by S. H. Jucha
“I’m well rested, sir,” Aurelia replied cheerfully. “I slept deeply. Perhaps, it’s my youth that allows quicker recharging.”
“Yeah, youth,” Darrin grumbled. He stood and stretched. The popping of a few vertebrae was audible, and Aurelia winced at the sounds. There was much she could do to help the crew with their mental strength, but nothing she could do to spare the spacers the accumulated wear and tear their bodies experienced from a life in space.
After a meal and a rotation at the scarcely private and extremely utilitarian wash basin and toilet, Darrin assigned responsibilities for the day’s outing. Many of the crew would remain close to the shelter and complete its functionality. The rest would accompany Darrin to the crater’s edge.
Belinda and Aurelia suited up. They were the safety team for Darrin and three crew members, who exited the shelter with them. Outside, an engineer, Tully, climbed into the piloting seat of the rover. Darrin sat up front with him, and two techs climbed into the rear seats.
Aurelia stared at Darrin in confusion when she noticed the seats were taken.
“Youth can walk,” Darrin replied on open channel, and Tully started the rover forward.
“Don’t you dare, Rules,” Belinda warned Aurelia on a private channel. She had implemented the secondary channel after she realized that Aurelia wasn’t sufficiently versed in multiple channel communication.
Belinda spotted the flash of Aurelia’s evil grin, which she could see through the girl’s faceplate.
“It was only a thought, Belinda,” Aurelia replied over the private channel.
“Keep it that way, Rules,” Belinda reprimanded, but she couldn’t help the smile that tweaked a corner of her mouth, and Aurelia’s grin broadened.
The two women bounded after the rover, quickly catching up to it in the low gravity. Aurelia couldn’t resist sailing about 10 meters past it, expecting the inevitable call from Darrin.
“Stay with the rover, Rules,” Darrin sent on the open channel.
“Sorry, sir,” Aurelia replied, halting her forward progress. “My youth got carried away.”
The crew chuckled, and Tully commented, “Got you on the nose on that one, sir,” and laughed at his own joke.
“Fine, Rules,” Darrin grumbled, asking, “Truce?”
“Of course, sir, I serve to please,” Aurelia replied sweetly.
When everyone around Darrin broke into laughter, he replied, “That will teach me not to jest with teenagers.”
Aurelia’s pleasure wafted through the crew, but it was interrupted when Belinda sent her a message to focus.
Tully selected his private channel with Darrin. “You ever felt anything like that?”
“No, never have, but it’s not the right time for it. I think Belinda is keeping Rules on a short safety line. Did you notice how quickly it switched off?”
“Unfortunately, I did,” complained Tully.
Hundreds of meters farther on, Tully brought the rover to a halt. He was able to triangulate his position via signals from the shelter and the Annie, which was holding station over the crater, while keeping pace with Triton’s orbit around Pyre.
“Everyone stay put,” Darrin ordered, climbing out of the rover. A tech handed him what looked like a cumbersome walking stick, but it was a sounding device with a sophisticated microsensor that relayed its findings to Darrin’s helmet. He took a few steps forward, activated the device, tapped it on the surface, and repeated the process, as he approached the crater’s edge.
Aurelia glanced at Belinda, who told her that Darrin was testing the structure for soundness. “Sometimes craters like this have soft edges, because of the force of the impact from whatever caused it,” Belinda explained.
“Yes, I can see that it would be the height of rudeness to have us and the rover perched at the edge of the crater when it crumbles,” Aurelia replied.
Belinda picked up the reactions of the two techs, who were silently snorkeling. “You two are eavesdropping,” Belinda scolded. “Are both of you looking for reprimands in the log?”
“No, ma’am” chorused the techs.
“Bad techs,” Aurelia said. “No feel-good medicine for you two tonight.”
The meek apologies that came back from the techs had Belinda shaking her head. A reprimand from a second mate received the expected level of apology, but hearing they would lose Aurelia’s empathic administrations produced true disappointment.
“Tully, it’s safe to the edge,” Darrin called back.
The techs climbed out of the rover, and Belinda prevented Aurelia from walking forward by a hand on her forearm. Tully slowly advanced the rover, checking his equipment for microtremors, which might indicate the ground shifting.
Darrin held his hand up when Tully reached the crater’s edge. “Did you record anything?” Darrin asked.
“Nothing,” Tully replied. “It’s solid. What kind of impact crater is this?”
“Take a look for yourself,” Darrin replied. “Come on up, crew,” he added.
Aurelia started to launch herself forward, but the hand on her arm held her.
“Hook on, spacer,” Belinda ordered, and Aurelia’s training kicked in.
“Latched on,” Aurelia replied, after spooling off a couple of meters of safety line and linking to an eye on Belinda’s belt. Belatedly, she noticed that the techs had already linked their safety lines, and she flashed her chagrin at Belinda.
“You’ll learn, spacer, if you live long enough,” Belinda replied. It was her incessantly repeated warning during training.
“I was looking at the cam shots from the Annie last evening before beddy-bye time,” Tully remarked. “Kind of an odd formation for an impact crater. Where’s the residue lip around the rim? This one has a rim that meets even with the surface.”
“Yeah, I noticed that too,” Darrin replied. “And look down at the crater’s inner edges. They’re jagged, heavily undercut in places.”
Tully had linked his safety line with Darrin, and he carefully peered over the edge. “Well, if nothing else, we’ll be able to easily obtain core samples.”
“I want to look,” Aurelia sent on the private channel to Belinda. When she received approval, she edged next to the crater’s lip. Her boot struck a small piece of stone, and it flew over the edge. The depth and breadth of the enormous hole sent Aurelia’s senses swirling, and she instinctively grabbed for the safety line with one hand, but Belinda was already pulling her away from the edge.
“Stare at the rover, spacer,” Belinda ordered.
Despite Aurelia’s dubiousness about the strange request, she focused on the parts of the rover, one at a time, and slowly her equilibrium was restored.
“Space can create odd sensations,” Belinda said, when she saw Aurelia straighten up and look her way. “You have to know what challenges you and how to combat those sensations before you succumb.”
“How’s our newbie?” Darrin asked over a private channel with Belinda.
“Had her first experience of space vertigo but came through it quickly,” Belinda replied.
“Good to know,” Darrin replied. Then on the open channel he directed the crew to ready the rover.
Tully hustled to the vehicle, his safety line playing out. He lowered the telescoping arm that was mounted on the rover’s forward structure and released the tethering lines from the rear.
“Time to go to work, newbie,” Belinda ordered.
Aurelia followed her to the rover’s rear. Belinda picked up what looked like a heavy metal stake with a bulging head and which was connected via cable to the rover. Aurelia picked up the other one and followed Belinda. When the cable came up short, Belinda planted her stake in Triton’s surface. She directed Aurelia to step about 3 meters away and do the same. Then Belinda ordered Aurelia to step back, and she sent a signal to the stakes.
The only effect that Aurelia saw was that the heads of the stakes popped off. But the shafts of the stakes had elongated, driving deep into the surface crust.
>
The techs worked to ease Darrin into a harness sling from the cable end of the rover’s arm. Once he was firmly seated, they released his safety line to Tully. The techs loaded a bag on the arm. It hung on the end of a thinner second cable and carried a load of sampling tubes. Darrin checked the snugness of the harness fit and gave Tully a thumbs-up.
Meanwhile, Belinda pointed at the stakes and said, “Rules, your job is to stare at those anchors.”
“Stare at them?” Aurelia questioned.
“Yes, if they so much as twitch, you let me know immediately.”
“Twitch?” Aurelia asked, holding up gloved hands about 6 centimeters apart.
“Twitch,” Belinda repeated, but her gloved hands were flat together.
“Aye, no twitching allowed,” Aurelia affirmed.
Tully had joined Darrin at the crater’s edge. Belinda took Tully’s seat behind the guide console. A tech took the seat beside her to handle the arm and the twin cable winches. The second tech supported Darrin and Tully for the drop.
“Nose, you sure you don’t want me to do this?” Tully asked for a final time.
“Tully, I’m not missing out on the opportunity to be the first Pyrean to investigate the mysterious Triton crater,” Darrin replied.
“You know the captain’s not going to like this.”
“And the captain can strip hide off my butt, but it’ll be afterwards. Ready to lower,” Darrin said, a huge grin on his face. Pyreans had discussed Triton’s crater for generations, and Darrin knew he’d always carry the honor of being the first human to descend into the cavernous hole. Slightly above him and to his right dangled the core sampler. To his left and lower rested the bag of sampling tubes.
Guided by Darrin’s directions, the tech let out the cables, lowering the first mate over the edge. During the next three hours, Darrin roamed the face of the crater. He’d stop at a mineral deposit that caught his eye, often tapping at it with a small hammer. If it interested him, he’d load a tube into the core sampler and fire the recoilless, pneumatic device. Then place the sample into the bag. Its top end was now red, which differentiated the filled units from the empty, green-ended ones.
Each sampling tube was encoded by Darrin’s device with its location within the crater wall, which allowed the assay engineer to build an image of potential, high-value, mineral deposits.
“Time,” Tully called over the comm.
Darrin checked the chronometer in his helmet’s heads-up display, surprised to find the time had passed so quickly, but then it always did when he was prospecting. His air tank was at 25 percent, and it was right for Tully to call a halt to the day’s efforts.
The first mate lived for the emotional high that accompanied incredible strikes, and the coin that followed was always a pleasure too. This time around, Darrin was denied the euphoria he’d hoped to feel. There were definitely some attractive veins, but they were small. Nothing in his thirty-two core samples screamed rich deposit.
The tech handling the winch slowly hauled Darrin and the sampling tubes up, until the first mate dangled above the edge. Then he raised the arm and lowered Darrin onto the moon’s surface. Tully hooked his safety line to Darrin before he helped him out of the harness. The second tech collected the bag of core samples and stowed them in the back of the rover.
Belinda climbed out of her seat and hurried back to the stakes. She smacked the top of one unit with a hammer and then the other, triggering the shafts’ retractions. When she grabbed one stake to yank it free, Aurelia did the same, but while the second mate was careful to balance herself when the unit pulled free, Aurelia did not.
“Have to be careful of the low gravity, Rules,” Belinda sent, when she saw her trainee land on her rear end, holding the stake in front of her. She considered hurrying over to help Aurelia up, but the lesson was too important. If a spacer was on her back in a vac suit, even in low gravity, she had to be able to right herself and get to her feet. She watched Aurelia use the stake to strike the ground to her side, which gave her leverage to roll over. Then she used the stake as a crutch to gain her footing.
“Well done, newbie,” Darrin commented, before he climbed into the rover. “Hopefully your youthful energy hasn’t entirely been consumed. Back to the shelter, everyone.”
Aurelia was tempted to race the rover but felt she’d warranted a little too much attention from the first mate. It seemed more appropriate to show Darrin that she could act responsibly.
The entire survey team was finished for the day and went about their chores. After Darrin charged his vac suit tanks and ate a meal, he took food and drink over to Oscar, the assay engineer, who’d immediately dived into the analysis of the core samples.
“Seeing anything interesting?” Darrin asked.
Oscar squeezed some juice into his mouth from a tube and indicated his small screen. “Definitely some stuff here, but the ratios are pretty low. Most of this is common aggregate.”
“I was afraid of that,” Darrin said, patting Oscar’s shoulder. He sat heavily on his cot and unlocked his comm unit with a thumb and called the ship.
Yohlin took Darrin’s call in her cabin and was disappointed to hear her first mate’s report.
“Captain, I have this feeling there’s coin waiting for us down here. We just haven’t found it yet. I can tell you one really odd thing about our exploration today. This isn’t an impact crater. It has none of the features we’d expect from two bodies colliding.”
“If not an impact, then what do you think happened?” Yohlin asked.
“It’s difficult to say, Captain.”
“Nose, you’re not a shy man and have never withheld your opinion. What’s wrong?”
Darrin glanced around at the faces that had focused on him. In a survey shelter, there wasn’t any privacy. “Let’s say, I was on Pyre, Captain, and, let’s say, I was looking at a giant crater and assessing its origin. Under those specific conditions, I’d come to the conclusion that we were looking at a giant hole made by a detonation.”
“A detonation on a dead moon?” Yohlin repeated, incredulous.
“Captain, I offered a hypothetical comparison to a crater on a planet. That similar conditions exist on Triton have to be merely a strange and extremely unnerving coincidence.” Eyes from those surrounding Darrin stared at him intensely. None of his crew liked the sound of concern they heard in his voice. Rules will have her work cut out for her tonight, Darrin thought.
“We need to put the mystery aside, Darrin,” Yohlin replied.
“Yeah, I know, Captain. It’s grid search time. We’ll start tomorrow. Layout a grid slice away from today’s test point and see if it can direct me toward larger deposits.”
“Don’t sound so disappointed, Darrin. With luck, you won’t have to search the entire moon.” Yohlin chuckled, as she closed her comm unit.
-17-
Rumors
It was Toby who inadvertently started the rumor that led to the exposure of the governor’s secret to Pyrean society. His intentions were innocent, merely one good heart defending a momentary befriending.
Toby had become famous, as the boy who met the notorious downside murderer and lived to speak of it. Leg wrapped in bandages from his BRC surgery and seated in his wheelchair, once again he’d been surrounded by other youths, wishing to hear of his incredible encounter.
“How’d the BRC surgery go?” one boy had asked.
“Real good,” Toby enthused. “The medics say it’s taking well. Looks like I’m going to be walking again soon.”
“You met the murderer, right?” a girl asked. “People say you were lucky to survive. Others say that you played freefall with her. Which is true?”
“Aurelia helped me out to a terminal arm, and I taught her freefall,” Toby replied.
“Then it’s true. She was a downsider,” another boy interjected.
“Oh, no doubt about it,” Toby replied. “The girl didn’t have a clue what to do in zero gravity. It was kind of funny, at first, b
ut she caught on pretty quickly.”
“How come you think security can’t find her?” a second girl, Pena, asked.
Toby swallowed. Pena was the girl he liked. She was a year older than him and five inches taller, but, to Toby, none of that mattered. “Been thinking about that,” he said, dropping his voice, as if it was a secret. Pena leaned in to listen, and Toby’s heart thumped. “What if Aurelia isn’t a normal?” he whispered to her.
“How can that be?” Pena objected, swatting Toby’s arm.
“Think about it,” Toby replied.
The small group hung on Toby’s next words. The idea that the girl was a sensitive hadn’t occurred to them or their parents.
“Security hasn’t reported any breach of the airlocks on the station or the terminal arms, right? So, she didn’t step out into vacuum. And how long has any fugitive managed to evade security?”
“There was that guy last year who hid out in the air vents intersecting the maintenance corridors,” a boy volunteered.
“But he only lasted five days before security caught him,” the first girl argued.
“So how has Aurelia evaded security for weeks?” Toby asked. “I think she’s an empath, and she’s convinced someone to protect her.”
“Whoa,” one boy said on an exhale of breath. The others were too stunned to reply.
Toby’s comm unit chimed, and he glanced at the message. “Got to go. Mom’s got dinner ready.”
Two boys and a girl gave quick waves and stepped away to give Toby room to maneuver his chair. Pena leaned in and kissed his cheek. “Hope your BRC replacement continues to take,” she whispered.
Toby flew home, ignoring the shouts of irate stationers and imagining Pena kissing his cheek again.
It was a brief conversation, but the ramifications of the teens’ conversation were tremendous. The foursome, who were with Toby that day, told their parents and friends about the possibility that Aurelia was an empath. The rumors might have never gained traction, except, with every breath that repeated the idea, Toby’s name was mentioned.