude as they stood on the quarterdeck, admiring the view of the Rocky Main as the ship carefully picked its way through the boulder-islands.

  Weatherby smiled at the boy, remembering the curiosity of his mother, so many years ago. “I cannot say what is typical or not, Philip. You already know more of alchemy than I’ve the patience or ability to learn,” the captain replied. “Perhaps Dr. Hawkins might oblige you with an answer.”

  The boy looked up at Weatherby and gave a bemused smile, quite similar to the one his mother often wore. “Dr. Hawkins is often busy with his duties, sir. I don’t think he particularly likes company, nor many questions.”

  Weatherby barked a short laugh. “No, I dare say he does not. But he’s a good man. I’ll have him make time for your questions soon enough, Philip.”

  To be fair, Philip Thomas St. Germain was not ill-mannered, especially considering the typical curiosity and rambunctiousness of most 13-year-olds. Indeed, he seemed to have inherited the best of both his parents—his father’s self-possession and rigor and his mother’s compassion and gentle humor. The intellectual acuity and prowess, Weatherby reasoned, was a toss-up between the two, or perhaps even greater than the sum, which would be formidable indeed.

  As for the boy’s mother, Weatherby found himself intrigued and entranced all over again, despite his initial attempts at showing remove and resolve. It did not help, of course, that she was just as beautiful as he remembered, perhaps even more so. Gone were the last vestiges of adolescence, but otherwise the tide of time was forestalled in her face and form. Intellectually, Weatherby knew that the Count St. Germain had unlocked many secrets to longevity and health, and the hale man he had met in ’79 was, by then, well into his sixties but looked no more than forty. But to see Anne there, in the full flower of youthful womanhood . . . it was something for which he was wholly unprepared.

  Weatherby’s looking glass was somewhat less kind. The scar across his cheek—gained over Mars during those fateful days—never fully healed, and a life in service to His Majesty’s Navy had left a slightly crooked nose and a few more scars upon his weather-beaten face. Yet Weatherby liked to think that responsibility and command suited him well, and that his bearing had grown with his confidence. That is what his late wife, at least, told him, and he was more inclined to believe her now than when she was alive, may God rest her soul.

  “Good day, Captain,” Anne said as she climbed the stairs of the quarterdeck, her marine guard in tow. A formidable alchemist, yes, but she was still the only woman on a ship with six hundred men aboard, at least half of them pressed into service. Hence the armed escort. Ever mindful, Gar’uk appeared with a cup of tea in hand, which Anne accepted gratefully. The valet had been ordered to attend to the needs of Anne and Philip whenever possible—a charge he took so seriously that Weatherby had to remind the Venusian that the captain still needed a valet now and again.

  “Countess,” Weatherby said by way of greeting. “I trust you continue to find ways of passing the time?”

  “Your lodestones belowdecks are well ensorcelled, though a touch more elemental fire may be required once past Jupiter,” she said simply. “And it smells to High Heaven down there. How you put up with such rancid odors, I cannot say.”

  Weatherby’s smile was genuine; part of him worried the crew would begin to talk. “I shall communicate your recommendation to Dr. Hawkins when next he reports,” the captain said. “As for the odor, I’m sorry to say there’s little to be done for it.”

  Anne grimaced slightly. “I’m afraid I may have already offended Dr. Hawkins,” she said. “I tried to show him a few new procedures to improve upon the workings in his manuals, but I think I may have unduly upset him.”

  Weatherby could readily see the two clashing. While Anne looked merely twenty-five years old, she was in her late thirties, and her tongue was stayed for no man. And if that man was the overly sensitive ship’s alchemist . . . “I’m sure Dr. Hawkins will be quite fine. Eventually.”

  The two shared a secret smile. It was all too easy to pretend that the years were never spent away, though Weatherby knew that Anne was married now, and to the most renowned master of the mystic sciences in all Earth’s history. A ship’s captain was far less a prize than that.

  “You didn’t mention you had a daughter, Captain,” Anne said, with the barest hint of . . . something . . . in her voice, something Weatherby could not place. “I could not help but notice the portrait of her upon your table below. How old is she?”

  Weatherby felt color seep into his face. “Nearly ten years, now. Elizabeth. Her mother died in childb
irth,” he said quietly.

  Genuine concern and remorse appeared on Anne’s face. “I’m sorry, Tom. I didn’t mean to pry.”

  “Not at all, Lady Anne,” he said, tempering his mood with a small smile. “Elizabeth is my raison d’etre. I had hoped to see her when the prizes were returned to Portsmouth. She is . . . well, we all dote upon our children, I suppose. But she is frighteningly intelligent, and fully of questions. I cannot help but be reminded of . . .”

  He stopped, catching himself staring into Anne’s eyes a bit longer than was entirely appropriate. The fact that she met his gaze for the same amount of time was . . . well, it was too much. He quickly looked down at his shoes, while she turned to look larboard at the boulder-islands of the Rocky Main.

  “Lights spotted!” came a cry from the top of the mainmast. “Two sets, one larboard, one starboard!”

  Never was a sighting so welcome as in that wholly uncomfortable moment. Weatherby immediately drew his glass and raised it. There . . . along the boulder islands massed to the left, was a blinking light. He swiveled right . . . and saw a light blinking in response.

  A code.

  “Beat to quarters! All hands, prepare for battle!” Weatherby shouted. “Lookouts to their stations right away! Identify those ships at once!”

  He then turned to Anne, who had immediately taken charge of Philip. “Anne, I need you to go . . .” He stopped, looked at her, and saw the gleam of readied anger in her eye. If it were any other woman and child, they would be sent to the bowels of the ship for relative safety. He could instantly see this would not stand. “Report to Dr. Hawkins and assist as you are able.”

  She flashed him a winning smile. “You’ve a fine memory, Captain. Come, Philip. We’ve work to do,” she said, handing her teacup to Gar’uk and hustling back down the stairs toward the ship’s forecastle, where the alchemy lab was housed.