Exiled to the Stars

by Zellmann, William

  "Doctor Jon Gutmann has completed all requirements for a limited certification for medical radioactives only. The only living colonist previously qualified to handle nuclear fuel is Lars Norstrom. However, his certification has long expired, of course."

  "Please ask Lars Norstrom to visit me, if you will. What is his present position?"

  "Lars Norstrom is currently unassigned. He was injured in an industrial accident, and is listed as 'medically retired'."

  Ken exchanged glances with Vlad. "That could be trouble. If he's badly crippled, we might have to train someone from scratch. It could set our schedule back months." He sighed. "Oh, well, we can only do the possible. Evelyn, Doctor Vladimir Renko is authorized to requisition fuel pellets and authorize fueling of the, uh, JZE-101, wasn't it?" At Vlad's nod he continued. "Oh, and that other gadget, too. What is the uh, R65C, or whatever it was?

  The computer's voice turned formal again. "The R65C is a remotely operated ground-penetrating metals detector. The largest colony airship was actually designed to house the main unit. This unit deploys low-flying drone probes equipped with ground-penetrating beams programmed to detect metal ores. Due to the power required to obtain sufficient penetration, and to operate the probes and its onboard computer, the R65C is powered by the same fuel pellets as the JZE-101 Contact Vehicle."

  Ken looked pleased. "Now that sounds useful. All right. I'd like to see Lars Norstrom as soon as possible. I know him, of course, but not well, and I didn't know he'd been injured." His voice turned brisk. "Doctor Vladimir Renko, any personnel he designates, and all personnel with the designation 'Explorer' are authorized to access all available training and maintenance materials on the JZE-101 and R65C."

  Vlad and Ken began a 'do you remember when' reminiscence of the scandal, and an excited Ron made his escape as soon as possible, so he and the other Explorers could review the lading lists.

  "Look at this!" Ron cried. "Seventy-five Packs, Exploration. I wonder what's in an 'Exploration Pack'."

  "I'm more interested in the forty-five 'Cameras, Survey, High Resolution'," put in Tran Vanh.

  "I'm interested in a lot of this stuff," added Vito Carelli. "How soon can we get our hands on it?"

  Denis Chu looked at Ron. "Y'know, Creding, it's just barely possible that you're not quite as dumb as you look."

  Tran snorted. "Nobody could be as dumb as Creding looks!"

  "Oh, I don't know," Elaine Renko replied, ruffling Ron's hair. "Give him a bath once a month or so, and an occasional haircut, and he's almost presentable. Or he will be, once I teach him to quit dragging his knuckles on the ground when he walks."

  "If you're all quite finished expressing your jealousy," Ron said with massive dignity, "I'm going to explore compartment 7-3071. Those of you who grovel and beg appropriately may be permitted to accompany me."

  His statement was greeted with hoots and shouts of laughter, and the group set off eagerly for the ship.

  Compartment 7-3071 was an echoing hall that had contained large agricultural machinery, but now contained only a few scattered pieces still in their protective cocoons, and a few pieces of wood and plas scrap left over from the unpacking of other equipment. The compartment was high and large, but comparatively dimly lit. Two inconspicuous doors simply labeled "7-3071A" and "7-3071B" occupied intersecting walls of the larger compartment. Ron looked at the thick coating of dust on the floor of the compartment. No one had approached those doors in a long time, perhaps not since the ship was loaded at L-4.

  It turned out that the two compartments were actually one huge one, divided by a large collapsible wall that folded itself silently into the ceiling of the compartment when Ron pressed a large button. They discussed the purpose of the dividing wall, but nobody's theory seemed persuasive, and they were interested in more exciting things.

  The now-huge compartment was filled with shelves, bins, and racks in long rows, with only narrow walkways between them. At one end, a small desk faced a terminal screen mounted on the wall. Next to the screen, on the bare wall, someone had scrawled "GOOD LUCK AND GOOD HUNTING!" in large letters using some sort of black marker.

  Ron gestured at the sign. "Maybe everybody on Earth wasn't trying to throw us away," he said with a laugh, but still, the crude sign touched him. For his whole life he had been taught that Earth was EarthGov, and that EarthGov was a villain. Whoever scrawled that sign worked for EarthGov, helped build or stock the means of their exile; but he (or she) had still wished them well.

  Clearly, EarthGov had never expected the colonists to huddle in a group and ignore their surroundings for twenty-three years. The equipment and supplies here were clearly designed to support large-scale exploration for a long period.

  Ron finally located the bin containing 'Packs, Exploration'. As he'd hoped, the bin was full of pre-packed, lightweight, framed packs. He pulled one from the bin and began inventorying its contents, verifying it against the list on his tablet.

  The Explorers had been making their own packs, based on designs in the computer's files. But these were something special. Ron marveled at the lightness of the empty pack, despite its full frame. Frame and pack together weighed less than a kilo, and fully loaded, weighed only about eight kilos, Ron estimated. When he slipped it on, he could feel the padding in the shoulder, back and hip supports mold themselves to his body. Remembering the chafing soreness of their improvised packs on the expedition to the sea, he could only shake his head.

  But the pack itself was only a small part of the wonder of this pack. It contained over fifty items, ranging from a small stove to a sleeping bag that compressed into a cylinder 10 cems in diameter and 15 long, to night vision glasses, to a small tent with a tiny built-in air compressor to inflate it, to binoculars attached to the side of the bag. By the time he finished marveling over each item, he was wondering what else an explorer could possibly need.

  Elaine snorted. "I can think of plenty of stuff. How about food? Weapons? Cameras, anyone?"

  Ron flushed. "Okay, you've made your point; but there are food concentrates in there, you know."

  Elaine's face was suddenly wreathed in a smile whose excitement mirrored his own. "I know. I wish we'd had these on our trip!"

  The vaunted JZE-101 occupied three small crates in a corner of the room. Ron knew that Doctor Renko would be excited, but the Explorers had hundreds of items that interested them more. He decided to get the thing into the hands of the black roboticist at the first opportunity. After all, their families were close. It wouldn’t hurt a bit to make a few points with Elaine's father.

  Tran Vanh found his cameras, dozens of them. Some were designed to be hand held, some to be mounted on the colony's aircraft, and some were designed to resemble birds. These were obviously designed for close aerial surveillance. Still others were designed to attach to other equipment, for the recording of findings.

  The list went on and on. On the second day of their exploration of the compartments, Raj Darpee called Ron from the equipment compartment's terminal desk. "Hey, Creding! I think you'd better call in Frank Wong. And Michiko, of course. There's a whole sublist devoted to test equipment, and they'll never forgive you if you don't call them in right away."

  "Not just Frank and Michiko," Denis Chu added over the tablet 'net. "I've got several dozen telescopes, here. I think if you don't call in all the scientists, you're going to touch off a war!"

  Ron called Frank on his tablet. "Hey Frank," he began. "Do you know what 'Christmas' is?"

  Frank frowned, obviously surprised by the question. "Some kind of EarthGov religious festival, isn't it?"

  "Yeah," Ron replied, "and it's characterized by the giving of gifts. Round up all your science zerbs and come over to the ship. Compartment 7-3071A. It's Christmas!"

  "I'm busy," Frank protested. "We all are. Just because you Explorers are unemployed…"

  "Believe me, Frank," Ron interrupted, his tone turning serious, "no matter what you're doing, you're not too busy for this. And neither are Michiko,
Angel and Wen Ho. All we ever hear from you farbs are complaints about the lack of equipment. Well, you're going to want to get down on your knees and beg to get some of the stuff in this compartment."

  Frank's eyebrows rose. "You found something? On the ship? We'll be there in half an hour!"

  They made it in twenty minutes. Having been on the first survey expedition, they 'oooh'ed and 'aaaah'ed appropriately at the things the Explorers had already dragged from the shelves. But when Raj took them to the terminal and called up the list of scientific equipment, their attention was rapt. "Telescopes!" shouted Angel, at the same moment Michiko shouted "Microscopes!" They nodded sheepishly to each other, then grinned and returned their attention to the list.

  Frank's reaction to the R65C was so enthusiastic as to be almost comical. He devoured the unit's operations manual before even searching out the machine itself, and began nagging Ken unmercifully until he got the Council to authorize installation of the machine on the largest airship. Even though the probes clamped to the airship's skin for easy launching, the main unit and the shielding for its fuel chamber seriously reduced the passenger capacity of the airship.

  "I wondered why they gave us three airships," Carlos Torres, the chief pilot commented. "Now I know. They expected the big one to be permanently full of this thing. Add a couple of operators and a few samples, and old 'Fatty', here will be full." He sighed. "So much for the romance of the skies. I'm going to be nothing but a truck driver!"

  Ken was right. They did spend days exploring the compartment and its contents. Contrary to actual events, EarthGov had expected that exploration would be a very high priority for the new colonists, a survival imperative, and they had not stinted on the supplies and equipment needed for it. In the end, it took more than a week for the Explorers and scientists to examine the contents of the two compartments that had been packed so long ago.

  Ron made sure that some of the first things removed from the compartments were the crates containing the JZE-101, which the Explorers hand-delivered to Vlad Renko. All had agreed that as the planet's foremost, and only, roboticist, Vlad was the person best qualified to examine the thing, and decide whether it would be of any value in current circumstances. Besides, he was Elaine's father, and already a central figure in the history of the colony.

  Vlad was almost pathetically grateful, and Elaine thought his eyes looked suspiciously wet as his hands caressed the still-sealed crates. He tried to protest that he didn’t have room to work in the Renkos' dome, but Susan waved off his feeble objection. Her own eyes were tearing at the obvious pleasure and excitement in Vlad's face, and she mouthed a silent 'thank you' to the rather embarrassed Explorers.

  ********

  The big man strode into Ken's office confidently, only a limp betraying his infirmity.

  "Hello, Lars," Ken greeted the man warmly. "Please sit down. I was sorry to hear about your accident."

  Lars Norstrom was over two meters tall, with broad shoulders and light brown hair. He towered over most of the colonists, but his ready smile and constant cheerfulness made it impossible to be intimidated by his hulking size.

  "Hi, Ken," Lars greeted him, a ham-sized hand extended in greeting. "I've been meaning to get over here to see you. I need you to help me escape the clutches of the med techs."

  Ken winced as he struggled to retrieve his hand from the big man's crushing grasp. He thought for a moment. "Y'know, I just might be able to help with that. Tell me about it."

  Lars shrugged. "Oh, we were working on a harvester. We were pulling the transfer case, and I saw it start to slip. I tried to get out from under before it fell, and I almost made it. The transfer case missed me, but the link bar slammed into my back.

  "I was paralyzed from the waist down for over a month, and the med techs said I'd probably never walk again. Well, as you can see, I'm walking, but it's no thanks to the med techs. They don't know how it happened. They said they couldn't regrow nerve tissue. Now they tell me it must be the symbiont." He shrugged again. "I don't really care. What I do care about is that they put me on this damned medical retirement, and that means I can't work. They won't unretire me, and I'm going nuts sitting on my butt."

  "Why won't they, ah, unretire you?"

  Lars shook his head. "You'll probably have to ask them, to get a straight answer. All they'll tell me is that they think the new nerve connections aren't as strong as the old ones were, and they don't want to chance further damage."

  Ken nodded. "Okay, I promise I'll look into it, Lars. I need you 'unretired' because we may need your expertise. Do you still remember anything you knew about handling radioactives?"

  Lars' smile faded to a quizzical expression. "Radioactives? Sure. I did it for almost twenty years on Earth. But we don't have any…" he stopped himself. "Well, I guess we do have some backup fusactors. Why? Is something wrong with the Cobb drive power after all these years?"

  Ken shook his head. "No, it's humming along fine, so far. But we've found some equipment we need for exploration that uses fuel pellets."

  Lars's smile widened, became enthusiastic. "Really? What size? What type? Do we have the handling equipment?"

  "I haven't the slightest idea. But it's been almost twenty-five years since you worked with radioactives. Do you think you can remember how to do it? Or maybe train a Planetborn to do it?"

  Lars snorted. "Of course I could do it. Give me a couple of weeks for refresher study, and I'll be able to do anything you need, including lighting off the fusactors. I'll even take on a Planetborn as an apprentice. If you can get the med techs to let me go!"

  "Lars Norstrom?" asked Dr. Bono, the senior Med Tech, "An interesting case. Let me guess. He wants you to get me to remove his 'medically retired' designator. You're about the only one he hasn't had try to pressure me."

  Ken smiled. "I've heard his side, Doctor. Now tell me yours."

  Dr. Bono shrugged. "His entire spinal cord was severed. Not bruised, not damaged, severed. The man should have been bedridden for the rest of his life. Nerve tissue doesn't regenerate; all we could do was jam the ends of the nerve bundle together and hope. Our scans show that the nerve endings have not rejoined. Somehow, we think the symbiont is functioning in place of his normal nervous system. I've been watching to see if he eventually loses that limp. I have a bet with Dr. Gutmann. Frankly, we have no idea how or why it is happening, and we are unwilling to take any chances. What if going back to work strains whatever it is the symbiont is using to restore lower body function? He could still end up spending the rest of his life helpless in bed." The doctor straightened. "I'm not willing to risk that."

  Ken frowned. "Well, he's willing, and Lars is one of those people who need to be active. You may prevent him becoming bedridden, only to see him suicide." He shook his head. "Look, Doctor. You know I'm not normally in the pressure business. I try to avoid it whenever possible. This time, I don't think it's possible. We need Lars, and we need him cleared to work.

  "Oh," he said with a dismissive wave as the doctor opened his mouth to speak. "I'm not talking about his old job in Machine Maintenance, or any other heavy work, for that matter. But on Earth, Lars was certified to handle radioactives, and we have some equipment we need very badly that is nuclear-powered.

  "Now, I've already gotten him to agree to take on a Planetborn apprentice, and I'm sure we can keep him away from any heavy work. We need the knowledge in his head and the skill in his hands, not the strength of his back. But we need that knowledge and those skills badly.

  "So," he finished, "I'm afraid I'm going to have to ask you to release Lars from medical retirement so he can help us with something only he can do."

  The Doctor's expression had turned sour and resentful, and Ken suppressed a sigh. That was the problem with using a position of authority to pressure people to do things unwillingly. The next time he needed the Doctor's cooperation, it would be harder to get, now.

  "All right, Administrator." Bono replied in a surly tone. "But there are conditions. Fir
st, you must appoint him an apprentice or assistant to handle any physical tasks required. Second, no matter what he says, Lars is not to lift more than five kilos under any circumstances – and it won't always be easy to stop him. Third, he is to report to the Clinic once a week so we can monitor developments. If you can accept those conditions, I'll cancel his medical retirement and place in him 'Light Duty' status."

  Ken nodded. "Thank you, Doctor," he said in his warmest tone. He relaxed into a smile. "I was afraid you'd insist on him working from a power chair."

  Some of the resentment faded from Bono's face. "Actually, Administrator, we suspect that light exercise might help the symbiont do…whatever it's doing." Suddenly the scowl was back in full force. "But I still disagree and disapprove, Administrator, and comply only under protest. I consider it an unacceptable risk. I hope whatever you need him for is worth that risk!" Bono cut the connection abruptly.

  Ken sighed at the blank screen. "So do I, Doctor, so do I." He liked Lars, and hated having to put him at risk like this, and he'd had to suppress a wince at Bono's angry formality in repeatedly referring to him by his title. But he'd had no choice. He made a mental note not to get sick for awhile.

  He called Lars. The man had obviously been awaiting his call, as he answered before his tablet could complete a single ring signal.

  "All right, Lars," he said with obvious reluctance. "Doctor Bono was not happy about it, but he has agreed to cancel your medical retirement and certify you for light duty."

  "That's great, Ken," the big man gushed. "I…"

  "Don't get too excited," Ken interrupted. "Doctor Bono set conditions, and I agree with them. First, you will have a Planetborn apprentice, as soon as I can find one. He, or she, will lift anything you need except a bulb of beer! If you even look like you're thinking of lifting something heavier than that, You'll be back on medical retirement so fast you'll leave a hole in the air!

  "You will also have a weekly appointment at the Clinic, so the Med Techs can keep a handle on your progress," Ken continued. He frowned. "I had to put pressure on a man I respect and one who is very important to the colony. So don't screw this up, or try to play games. Play it straight. This is too important to the colony."