____________________________________________________________________________
J. Austin Wilde and Fission Park Press proudly present:
2010: Second Odyssey
Part 2 of 3
By J. Austin Wilde, K.B.C.S.
Super Critical Reactor Axe Man
Fission Park Press
wildeman@psn.net
http://www.psn.net/~wildeman/
---------------------------------------
"2001: Odyssey 1/2" can be found at the
URL listed above
Part 1 of 3 can be obtained be emailing
the author <wildeman@psn.net>
---------------------------------------
The characters and situations of this work of fanfiction are the creation
and property of Rumiko Takahashi and Arthur C. Clarke. This work was not
created for profit in any form, and no infringement of copyright is intended
nor should it be inferred.
____________________________________________________________________________
CHAPTER THREE
08:15 UMT, November 16, 2010.
PLA(N) Spacecraft Tsien,
within eight million kilometers of Jupiter.
"Doctor Tofu, is you okay?" Shampoo asked with a warm smile.
Tofu struggled to sit up, but was held down by either Pink or Link.
He wasn't sure which, they were both rather fuzzy at the moment. He also
wasn't sure where he was, or even when.
"Lie still, doctor. Wait for electrolytes to reestablish equilibrium,"
Pink said. At least he thought it was Pink. Electrolytes... That meant
he was recovering from hibernation. He gave Pink an anxious look.
"How you feel?" she asked in return.
"Hungry," Tofu managed.
"That good indication," Pink replied. "We see about food in little
while."
"Are we there yet?" Tofu asked hoarsely. He tried to look around
for the other members of his crew. He caught a glimpse of Ranko's flaming
red pig-tail settled over a pearly white shoulder in the hibernaculum next
to his. Her face was serene and luminous even in the sleep of near death.
"No," Shampoo replied. "We still eight million kilometers from Jupiter.
Still have aerobraking maneuver to perform."
Tofu tried to let this sink through his fuzzy skull.
"Then why...?"
"NCA want to send you transmission. It urgent. They say revive early."
Tofu tried to sit up again with a bit more success.
"When?"
Shampoo helped him throw his legs over the side of the hibernaculum.
She began rubbing them with her deliciously warm hands to restore
circulation. "As soon as you transmit message saying you awake," she
replied.
His brain was still on ice. **What could they possibly have to say
that can't wait until Jupiter?**
He had his answer in under two hours, or the delay time caused by
sluggard electromagnetic waves traveling across the distance from Jupiter
to Earth and back. He used the time to recover from hibernation. It wasn't
nearly enough.
The transmission was heavily encoded using the product of two hundred-
digit prime numbers as the encryption key. Whatever it was, the NCA didn't
want the Chinese reading it for about sixty-thousand years. That worried
him.
Gai'do had been true to his word, the compartment he would call home
for the next hundred odd days was clear of the provisions that had been
stacked up deck to overhead and bulkhead to bulkhead. Even though Kuno
and Doctor Kurenai were still in hibernation, he found the space to be
anything but spacious. There was a fold down desk and study station, but
to set it up meant that anyone sleeping in the middle rack of the triple
bed set would be almost trapped. He quickly tranferred his effects to
the top rack upon noticing this.
Within a triple locked and hermetically sealed case was the decryption
device. Tofu entered the combinations in sequence, and noted that the
external and internal seals were intact -they would change color within five
minutes of being broken, so there really was no chance of the Chinese
rifling through his case undetected while he slept in hibernation. The
device itself was a laptop computer. The key had been programmed into its
memory in advance.
He closed the privacy curtain that separated the compartment from
the passageway outside. That was the best he could do for external security.
The laptop came to life as the case was opened, and he presented his eye
to the sensor for authentication. Once that was satisfied, he slipped the
data disc with his message into the drive.
The laptop chugged away at the message for a few minutes before putting
it up on the gas-plasma display.
TOPSECRET--TOPSECRET--TOPSECRET--TOPSECRET--TOPSECRET--TOPSECRET--TOPSECRET
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
Unauthorized dissemination of this message or its contents is in violation
of the National Security Act of 21 May 1999; 20CFR19, sec 9, para 14-22;
and punishable by life imprisonment and minimum fine of $1,000,000. Use all
means to prevent accidental disclosure or transmittal to foreign governments.
Destroy this message by shredding and incineration at the first opportunity
in accordance with CMS-1 and UNSECCOM Directive 02/311-2.
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
MSG: 20103201155Z TOPSECRET/NOFORN
FM: Director, Central Intelligence Agency.
TO: Dr. Tofu Ono, Ph.D., NCA-89211-C (Reserve)
CC: NCA, NSA, DOS.
VIA: NCADEEPSPACOMMCEN TERRA-ONE.
RE: URGENT MISSION ADVISORY.
<REFERENCES>
A. Executive Order 10/057-3 TOPSECRET/NOFORN
B. Msg 20101231200Z TOPSECRET/NOFORN
C. CIA Brief 10/118 TOPSECRET/NOFORN
D. Executive Order 10/059-1 UNCLAS/--
1. RECENT INVESTIGATION OF WORLD COURT JUDICIARY REVEALS UNCONFIRMED P.R.C.
INTENTION TO SEIZE U.S.S. DISCOVERY AS A DERELICT IN CONTRAVENTION OF THE
AGREEMENT WITH THE UNITED STATES DATED 10/059 (Ref. D refers).
2. YOU ARE DIRECTED TO TAKE WHATEVER COVERT DISCRETIONARY MEASURES NECESSARY
TO ENSURE SAFETY OF NCA PERSONNEL AND UNITED STATES PROPERTY. DUE TO THE
UNCONFIRMED NATURE OF THIS ADVISORY, YOU ARE TO TAKE NO OVERT ACTION THAT
WILL BRING DISCREDIT UPON THE UNITED STATES.
3. MAKE NO ATTEMPT TO CONFRONT P.R.C. PERSONNEL UNLESS NECESSARY TO FULFILL
OBJECTIVE #2 ABOVE.
4. YOU MAY BE REQUIRED TO ABANDON PLA(N) SPACECRAFT TSIEN AND MAKE EARTH
RETURN ORBIT VIA U.S.S. DISCOVERY. SURVEY AND REPAIR OF LIFE-SUPPORT,
PROPULSION, AND HIBERNATION SYSTEMS TAKES PRECEDENCE OVER ALL ELSE
-INCLUDING HAL-9000 SYSTEMS; THE RESTORATION OF WHICH MAY CATALYZE P.R.C.
INTENTIONS TO SEIZE U.S.S. DISCOVERY.
5. FURTHER ADVISORY MESSAGES WILL FOLLOW AS INVESTIGATION PROCEEDS. BEST
OF LUCK TO YOU AND YOUR FINE CREW. -VADM J.L. WALLACH SENDS.
--END MSG--
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
TOPSECRET--TOPSECRET--TOPSECRET--TOPSECRET--TOPSECRET--TOPSECRET--TOPSECRET
Tofu closed down the terminal and rubbed his temples vigorously. This
was *not* something he needed to hear from Earth so soon after coming out
of a months long hibernation. He needed to think, but his fuzzy brain
mutinied on the spot.
**If it is true,** he managed to ponder. **Why not just kill us in
hibernation and then make up some story about an accident or malfunction?
Why wait until we are within spitting distance of Jupiter?**
He lay back on his rack and wrapped the stabilizing netting around
himself.
**Of course they *do* need us to put HAL and the ship's systems back
together,** he realized. Thinking was apparently getting his drug and cold-
addled brain back on track. **If they were going to try something, they'd
wait until the Discovery was ready to go.**
He thought of Shampoo, Gai'do, and Pink and Link. He couldn't believe
that any of them were capable of murder or piracy. Mousse was an unknown.
If the CIA background on Commander Herb was accurate, he was a likely
candidate -plus he enjoyed sole access to the ship's encrypted communications
equipment, something that the supposed Communications Officer Shampoo wasn't
privy to.
Herb was just one man. It would take the entire Tsien crew's support
to steal the Discovery and neutralize the NCA crew. Cologne had been too
careful in selecting the rest of them.
He let out a long sigh.
**I just don't believe it. Cologne would not do this to me if she
had the slightest fear that it was possible.**
The message had to be a false alarm. The CIA's spooks had been wrong
about things many times before, after all.
Another thought occured to him.
What if he was being set up by his own government?
He had been as surprised as Koucho when the Secretary of State had
called to say they would back the mission. It was no secret that the sitting
President had no love for China. The President's insistance that he head
the mission was also strange. He was qualified, sure -at leading a salvage
and exploration mission. Babysitting the Chinese? There were astronauts in
the NCA with military backgrounds; people who were more than qualified for
that sort of mission.
Were they trying to make him paranoid, knowing that he had absolutely
no training to deal with such a situation -just so he would screw up and
cause an incident that lead to a war the President secretly wanted?
**No...** he sighed inwardly. **That is just TOO crazy, even for them.**
Wasn't it?
He decided to take a nap. Hibernation was making his brain turn logic
somersaults that he wasn't ready for.
* * *
PLA(N) Spacecraft Tsien rushed onwards to Jupiter. With the passing of
the four outermost satellites Sinope, Pasiphae, Ananke, and Carme, the ship
officially entered the Jovian neighborhood. The ship's cameras and other
sensors recorded what they could, but the reality was that these four hunks
of rock were utterly unremarkable.
Because Doctor Tofu had been revived sooner than planned, he found
himself the only NCA astronaut at the evening meal aboard Tsien. It was
Shampoo's turn to cook, he was told, although 'cook' was probably reading
more into it than the term would indicate. The ship's meals were planned
out long before they had left Earth orbit, and everything was prepackaged.
All one had to do was pop a meal into the microwave, and dinner was served.
Despite this, Shampoo seemed to have taken some liberties with the
preparation. The sterile plastic trays he had been expecting were replaced
with china plates, cups, and bowls. Tsien's pilot bounced happily around
the table in one-sixth gravity, passing out portions of the meal to everyone
before setting the remainder of the food in the center of the table.
Although she would never admit to deviating from the meal plan, it
was clear that she had taken matters into her own hands. Her stir fried rice
was far better than anything Tofu had ever experienced on a translunar
flight. The lemon chicken and snow peas were an actual delight!
He watched Mousse loft a pork siu mai dumpling into the air over his
head and let it drift lazily down into his open mouth. Such antics only
encouraged the others. Gai'do made a point of leaving his chopsticks hanging
in midair as he sipped from his tea, finishing just in time to catch his
them before they touched down on the table.
Only Herb refrained. Tofu noted that while he did not indulge, he also
did not object to such behavior. His strained dignity in the midst of such
clowning around would have been humorous if Tofu actually had the courage
to laugh out loud at the man. Something inside told him to hold his tongue
-if he wanted to keep it where it belonged.
"So, Doctor Tofu, what you think we find when we reach Discovery?"
Gai'do asked him.
Tofu was glad to have a line of conversation, and so he turned to the
portly computer specialist and shrugged.
"I really have no idea. There are so many possibilities."
"What you like most to find?" Gai'do pressed. It seemed good-natured,
but in the light of his most recent communiqu� from Houston, Tofu was
slightly suspicious.
"Well," he began. "I would like to find the Discovery intact and in
good condition. I'd like to find that HAL's malfunction can be resolved
quickly." He paused for a moment as a foolish hope welled within him.
"Most of all I'd like to find that Commander Saotome and Akane Tendo have
survived all this time and are waiting for us."
"Do you really consider that a likelihood?" Herb asked suddenly.
Tofu bit his lip. "No. Not really. The early model hibernaculums used
on the Discovery did not possess very sophisticated automated control
systems. If an unforeseen abnormal condition arose, they were incapable of
devising a remedy. This wasn't considered much of a safety problem, as they
were to be monitored by the very capable ship's HAL-9000, or even by ground
control 9000 units in an emergency."
"But that has proven impossible," Mousse observed.
"Correct," Tofu conceded. "The ship's HAL-9000 became deranged, and
shortly after it was neutralized by Commander Saotome, all communications
with the ship were lost. We don't know what happened to them. Even if they
did manage to put themselves into hibernation, without HAL-9000 supervision
the control systems have been proven through simulations back on Earth as
having a projected 100% failure rate after nine years. Even if they didn't
fail, if something happened to the ship's power system, the hibernaculums'
emergency batteries were only rated for the seven years it was projected
for the Discovery II to come and recover them."
"So there is good reason to believe that the ship is uninhabited,"
Herb concluded. Tofu suppressed a shudder at the possible implications of
the commander's words.
"Unfortunately so," Tofu admitted.
"We have speculation on why HAL-9000 became deranged," Gai'do said.
"Can you confirm that high-level programming conflict cause malfunction?"
"As best we can determine, yes," Tofu answered slowly. He refrained
from elaborating on the nature of the conflict, which was both too tragic
and too bizarre to readily accept without the level of involvement in the
mission that men like himself had. "We won't find out the truth until we
can look at HAL's memory banks."
The table went silent.
"We find more cheerful thing to talk about, okay?" Shampoo asked.
"Like the aerobraking maneuver?" Mousse asked archly in English for
Tofu's benefit.
"That no comfort either," Shampoo replied. "Shampoo glad when it over."
"It will be, soon enough," Herb told them. "There are only four more
hours before we reach atmospheric interface."
He stood up from the table, a sign that the meal was over. The others
stood as well, with Tofu last of all.
"We have many preparations to make for the aerobraking maneuver," Herb
said to them. "I want the ship ready by t-minus sixty minutes. That is all."
He left them standing at the table, as each person looked at his
fellows with a mixture of anticipation and dread.
* * *
Tofu watched Shampoo adjust the swing-arm display over her station as
computer voices spoke in sing-song Chinese. Herb sat above and behind
Shampoo's station, his trademark imperious glower on his taciturn face.
Mousse took his position at the Engineering repeater console as Gai'do and
the twins went to their quarters to wait out the maneuver.
There was tension in the air, no mistake about that, but also a cool
professionalism that Tofu found comforting. The aerobrake maneuver had
never been attempted on a spacecraft as large or as swift as Tsien, and
there were no expressed guarentees. Indeed, if assumptions of Jupiter's
atmospheric composition were incorrect, they could find themselves smashed
flat or incinerated in a millisecond.
"<Standing by to sever telemetry feeds and primary voice/data links;
T-minus one minute and counting,>" Shampoo announced.
"<Very well,>" Herb acknowledged.
Tsien continued to fall towards Jupiter, whose angry reddish mass
dominated the viewports and telescope monitors with a size that defied
pitiful human concepts of scale and grandeur.
"<Releasing lock seals on aerobrake elements one through six,>" Shampoo
announced, flipping open a bank of red safety covers. "<Severing telemetry
feeds and primary voice/data links.>" She flipped another bank of switches
close by. "<Main Antenna position indicates intermediate; S-band and
telemetry aerial positions indicate intermediate...>"
Shampoo watched the colored lights on her panel shift from amber
to red. "<S-band and telemetry aerial positions indicate stowed and
locked.>" Another group of lights remained amber, causing her to frown.
"<Main Antenna position continues to indicate intermediate.>"
Herb leaned over her shoulder. "<Try cycling the array open and shut,
that might work it loose.>"
Shampoo did so. The Main Antenna would not indicate stowed and locked.
"<We're running out of time, we have to deploy the aerobrakes,>" Herb
said. "<Either the position indicators have malfunctioned or the antenna
won't retract all the way. We can hope it's the former and not the latter.>"
"<I can't see it on my exterior cameras,>" Mousse announced. "<It's
probably an indication problem.>"
"<Deploy the aerobrake shields,>" Herb ordered Shampoo. The purple-
haired woman did so. More lights shifted from red to amber to green.
"<Aerobrake shield elements one through six are locked in position,>"
Shampoo announced. "<Estimated time to Jupiter interface ten minutes and
counting. Engaging viewport safety shields.>"
Heavy steel shutters locked in place over the viewports, cutting off
the reflected light of Jupiter ahead of them. The bridge was now dark save
for the glow of computer monitors and various indicator lights. Their
position versus Jupiter was extrapolated on a simulation monitor near Tofu's
acceleration couch. Arabic numbers ticked off as Chinese characters
scrolled along the edge of the display.
"<Jupiter atmospheric interface estimated in one minute,>" Shampoo
announced. "<All control systems showing green at this time. Orbit analysis
indicates proper aerobraking trajectory.>"
Mousse turned from his Engineering console to give Shampoo a smile.
Shampoo's eyes flashed in the briefest response before she announced the
final data corrections prior to interface.
Tofu found himself tightening up in his acceleration couch. He reminded
himself once again that aerobraking had been done with small probes, but
never anything as massive or swift as Tsien. If Jupiter's atmosphere
contained any surprises in composition or density, they could well prove
fatal. There was also the fact that those probes had sampled less than a
billionth of a percent of Jupiter's atmosphere. Anything was possible.
**No need to worry,** he told himself. **You'll never even know what
hit you.**
"<Atmospheric interface in ten seconds,>" Shampoo announced. "Nine...
Eight... Seven... Six... Five... Four... Three...>"
A thin whistling sound filled the bridge. The ship gave a barely
perceptible jerk. Fingers of gravity began to pluck lightly at them, making
the forward bulkhead the floor.
"Aiiiyaaaa..." Shampoo gasped as the thin scream rose to a roar of
incandescent hydrogen. Tsien began to vibrate as it passed through the
fringes of Jupiter's atmosphere.
Herb's expression was calm. He barely seemed to notice as the spacecraft
around him plowed through the tops of clouds the size of continents at over
a hundred kilometers per second. He glanced at one of his displays.
"<Trajectory stable to point zero one milliradians,>" he declared in
a voice barely audible over the groan of the hull and the wash of plasma
that sheathed the ship.
A massive jolt shook the Tsien, nearly stopping Tofu's heart cold.
The lights flicked out and alarms chirped stridently for a moment before
returning. He could clearly see the ashen expression of terror on Shampoo's
face as she returned to her instruments.
"<Jovian thunderstorm below us,>" Herb shouted.
"<Charge instabilities building in SAFFRON,>" Mousse announced.
"<Ionization rates are higher than expected.>"
"<Save your concern,>" Herb replied. "<We can degauss the engines
prior to the transfer burn.>"
Tsien continued its downhill run against Jupiter, surrendering its
velocity to the giant planet as it tore a vast arc across the hellish
panorama of hydrogen storms and helium squalls. A plume of incandescence
trailed behind the spacecraft as it crossed the terminator into the Jovian
night, lighting the darkness with brilliant auroral effects larger than the
planet Earth.
The roar became absolutely deafening. The compartment was nearly
broiling with radiant heat beyond the capacity of the ventilation cooling
system to manage. Tofu's eyes fixed upon the situation display directly in
front of him as the burden of gravity became too great to bear. How much
longer did they have to go through this?
"<Approaching perijove,>" Shampoo cried.
Seconds later the scream began to die away. The ship's trembling
abated. They were "rising" in relation to Jupiter's atmosphere, leaving the
scant fringes for open space. With luck they had traded just enough velocity
to put them on an intercept course with Io. From there it would be a simple
insertion burn to put them into orbit. If they were out of luck, they had
lost too much velocity, and would begin to fall back towards Jupiter. There
would be no rising from such a fall.
Silenced reigned on the bridge as Herb consulted his computers.
"<Ship's trajectory correct to one milliradian,>" he announced calmly.
"<We have entered into a classic Hohmann orbit. Estimated time to Io orbital
insertion burn: one day, nineteen hours, six minutes. First midcourse
correction burn to follow in three hours, twenty minutes.>"
Tofu realized that he was holding his breath. He let it out in a gasp
of relief. Shampoo sank into her acceleration couch. Mousse let his head
fall back against his shoulders. They had succeeded.
Jupiter had just captured another satellite; PLA(N) Tsien.
* * *
"If ever there was a sight more beholden to mine eyes, it is thee, my
pig-tailed goddess."
Ranko Saotome scowled and tried to find the source of the familiar
voice. Tatewaki Kuno floated in free-fall nearby, dressed only in the skimpy
drab green gown of a hibernaut. He was wired by inductive sensors to a
heart-lung monitor under the supervision of Pink.
"I wish I could say the same about you, Kuno-baby," she managed.
Link helped her to sit up in her hibernaculum.
"You need not spend thy slight reserve of strength in doting observance
of thy affection for me, pig-tailed one. The Blue Thunder knows full well
the measure of thy love," he replied.
"I'm sure you do," Ranko muttered. Link began to wire her body up in
the same manner as Kuno.
"How you feel?" Pink asked.
Ranko thought about this for a moment.
"Like crap, but I guess that's to be expected. Are we there yet?"
Link nodded. "Yes. Is good you miss aerobraking."
Ranko blinked twice. "I dunno, it might have been fun."
"Better that you sleep through it," Pink replied.
Ukyo and Tsubasa floated in. Apparently they had been the first to
be revived, for they were already dressed in blue NCA coveralls and looked
slightly better than half dead. Tsubasa had declined from dressing in drag
just yet, Ranko noticed. She wondered how long that would last.
"They said the last one up was a rotten egg," Ukyo joked. "That must
mean you."
Ranko stuck her tongue out in reply. "I don't care about that. Has the
Discovery been found yet?"
"Not yet," Tsubasa answered. "But we're still climbing away from
Jupiter towards Io. It's at least sixteen hours before we can really pick
anything out of the background noise of Jupiter with the radar, so you'll
have time to recover a little bit before we enter orbit."
Ranko closed her eyes.
**Just hold on a little longer, big brother...**
* * *
The NCA astronauts held a brief council in the dining area while the
Tsien crew made the last preparations for the orbital insertion burn. All
except Tofu sipped on fruit punch flavored drinks that helped to restore
their bodies' salt and mineral balances. Ranko looked particularly crabby
as she sat in her chair. Or perhaps she was just too anxious.
Tofu decided not to tell them just yet of his warning from Earth. Not
until the Chinese gave some hint that it might be true. Until they actually
reached the Discovery and assessed the damages, there was really nothing
they could do anyway.
He had more important matters to discuss.
"The reason for Discovery's eccentric orbit is most likely caused
by its orbital path around Io. A 'flux tube' of electrons passes from Io
to Jupiter as it intersects the bands of the Jovian radiation belts. The
strength of this flux tube was believed to be random and fairly minor until
recently, but we've already detected some fairly massive outbursts with
Tsien's magnetometers."
He gestured to a computer simulation on a small display.
"Apparently what is happening is that Discovery passes through the
flux tube during its forty minute orbit of Io. Because the strength of
the flux tube varies at any given moment, eddy currents generated by
the ship's hull also vary. The whole arrangement is like a giant inductive
motor, sometimes pushing Discovery closer to Io, sometimes pulling it away
towards Jupiter, sometimes even holding it in place for a short while. The
net effect is that the orbit is no longer stable, and Io's gravity is slowly
drawing the ship towards it.
"Until we can regain control of Discovery and modify her orbit to a
polar one, we have to beware of the flux tube during EVA. Radiation levels
in the tube are significantly higher than the surrounding space, and you've
all been briefed about how hot it is near Jupiter."
Ranko took this last part to heart. It would be herself and the
Chinese engineer, Mousse, who first went out into space to link up with
the Discovery and board her.
Mousse was a likeable enough fellow, and certainly cute, but also
apparently painfully in love with the ship's pilot, Shampoo -a fact that was
obvious to Ranko with only a few hours of consciousness aboard Tsien. He
tended to keep his head in the clouds around her. Ranko hoped he could get
himself together enough to do some good when they boarded Discovery.
CHAPTER FOUR
09:11 UMT, November 18, 2010
The orbit of the Jovian moon Io.
Tsien's wide aperture radar located Discovery long before the ship's
telescopes did. The ghosty green images on the display were confusing, as
the ship seemed to be changing size and position erratically. It wasn't
until Ukyo locked onto the spacecraft with the Tsien's 50cm telescope that
the reasons for this became apparent.
Discovery was slowly rotating end over end like a drum majorette's
baton. The formerly white hull was now a dull yellow from years of sulfur
buildup thanks to the continuous eruptions from the nearby hell-world of Io.
Her lights were dark, and she answered no radio hails from Tsien. She
appeared for all intents and purposes to be a derelict in space.
"This rotation, could it have been a centrifuge malfunction?" Mousse
asked as they stared at the images on the 50cm monitor.
"I think so," Ranko answered. "A loss of power to the motor, or a motor
failure itself would cause the centrifuge to slow down by friction, but
because momentum must be conserved, the angular momentum of the centrifuge
would be transferred to the ship itself. It had to be gradual; any sudden
cessation would have torn the ship apart."
"I can't see any lights," Ukyo said quietly. "There must not be any
power left..." She left all that her statement entailed hanging silently
before them.
"Not so fast, Ukyo," Ranko retorted. "I'm not going to give up hope
just yet. If they went into hibernation, it would only make sense to shut
everything down to conserve power."
Tofu laid a hand on Ranko's shoulder. "I think we need to reiterate
the fact that the survival of Ranma and Akane are highly unlikely, Ranko.
We need to remain objective about this, and do the job we came to do." He
regarded the rest of them. "That goes for all of us."
Herb gave orders over the ship's intercom circuit to prepare for
approach. Shampoo deftly engaged the Tsien's attitude thrusters to bring
them within one hundred meters. They dared no closer until they could
correct Discovery's spin and could ensure no further threats to the Tsien.
* * *
Down in Tsien's Number One Airlock, Ranko Saotome and Mousse were
suited up and ready to go. Both carried 'broomsticks,' those wonderful
tools born of spaceworkers' ingenuity. Part hook, part thruster, and part
brake, the device made EVA much easier than using a bulky backpack
manuevering unit. The throbbing of the airlock pumps was a dull sound
emanating through their boots as the chamber cycled the air out.
A green light flicked on, and Ranko stabbed at the 'open' button.
The airlock door slid open to reveal the hundred meter length of Discovery
tumbling a football field away across the black void of space. Io loomed
beyond, its sulfurous surface baleful and glaring with yellow intensity.
They could see vast lakes of fire seething upon its pocked and tortured
skin. The characteristic yellow-orange glow of elemental sodium mingled
with an electric blue of excited plasma in the auroral discharges that
raged just over the other side of the hellish world. Jupiter was beyond Io,
an ominous presence lording itself over both its moon and the tiny
spacecraft that men had made.
There was silence now, save for the sound of their own breathing and
the continuous soft crackle and hiss of Jupiter over the radio channels.
Ranko checked her broomstick's operation, and then gave herself a hard
shove off Tsien's hull towards Discovery. Mousse followed at a respectful
distance.
As she neared the tumbling mass of Discovery near the Main Antenna
mount and the center of rotation, Ranko extended her broomstick to its
full length of six meters. She gripped the device tightly as it touched
down against the hull, and a heavy duty spring mechanism began to absorb
the force of her impact in a slow steady deceleration. She was practically
at rest when the broomstick was fully compressed, allowing her to reach out
to a handhold and grab onto the ship. Mousse repeated her maneuver with as
much ease.
"We have contact with the hull. So far there are no obvious signs of
damage," Ranko reported.
"No waste time getting inside," Link advised. "You only have twenty
minutes before our orbit brings us around to Jupiter side of Io. I no need
tell you what few quintillion coulombs of current moving down flux tube to
Jupiter will do to you."
"Make me look like a hot dog that spent too much time in the
microwave?" Ranko half joked.
"You fortunate meet such kind end," Link intoned.
"I get the idea," Ranko said dourly. She tugged on Mousse's suit
sleeve. "Come on, Mousse."
The Chinese man followed her as they pulled themselves towards the
spherical habitation module forty meters distant. As they made their way
along the hull, the spinning motion of the ship was beginning to approximate
gravity. Ranko found it was rather like climbing down a ladder face first.
Still, she'd prefer that uncomfortable experience to not seeing where she
was going. There were projections on the hull that could easily tear a
pressure suit if one wasn't careful and observant.
They reached the airlock door with six minutes to spare. Ranko
flipped open the access panel door, sending a fine yellow haze of sulfur
particles drifting about them. There was at least a millimeter of the stuff
built up on the hull, blasted many kilometers into space by the gigaton
detonations of Io's more active volcanoes.
As expected, there was no power to the door's electrohydraulics.
Mousse handed Ranko a torque-driver, which she inserted into the emergency
station. The driver vibrated rapidly in her grasp as it rotated the gearing
mechanism in the airlock door.
A little winded by their efforts, they slipped inside the dark
airlock chamber to catch their breath. Very soon they would enter the flux
tube, and radiation levels outside would climb past fatal very quickly. The
door was much easier to shut from the other side.
They were now surrounded in pitch black silence.
The two of them switched on their suit lights. In the near darkness of
Discovery's airlock, Ranko checked the manual gauges on the inner door.
"I'm showing air pressure," she announced. "About point nine five
atmospheres, so any pressure leakages have to be minor." She checked another
gauge. "There's air in the lock mechanism banks. I'm going to equalize
pressure."
She flipped open another panel in the forward bulkhead and studied
the valves within. It was as she remembered it from the mockups and the
builder's drawings. She had rehearsed this part over and over in simulations,
exercises, even in her dreams. A twist of a valve sent atmosphere flooding
into the airlock, cutting off automatically through a regulator as pressure
equalized with the interior of the ship.
"Airlock equalized," she announced. With the return of air pressure
came the return of sound. She could hear the distant flex and creak of the
hull as the ship tumbled.
Mousse set the torque-driver in place to open the inner door. At
Ranko's nod, he began to open the door. More darkness greeted them. Their
suit lights cast weird shadows in the gloom.
Mousse consulted his suit's sensors.
"It's cold in here. Ambient temperature is minus eighty centigrade."
"Sounds like good polar bear club weather," Ranko remarked.
"Pardon me?"
"It's nothing," Ranko replied. "Just one of the dumber things I've
done in my life."
"Oh."
Ranko stepped through the open airlock door and into the Pod Bay.
Mousse followed behind in silence. What she saw in her suit lights made
her choke back a sob.
There had been a fire here, and judging from the scorched bulkheads
and melted plastic, a bad one.
She caught hold of herself before she lost her emotional control.
Mousse had the portable air sampler, and she nudged him to use it. The
Chinese astronaut set it to work, thrumming noisily as it drew in the
requisite cubic meter of atmosphere for analysis.
"There is evidence of a fire in the pod bay," Ranko announced for
those back on Tsien. "We're taking an atmosphere survey now."
It chirped for attention when the sample was complete. Mousse consulted
the display, which was in Chinese, and so unreadable to Ranko.
"Nitrogen: seventy-eight percent. Oxygen: nineteen point five percent.
Argon: One percent. Carbon Dioxide: one point five percent. Ozone: fifty-
three parts per million. Carbon Monoxide: fifteen parts per million. PCBs:
trace. Hydrogen Chloride: trace. Particulates: trace. Radioactivity: Less
than minimum detectable activity. Oxygen is at the low threshold, and CO2
is high, but the air should be breathable for extended periods of time."
Ranko sighed hopefully. "So whatever happened, someone must have
cleared out the air after the fire."
"Or the automated systems took care of it before they failed," Mousse
observed.
"Shut up," Ranko told him. "I'm trying to keep my hopes up."
"Is that wise? You don't seriously think...?"
Ranko gave Mousse a hard look through her helmet visor. "If there was
any way to survive all these years, my brother would have found it," she
told him matter-of-factly. "Now let's make our way to the centrifuge."
"Shouldn't we check on the Discovery's power plant first?"
"There's time for that later."
Mousse decided that Ranko was going to be impossible to dissuade. She
seemed hell-bent on discovering her brother's fate, and equally hopeful
that he could be found alive. What was going to happen to her when she
learned the awful truth?
They made their way slowly through the lower deck to the ladder well.
The weak artificial gravity generated by Discovery's spin made their transit
awkward and clumsy, as the ship's layout was designed for acceleration
in the opposite direction than they now encountered. More than once they
fond themselves sliding down corridors rather than climbing.
There was more evidence of fire here. Upon closer inspection it
appeared to be smoke damage. Up one level brought them to the middle deck.
All the way aft was the access to the centrifuge. Mousse rather nervously
stepped past the chamber to their right, where HAL slept in disconnection.
Ranko paused for a moment to look through the centrifuge motor access
door deadlight. As she expected, the centrifuge was motionless. She couldn't
see any obvious damage through the small window.
She slipped through the access and into the centrifuge. There was
more smoke damage here, among other things. She could see where small pieces
of equipment and other fittings had been ripped loose when HAL opened the
Pod Bay doors in an attempt to kill the crew. Her heart began to race as
she spied the long row of coffin shaped objects looping around the curved
track of the centrifuge compartment that surrounded her.
She stepped out carefully into the compartment. The Discovery's
faux gravity made the forward bulkhead of the centrifuge the floor. Mousse
followed through, pausing long enough to take another air sample. He
declared it safe as she made her way along the bulkhead storage racks,
fittings, and computer equipment to the hibernaculums.
Like everything else on board, they were covered in a fine greasy
coating of black soot, making it impossible to tell from a glance who they
may have contained. She tried wiping away the soot over the viewing window
of the first hibernaculum. She looked in and saw a white shroud over an
anonymous face.
Once cleaned, the nameplate revealed the occupant:
"Hibiki, Ryoga; NCA-94002-A."
She stepped away from the hibernaculum. It was Ryoga, HAL's first
victim, electrocuted when the computer reenergized a circuit the man had
been lured into examining. They had brought the body back inside the ship
after his death with the intention of preserving his remains in the
hibernaculum until he could be buried on Earth.
The device's lights were dark. There was no power to the unit. She
did not want to know how badly decomposed Hibiki's remains were after all
these years. She especially did not want to get sick inside her helmet.
The next hibernaculum was empty. The nameplate explained the reason.
"Tendo, Kasumi; NCA-95455-A" had never been found after the ship was
evacuated to space.
The third hibernaculum was occupied. Like Ryoga's, Nabiki Tendo's
unit was a sarcophogus, and nothing more. Ranko kept her hibernaculum
sealed shut as well.
"We've found Nabiki Tendo and Ryouga Hibiki," she said over the radio.
"What about the others?" Herb asked unexpectedly.
"Give us a few moments."
The next hibernaculum was Akane Tendo's. It was dark. No lights shone
on the display panel. A thin layer of frost glazed the viewing window. The
face within was pale and still.
"Akane Tendo is here," she said softly.
"Alive?" Tofu asked over the radio.
"I don't think so," Ranko said, voice starting to crack. She didn't
want to check the last hibernaculum. Not now.
Mousse knelt over the unit to examine it. There was a small stethoscope
in a drawer on the opposite side. He plugged it into a jack near the display
and popped his visor open to listen.
"Mousse!" Ranko cried. "Are you crazy? You'll freeze to death!"
Mousse waved her silent as he listened. "This is just a normal winter
night back home in the mountains," he whispered. Wisps of steam streamed
from his nostrils and mouth as he breathed, glazing his helmet visor with
frost.
"I'm getting a pulse," he said.
"Repeat that, Discovery," Herb broke in sternly over the radio.
"<I said I am hearing a pulse through the stethoscope jack plugged into
Akane Tendo's hibernaculum,>" Mousse repeated in Chinese. Then to Ranko he
said, "it is very slow and weak, but it sounds like a normal hibernation
rhythm."
Ranko didn't wait another moment. Ranma Saotome's hibernaculum was
dark and silent as well. She plugged in the unit's stethoscope and lifted
her helmet visor with a hiss. After several agonizing minutes, Mousse
watched as two streams of tears slowly fell from her eyes, threatening to
freeze into tiny saline icicles on her cheeks.
"Yes...?" he asked her softly.
Ranko looked at him through blurring eyes and sobbed.
"He's alive."
END OF PART TWO
