Europa (Deadverse Book 1) (15 page)

- Gary –

The doctor had a strong sense of dread building up as he looked over the horrific human pyramid. Ben had called Gary in to help with the removal of the drone soldiers to see if he could determine anything that could help them understand just what they were dealing with. Thomas and Cary had dragged the large block of ice with the rover far back from the ice highway so that no one else would be able to see it, and with a plasma drill, had melted away the water to get to the men inside. All the work had to be done there, outside, in order not to risk anyone else seeing anything.

Gary understood, too, that Ben had been very wary in bringing him in. He had been inside of the alien vessel. He hadn’t had the interactions that Emir and Glorin had, though, and this worried him. It worried Ben too, Gary could tell.

“Just find out something, anything. I have to stop this before it gets past the point of creepy,” Ben had asked.

And so, with Cary and Thomas’ help, they had stripped the mechs down to the human bodies inside, and in the frigid moon surface, with just unwieldy gloved hands, he did a few autopsies. Ben wasn’t going to be happy with that he found. They had died from CO2 poisoning, likely brought about by them being trapped in ice. Because they had been frozen, it was nearly impossible for him to determine if they had died a mile under ice, when the tidal forces had ripped through the base, or if they had somehow survived and then, been murdered by whomever had committed this insane crime, if it could be called a crime.

Thomas had a major issue with that theory, though, and Gary agreed. The drones were top of the line military units, with AIs specifically programmed for combat. If they had somehow survived the ice quake, it was highly unlikely someone on the base run by scientists and engineers, would have been able to take one down, much less a dozen of them. So they must have died, buried in the ice, and then somehow, almost magically, been removed from a mile down in the ice, put into a pyramid, and refrozen.

Of course, there was one more theory.

“You know what Susan would say,” Cary said as they finished up the last of the drones.

Gary nodded his head in the helmet. “Yeah,” he chuckled lightly, “she would say the aliens did it.”

Cary laughed along with Gary. They loved their other partner in this unconventional love triangle, but understood that while she was a genius in botany and biology, she was a bit naïve in many other matters. It was a source of humor for them, even if Susan didn’t quite get it.

Thomas didn’t laugh.

“Wait,” Cary stopped, “seriously? You think that’s possible?”

“When you have eliminated the impossible….” Thomas started to say, and both of them responded to finish the quote.

“It’s weird…but Gary, you were in there, just how weird was it?”

Gary thought about it for a moment. He had been so busy since he had returned from the time warped trip inside of the alien vessel that he hadn’t thought much about it.

“You know what’s really weird?” Gary asked. “The really weird part is that, oddly enough, it didn’t feel weird. It felt, I don’t know…familiar.”

Gary described the inside again, the layout. It felt like an American submarine he had served on for two months when he was younger.

“Ok, I get it,” Thomas continued, “but, the green light thing, and Glorin and Emir and talking to the ship, that’s weird right?”

“Is it? We just took apart human-machine drones, where a computer program talks to the human brain to tell it what to do. Isn’t that about the same?” Gary pointed out.

“You know what, doc?” Thomas pointed a finger at him. “Quit making sense.”

Cary hid a smile underneath the helmet.

“So, now what?” Cary asked.

“Ben’s not going to like it, but we are clueless here.”

Thomas had already melted out a twenty foot deep hole in the ice which they then placed the bodies of the drone soldiers, now free of their mechs. The drill then began to lightly melt the ice from the side of the cliff they had moved them up to, and water rushed into the hole, freezing nearly instantly. The mech suits were put in a far shallower ice hole in case the parts were needed at some point. The biggest agenda was simply making sure no one else saw what they had done out here.

“I don’t like keeping this from everyone else,” Thomas said as they slowly bounced their way back to the rover. “How do you keep that from Susan?”

“Or from Connie?” Cary added.

“Yeah, this whole place just sucks. Two years of boring, then two weeks of hell.”

The rover hummed to life and Thomas began driving it back slowly over the bumpy ice towards the ice highway. Just as he turned in to head back to the base, he looked to them.

“But, really, you both think it was Emir, right? The guy has been a creep, so maybe now he just cracked.”

“I can’t…” Gary began, but Cary cut him off.

“He is an ice engineer, after all.”

That realization created silence between the three of them. As the rover turned onto the ice highway, still smooth and shining Jupiter’s colors off of its surface, it picked up speed and they headed back to base, not feeling any better about what they had done out there.

- Susan –

A small crowd had gathered in the green dome, awaiting expectantly to see if the experiment would work. A large half dome, about six feet in diameter and three feet high, stood on top of a large metal container. Inside was a collection of eggs, all gathered under a heat source. Two dozen eggs of an off white color sat gathered together. One of them had a pip hole, signs that the experiment was in the last stages.

They were chicken eggs, incubated to within three days of hatching, and then placed in a jelly-like substance and finally, frozen, completely stopping the growth of the chick inside of the egg, but not killing it. Susan had been fascinated, but wanted to find out more. Experiments on Earth had shown they could keep an egg viable this way for nearly nine months. The biggest reason for such an experiment was to show the viability of the stasis gel on life, and of course, humans. The everlasting search for the stasis chamber was yielding results in the gel. Being able to travel great distances in space required some form of deep sleep. On Earth, the gel was a life saver for those whose diseases had no cure, but were possibly in the works for one.

For the Europa mission, the eggs had been sent several months back with the purpose of seeing if they could survive a fourteen month deep space journey. As the egg cracked a little further, it appeared that the gel had done its job.

In nearly all other cases, Susan would have been taking notes, recording the event and saving all the data. After the ice quake though, the experiments were all put on hold. This one was not for some company on Earth, but for their own survival. The chickens within the eggs were of a fast growing breed, ready to lay eggs or be butchered in three months. It would provide a much needed source of protein, especially in the case of the worst scenario.

Twelve years ago, Susan had been a part of a group that had run a complicated series of experiments to simulate living in a completely sealed environment, extremely similar to the one she was in at the moment. Twenty separate closed environments were created and Susan and three other people were placed into each of the domes. The domes were small, barely the size of a small house. There were four people to a dome with all the seeds, water and materials they would need. The outside would provide food and air for two months, but then, it was up to the four people inside each dome to make the system work.

Her dome was one of two that made it through the fifteen month program, and of those two domes, her dome was actually thriving.

The botanist had a keen sense of natural balance. She clearly understood the chemistry and biology behind life, but beyond that, she could almost see the cycle of life in an environment. It was almost instinctual, she explained. She could see the entire planet if she really tried, but for those fifteen months, locked up in the small structure, she was able to see that cycle clearly. It had been the best time of her life.

Now, here she was, millions of miles from the planet she adored, just under the surface of a frigid moon that had almost no way of supporting life, watching life erupt from a calcium shell. She heard some peeps and someone behind her shouted in excitement. They were all grown men and women, yet the thought of a tiny baby was enough to work their emotions.

Susan stepped away from the clear dome to allow others to see the little miracle finish working through her shell and come popping out. Everyone cheered and Crysta looked up in tears, and said that they should call the chick ‘Nugget’. There was laughter and more cheering. Susan looked through the bodies and saw the chick, slowly twisting itself to get on its feet. It was coated in a thick ooze, looking like a wet rat. In a few hours, it would be completely dried off and would be completely adorable.

It would also be pouncing off the sides of the little dome they were in. She needed to keep an eye on how they reacted to the low gravity before they hurt themselves. She stepped away and walked towards the pile of materials that had been included with the experiment.

There were a few data cubes that she would need to install, but, as Crysta had let her know, it was going to take a while. There was only one place to upload data cubes, back in the central dome. From there the data could be uploaded to her tablet. She grabbed the cubes and headed towards Crysta, whose face was still glued to the chick-viewing dome.

As she walked by, Ben reached out and grabbed her by the arm. Susan was shocked, as she had never seen him grab anyone. Ben noticed right away what he had done, and let go.

“I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to do that. It’s just… a bit loud in here. Didn’t want to shout.”

“It’s OK, boss.”

Ben stopped and looked back at the commotion.

“So this is good, right?”

“Yeah, really good,” Susan responded, beaming with pride.

“Follow me, will you?” Ben asked, walking off away from the group of people.

Susan followed the base commander back behind a pile of crates. The cries and shouts were blocked a bit better there, and the botanist could see why he wanted to get away.

“I went over your data this morning. It took me a while. You have some really detailed information there that, honestly, took me some time to understand. But, those numbers, how confident are you in them?”

Susan stood there for a moment. So much had happened in the past few days and she had been so busy, she didn’t remember which data he was talking about. Then it hit her.

“Oh, yeah. Absolutely one hundred percent confident.”

“So, six years?” Ben asked. “Really?”

“Absolutely. That’s just the initial growth burst. I’m fairly confident that I could produce enough food for a lifetime here. Our only limitation is light. We would have to dig up any and all light sources buried in the quake. Also, if we had another quake, well, that would be rough. But, we could build redundancies. Of course, if we lost power, then all bets are off.”

“Couldn’t Jupiter give us enough light?” Ben asked, truly not knowing.

“I could probably manage it, but then I’d have to grow right on the surface, with just barely a dome to protect it. I have no idea what kind of damage the radiation would do to the plants.”

“Well, that is certainly really good to hear,” Ben said, trailing off at the end.

“Yes, of course,” Susan added, a little concerned. “Why do you ask? Is there anything wrong? Are we stuck here? Did I miss something?”

Ben quickly shook his head.

“No. No. Nothing wrong. We don’t know anything about the ship yet. I just…” Ben stopped and looked around the crates at the group. From the shouts and cheers, it appeared that another chick was hatching. He heard shouts of ‘this one is black’.

“It’s that. The excitement and happiness this little thing just brought us. We really needed that,” Ben stopped and reached out to hold her hands. “And I needed just a little bit more of good news. That was it. Thanks again.”

He let her hands go and walked away.

Susan stood there for a moment, shocked. Her eyes began to fill with tears and she realized what she had done. On the bleakness of space, within the frigidity of the ice moon and the darkness of all the hopelessness they had found themselves mired in, she had created a spark of life. Well, she hadn’t, but they didn’t need to know that. Their cheers and smiles were enough.

Susan came around the corner just in time to see both Gary and Cary turn to look at her. Their looks filled her with warmth.

Oddly enough, despite it all, she felt completely at home in her dome, with her plants and the two people she loved the most.

- Charles –

It had been a busy day, but unlike some of the past days, small moments of happiness and relief were interjected in it. It had begun with the spectacle, simple as it was, of the hatching chicks. Of the twenty four eggs brought out of stasis, twenty three had hatched. According to Susan, that was a superb result. Charles didn’t know any better. He was as far from being a country boy as any. He had a dog once as a child, and that was it. Still, he had to admit, it had been a fun moment.

The evening had brought everyone together for a large meal in the green dome, which had become the unofficial living quarters. Many of the underground rooms had been dug out, even if rudimentarily. Despite that, few of the crew ever slept in those rooms. Charles understood. He could sleep anywhere, but to most, those rooms had become their own personal quarters, and the new rooms simply weren’t that. There was also the thought that they could be buried again under an ice quake. Bobby’s body still hadn’t been found, despite all of the digging.

Instead, everyone had found comfort in the new communal sleeping area. Most of the crew still had their own private niche where they slept at, and certainly the couples, or triples, had a little more privacy than others. Walls had been laid down from the excess water that was melted out of the underground rooms and everyone had their own space. Still, as the lights on the plants ran on a fourteen hour cycle, the walls were nice that way.

Charles had spent the last hour walking the base. He wasn’t sure why he did it anymore. When they had first arrived, and the base had been completed, it was part of his duty to walk the entirety of the base once daily. He had quickly thrown that practice aside within a few weeks. There really wasn’t any reason to perform such security measures. But after the ice quake, and especially the events in the alien vessel, something in Charles had made him start that chore again.

Ben was working in the central command still, running through pages and pages of data of energy readings. At least that is what he had explained to Charles. The captain didn’t even try to understand. He had always understood that his position on the mission was mostly useless, but now, more than ever, he felt completely unused. Sure, he could do some manual labor, but even some of the simplest jobs required skills and experience he simply didn’t have. Maybe that’s why he walked at night. Made him feel like he was doing something. Maybe he would keep them safe from the aliens.

He still wasn’t sure what to think about the alien vessel. To start, it hadn’t felt alien, not inside. Sure, the gel hull was odd, the green beams more so, and the time dilation far beyond bizarre. But the inside of the ship had been far too familiar, and he just wasn’t sure why. There were no remnants of the crew, but whomever they had been, must have had similar needs and designs as a human being. And the order of the layout, the design, it just made him feel like it was a military ship. Years and years of work onboard carriers and other Navy ships told him that. So if this was a military ship, why was it headed towards Earth, and better yet, why did it veer off towards Jupiter?

Those were just one of the many things that had been running through his mind. Of course there was the uncertainty of the return ship even arriving and the impending doom if it didn’t. And if they made it back to Earth, then what? What was left of it? Charles understood America’s capacity for automated warfare, as they had called it a decade ago, and certainly, many of the other nations of his planet had similar capabilities, so just how long could that war between dumb machines last?

He stepped out into the last passage way into the green dome. A metal door sat just slightly crooked in the ice frame that held it. He pushed it open with a bit of force and walked into the lit dome. The light made him blink and it took him a moment to adjust, although he continued walking. The entire dome was quiet, with just a slight hum of some of the machinery and electricity taking the edge off of the complete silence. As his eyes adjusted, he looked past a rather large wall of tomato plants that stretched upwards of thirty feet. Susan had told him the low gravity of the moon had lent to the huge plant growth. It certainly looked and felt alien, but there, among all the crazy growth, were hundreds of large red tomatoes, easily recognizable, even in their inflated state.

He walked towards the plants when he heard something, a scratching sound. He turned quickly and there, back by the chick brooder was, sat Emir, on an ice bench directly in front of it. He was stooped over, legs over either side of the bench, with his back towards Charles. He appeared to be doing something in front of him. Charles walked slowly over. He hadn’t expected anyone to still be awake. Emir himself had been doing a lot of the ice digging today, had put in nearly sixteen hours of very labor intensive work.

Charles began to approach quietly as it looked as if Emir hadn’t noticed him. Then, because the captain found it rather odd to sneak up on him, he started stepping heavily to purposely make noise. Emir sat up straight, and turned to look back.

“Oh, hey, cap,” he said, spinning around on the bench to face Charles.

“Mr. Tagula. Up rather late?”

“Just sitting here, watching the chicks. Cute little guys,” Emir said, leaning towards the clear dome above the brooder.

“You really should get some rest.”

“Honestly though, it’s been hard to sleep lately,” Emir said, looking back behind him. Charles noticed that.

“Are you OK? Doctor Tarner probably has something that could help you sleep.”

“I can’t do that. Last time I took sleeping pills I slept for almost twelve hours. We don’t, I mean, I don’t, have time to sleep that much. Too much to do.”

Charles came closer and stood next to the brooder. Inside, nearly two dozen little chicks of various shades and colors of white, black and brown fed off of a small tray. From time to time, one would run off and go flying off into the padded walls of the brooder. It was going to be important that the birds adapted quickly to the low gravity.

“Are you sure you are OK? Is there anything else going on?” Charles asked. He noticed sweat beading off of Emir’s forehead. That might have been understandable when he was working, but in the dome it was currently a cool sixty two degrees and he hadn’t been working for nearly an hour.

“Same ole, cap. Just so tired I can’t sleep. Like everyone, just wondering what’s going to happen,” Emir said, not making eye contact.

Emir had a really bad rap on board the base. Charles actually felt bad for him, most of the time. He was different, and not just racially and culturally, but just…an oddball, as Charles put it. While most of the others on board were content with their solitude, or had found partners, Emir had not. The incident with the shower had cast him as a pervert and creep, when, to Charles’ eyes, the black doctor and his two white concubines presented far more of an abomination than a guy simply wanting to get off a bit while stranded on a frozen moon. Charles, more than anyone here, understood the need to tolerate most choices in life, and so he didn’t look down on Emir.

“There’s nothing we can do about it until we have the news,” Charles tried to console.

“That’s easy for you to say. You’re a military guy, you’re used to being in crappy situations.”

“Maybe I’m used to it, but it doesn’t mean I like it.”

Emir turned away and looked at the chicks jump around, seemingly out of control.

“I don’t think that ship out there was here to help us, cap,” Emir said, completely changing the subject.

“Why do you think that?” Charles asked.

“I don’t know. Something deep down. I think it’s better off staying frozen here.”

“Maybe.”

Charles lost himself in thought for a moment and didn’t notice Emir standing up and walking off. By the he realized the Middle Eastern man had left, he was already twenty feet away, and walking towards his little frozen cubicle room on the far side of the dome. His was set apart from everyone else’s. Charles raised his hand, but then held his breath. He would talk to Horace in the morning, but for now, it was better to just let the man get some sleep, if he could.

Sitting down on the bench, the captain felt the exhaustion in his own muscles and bones. He knew he needed to get sleep as well and wondered why he had even sat down. He reached out with his hands to push himself up off the bench when he felt some grit on the bench. He looked down and saw that something had been carved out of the ice. It was a 3d representation of a pyramid, just the lines, and arrows coming out of each corner of the pyramid. It was different and Charles wondered if it had been Emir who had carved it out.

Maybe it was his way of coping, ice carving, drawing, art. Charles shrugged it off, got up, and walked towards his own small room. If he remembered it, he would ask Emir about it the next time he saw him.