Europa Contagion

by Nicholas Thorp

  Dimitri looked over at Bailey with a bit of a frown and said, “You always take your helmet off before you should, and you have the biggest grin every time you do.”

  “What can I say? I'm a bit of an adrenaline junky,” Bailey responded.

  Bailey wasn’t lying. From the time she was old enough to walk she had always loved the excitement of adventure. She had found out rather quickly that what she tended to think of as fun others thought of as dangerous. Much of her career had been traveling around the world studying its geology. That soon grew boring and she ended up on Earth’s moon, surveying the land. That too grew boring for her. It was no wonder she had immediately signed herself up for this mission. It was exactly the kind of thing that she couldn’t say ‘no’ to.

  Bailey and Dimitri were now in orbit around Ganymede. By waiting for the Seeker to be nearly above them and by launching along the same orbital line as the Seeker, both the Lander and the Seeker were now in the same orbital plane. Although close to the same orbit, it was not precisely the same orbit. It might seem that a straight shot from the ground to the Seeker would have been the fastest route. In fact, it would have been the fastest, but also the most dangerous. It was much safer to put the two vessels on nearly identical orbits first, and then make some minor burns to put them on an intercept course.

  For about twenty-five minutes they stayed in their seats monitoring their surroundings and making sure that nothing was amiss. Finally, they found themselves at the vertex of their orbit; the most elongated part of their path.

  “Okay, time to burn in prograde,” Bailey said.

  “Roger, ready to burn prograde,” Dimitri responded.

  The burn prograde was done in the direction of motion and was a minor one, slightly changing their orbit from an elliptical shape to a more circular one around Ganymede. More importantly, it put them on a direct intercept course with the Seeker. In only a few orbits they would be within visual distance. As the rocket burned, Bailey's helmet, which had been floating in place since she left it, appeared to move to the back of the lander. This was a bit of an optical illusion, as an observer watching the lander from afar would see the helmet was staying in place and the rocket was the object moving around the helmet. After a brief period, the rockets stopped again.

  “Second burn was good. We’ll be in contact in ninety minutes,” Dimitri reported.

  At this point, Bailey removed her straps and began to float away from her seat. She placed her hands on the head of her seat and pulled herself around the chair and flung herself gently toward one of the windows. Now in the weightless environment, she flew to the window. The view was - as always - incredible to her. It would be the last time she would see the surface of Ganymede this close, and she wanted to make sure to bask in its beauty one last time before leaving. They would be the only two people to have walked and looked directly upon the surface of Ganymede.

  “We have visual contact,” Dimitri said.

  It surprised Bailey just how quickly the time passed, but now she had work to do. She was in charge of the approach to the Seeker. She pushed herself away from the window and floated back to her chair. She pulled her straps on and tightened them down to ensure that she was firmly against the seat. Taking the two joysticks in her hands and placing her feet on the support pedals, she began the precise task of approaching the station. Bailey was always able to push aside her instincts when the time came. She tended to do things quickly, but in a case like this doing something quickly was a bad idea. If she approached too quickly, she could run into the Seeker and cause serious damage to both vehicles.

  Slowly but surely the Lander and the Seeker moved closer together. The initial approach wasn’t the difficult part, though; the computers handled that part while Bailey monitored them closely. It was the actual process of connecting the two ships safely, the last few meters, that required her total concentration. In this final phase of docking, Bailey would be in command of the Lander and the computers were only a backup. Despite the greater precision computers offered, virtually all astronauts preferred a manual approach to docking.

  Soon they were close enough that Bailey had to switch her view from a more general visual approach to a more detailed one. On her monitor, she could see exactly where she needed to be and at what speed. The computer displayed all the necessary and important information, including several white dots that she had to keep aligned perfectly. The process was very slow, but she kept the lander on the correct path the entire time. The two ships got closer and closer until finally, there was a loud thunk. They had successfully docked with the Seeker.

  Just as before, Bailey unstrapped herself. This time Dimitri unstrapped himself too and began to take off his helmet. Now that they were docked, there wasn’t much point in staying seated. There was still a period where they had to wait to make sure nothing had gone wrong with the docking and the mating collars were properly sealed. The docking ports were, after all, one of the most dangerous parts of any ship in space. Any piece of equipment used often enough wore down. The docking station was designed for many uses, but it was also a potential opening to the vacuum of space.

  No disaster struck, though, as the latch opened to the Seeker. Li had opened the door and was waiting for them, floating in the adjacent room.

  “Nice to see you guys. Hope the launch up here was smooth,” Li said as Bailey and Dimitri exited the lander.

  “It’s nice to be back and out of the lander. We didn’t get nearly enough surface time to make up for how cramped that thing is,” Bailey said.

  “I can’t believe I’m saying this, but I kind of miss being on Europa. The Habitat is so nice,” Dimitri said.

  “Well,” Li responded. “We still have some more research to do while in orbit. There is a window of opportunity to leave early if we finish early. If not, we’ll have to wait for the scheduled departure time.”

  “I think I’m going to go and try to get some sleep. Bailey’s right, that lander is really tight,” Dimitri said as he pulled himself past Bailey and Li deeper into the Seeker. Soon, they would be done exploring this lifeless moon and would join their compatriots on Europa: the second place in the solar system that harbored life.

  SEVEN

  Sample

  Kato had not been particularly happy to learn of the demise of Big Bertha. When he returned to the control room to see a black screen and learned what Sonya had done, he had closed his eyes, shook his head, and walked out of the room. He knew that arguing about what happened wouldn’t make progress, so he decided to go try to cool down. As Kato left the docking bay, he bumped into Felix and Navya who were coming in to see if anything new had happened. It was apparent to them that something had happened.

  “Kato, what happened?” Navya said as she turned around and went after him. Navya knew that when Kato got upset he usually wanted to vent his frustration verbally. A decade-long mission with eight people in a small environment together would often result in some kind of friction, and this was not the first time she had helped someone on the crew past their problems.

  Still in the docking bay, Sonya looked over at Felix with a scrunched-up face, obviously trying to think of what she should do.

  Felix saw the black screen and had seen Kato look quite upset. He put two and two together quickly. He looked at her and raised his eyebrow.

  “I know! Don’t give me that look! I shouldn’t have done that,” Sonya said to a very disapproving look from Felix. “But I needed to get a better reading! I was hardly getting anything good with it sitting there! I mean, maybe we can fix this. Maybe we could retract the tether or something?”

  Felix was a natural and gifted problem-solver. He put his hand on his chin and thought about it for a moment, then shook his head at the idea. The cable wasn’t designed with that in mind. It was there to supply power to the drone, not yank it out of some hole in the ocean.

  “Yeah, you’re right, that’s a bad idea,” Sonya said, interpreting Felix’s body language.

&
nbsp; Felix stood there, thinking, while Sonya paced around the room.

  “Well, what else can we do?” Sonya asked, exasperated.

  “Hmm…” Felix began, and paused for a moment, still thinking. Then he finished his thought, “Maybe Little Missy.”

  Felix knew both drones very well. The radiation was a problem in this area, but that didn’t mean they couldn’t do anything. Both Big Bertha and Little Missy were lightly shielded from radiation. He could take some shielding that wasn’t being used on one of their POWER units and use that.

  Felix and Kato had used the POWER modifications that fit over their EMUs when unloading Big Bertha at Outpost One. The POWER modifications were made from a combination of polyethylene and pockets of water, and had special dosimeters built into them to measure very high amounts of radiation. The purpose of these modifications was to reduce the amount of radiation a human would receive, which was a recurring problem on the surface of Europa. Under normal conditions, the average person would receive about 0.62 rem per year on the surface of the earth. The conditions on Europa were anything but normal. Here, you could receive that same amount in under an hour if you didn’t protect yourself. If you continued to not protect yourself, in one day you’d increase your mortality rate to greater than 50%.

  Although it was tempting to borrow the POWER mods from their suits, he didn’t want to place anyone in a situation where they might lack for something so vital. He thought for a moment about where to get extra shielding. Then, he came up with an idea.

  He could take one of the construction bots that constructed the Habitat and Outpost One and remove the shielding from it, adding the extra shielding to Little Missy. He also thought about the tether. Just because they couldn’t retract the tether didn’t mean they couldn’t use that to their advantage. He could use the sample scooper on Little Missy to hook the cable, or more probably Big Bertha if he could get it close enough, and pull Big Bertha out from close-range, reducing the strain on the tether. If they were lucky, Big Bertha would come back to life once it was brought out far enough away from the radiation. Excited to see his plan in action, he got to work right away.

  Felix ordered one of the construction bots to come to the hangar. Once it was safely in the hangar and the area was pressurized, Felix enlisted Kato’s help and they worked to strip the construction bot, taking the valuable shielding that protected it as it worked on the surface. Without it, the drone would eventually run into the same problem that Big Bertha did. But, for now, that was not a concern.

  Finally, the men took the shielding and attached it to Little Missy. They weren’t sure how much to add, so they took some guesses at the levels of radiation and put a modest amount on Little Missy. Felix didn’t want to overburden the smaller drone. It had only been designed for exploration under the ocean with limited to no exposure to radiation. The added mass would still work, as Little Missy had a surprisingly high buoyancy force if it needed it. However, he didn’t want to make a similar mistake as with Big Bertha and lose their only functioning drone.

  Felix installed the RIID from the Nomad back into Little Missy. Assuming they got the drones back, they could see the exact amount of radiation and add the proper amount of shielding to both Big Bertha and Little Missy if they decided to continue searching the area.

  This time Navya helped Felix and Kato move Little Missy from the docking bay to the Nomad. Little Missy was quite a bit smaller, which made it easier to move around. After loading it into the Nomad, Navya and Felix took off for Outpost One to once again load up yet another drone. The long trips out to Outpost One were becoming routine.

  ----------

  The outer surface of the tether attached to Big Bertha was very smooth, and hooking it with Little Missy’s sample scoop wasn’t working. They would have to see if they could get right next to Big Bertha.

  Using the tether as a guide, Little Missy moved and Kato gave the command to stop at the entrance of the cave.

  There it was, right on their screens: the lost Big Bertha. Despite the extra shielding, it was difficult to see. The interference on the camera was tremendous, but the extra shielding had done the trick and gotten them just as far as Big Bertha had gone.

  Kato carefully hooked Big Bertha’s body with Little Missy and started to pull back. Inch by inch, Big Bertha was being extricated.

  Big Bertha suddenly perked up. Being removed even a few meters from the heavily irradiated area had brought it back to life. The computer screen for Big Bertha also came back up, and Kato was able to once again control it. He ordered Big Bertha to slowly back away from the cave. As he did so, a welcome surprise occurred: the screen for Little Missy suddenly became more clear.

  “The transceiver is still in Big Bertha. With the extra shielding on Little Missy and now the transceiver close by, Little Missy is getting a much stronger signal,” Sonya explained. With both drones pulled back it was now possible to see what they had been looking at.

  Alice had been right the first time she saw it: it was the entrance to a cave. The cave didn’t look as they had imagined an underwater cave on Europa might look. It seemed there was fresh-looking debris everywhere.

  “The cave must have opened because of the earthquake,” Alice said.

  Now that Little Missy was giving much clearer signals back to the crew, they agreed to send Little Missy inside the cave. The cave itself was not particularly unique. It was just wide enough at the entrance for Big Bertha, but beyond that, the walls closed in. Little Missy was small enough to navigate in the closeted space. As Little Missy worked its way around the many turns and curves, the interference once again began to get worse.

  Finally, Kato decided to go no farther, or risk losing another drone. If they wanted to travel any deeper into the cave, they would need to shield the drones even more.

  “Hey, what’s that?” Navya asked, peering at the screen.

  There didn’t appear to be anything they could make out, but Kato had Little Missy take its scooper arm and extract a large sample from the floor of the cave. They would only know what the sample contained by inspecting it in their lab.

  With the sample taken, Kato reversed Little Missy's movements. With a simple command, the computer took Little Missy and unwound its way out of the tunnels exactly the way it had entered until it was back next to Big Bertha and giving the clearer picture they had seen before.

  Felix, Alice, and Sonya had already donned their EMUs, hopped in the Nomad, and were on their way to Outpost One. They were all eager to see what the sample would contain.

  ----------

  Felix, Alice, and Sonya stood in complete silence as the boring cylinder slowly ascended into its top-most resting position. The only sound that could be heard was the breathing of three people, picked up by three microphones, one in each helmet, and amplified in each earpiece.

  Despite the tension in the room, no one could physically see the cylinder as it moved; the only indication that anything was happening at all was a flickering yellow light near the handle of the machine. As the cylinder in the machine reached the top, a mechanism slid in and locked the cylinder in its place. The light changed from its blinking yellow to a solid green.

  Even though the first phase of the transportation process was complete, no one moved. Three pairs of eyes were transfixed on the handle that would open the latch to the cylinder. The machine itself wasn’t particularly interesting to look at. Other than a panel of buttons, the only noticeable feature was a large horizontal handle. It had been designed this way, with only smooth corners and edges in mind. Despite its appearance, however, everything about it was expensive: the materials, the cost of transportation, the years of planning, and human intellect put behind getting this machine in this particular location for this particular job. Everything about the machine and the mission was the most expensive endeavor humans had ever assembled and set forth to accomplish.

  The three people were very anxious to see what the sample contained. It had been quite a struggle
to get it.

  Alice was the first to move. She slowly stepped toward the machine and carefully raised her arm, wrapped her glove around the handle, rotated it ninety degrees clockwise until she felt a thud, and pulled. The latch swung outward on perfectly oiled ball bearings without protest, revealing the cylinder. With the precision that one gets from decades of training and experience in moving precious samples from one part of a lab to another, Alice and Sonya removed the heavy and shielded cylinder from the machine and placed it in its designated transportation chamber. Both knew how careful they had to be, as the cylinder could hold an unbelievably important sample. They took their time for each step of the process. Although the room was pressurized, they spared no chances and wore full spacesuits. The smallest mistake could lead to a tear in the suit, which could contaminate the sample, or in the worst-case scenario, lead to death.

  Next, the chamber with the sample was placed in a large cart. Closing the final latches in place, Alice and Sonya wordlessly made eye contact with Felix and gave the thumbs up. Felix turned away and began opening the door which would lead out of the room. All three moved the cart to the next area, a larger room with storage containers and a large elevator door.

  As slowly as every step in the process had been up to this point, the three people placed their POWER modifications over their regular spacesuits. Placing all the parts of the POWER modification on top of a regular suit was tricky considering how large and bulky they were. Once underground, they had taken off their extra protection as it wasn’t necessary. Going back to the surface, it was now necessary again. Although it was possible to put them on alone, it was always easier to have a second person help with certain parts. One at a time they helped each other and, once fully suited up, the three people pushed the cart into the elevator and began their trip to the surface. The trip up the elevator was as slow and silent as before.