Ice Moon 2 The Io Encounter

by Brandon Q Morris

  “Come on, we can take a break later,” he called to her.

  Francesca moved her legs. There was a strong twinge in one thigh when she moved that leg a certain way, but otherwise everything seemed okay. They had been exceedingly lucky. The pilot got up and turned toward the cliff. There it was—the monstrous boulder, its formerly-proud tip now stuck, partially crumbled, in the surface of Io. Next to it was something giving off a metallic gleam. Shocked, Francesca reached for her back. She had lost one of the oxygen tanks.

  Hayato noticed her movement and said, “Don’t worry, we have enough with us. But we cannot spend too much time out here.”

  “Okay, then,” Francesca replied. She was grateful to Hayato for calming her down. He was probably right. They had included a generous safety factor.

  The Reiden Patera volcano was clearly visible now. It had developed above a crater, and parts of that outer ring could still be seen. The impact that had created the crater must have punctured Io’s thin crust so that lava oozed out, gradually forming a mountain. The lander’s onboard radar had, during their descent, measured a height of 500 meters for Reiden Patera. During the last fly-by of a probe from Earth, 50 years ago, it had been measured at only a fifth of that. Quite a bit of pressure seemed to be gathering beneath the crater. Francesca looked at the volcano through her binoculars. In infrared it looked rather dark. Apparently there had been no fresh lava flows for a while.

  They were approaching the volcano from the northeast, which was very practical, because nothing was left of the crater wall there. The closer they came, the more clearly the black ground revealed sprinklings of other colors. Instead of walking across bedrock, they stepped on an increasingly-thick layer of dust that had rained down during earlier eruptions. Francesca took samples of the material so they would be able to reconstruct the sequence of events. When they suddenly stood in front of Reiden Patera, the volcano somehow seemed boring—even puny, in truth. The visit had probably not been worth it.

  Hayato seemed to disagree. He unpacked his bag. This time, Francesca was particularly surprised by his drill, actually a small drill robot. It included a tripod for support, and reminded Francesca of a miniature oil rig. Hayato used the night-vision device to find a good spot.

  “The location should be as warm as possible,” he explained. “The hotter the surface, the closer we are to the lava chamber from which we need to take samples. We need a spot where the crust is thin, since we do not have time to drill through hundreds of meters.”

  His search for the right spot appeared to be successful. He lifted the tripod with his right hand and carried it to a place that looked no different than its surroundings without using the night-vision device.

  “Perfect,” Hayato said, activating the drill. “Let us see how fast it goes.”

  A minute and a half later, the machine beeped.

  “Is everything okay?” asked Francesca.

  “Yes,” Hayato replied. “It is just telling me to snap on a sample container. I programmed it to take samples at regular intervals.”

  The procedure was repeated several times, but then they saw red vapor rising from the hole.

  She looked at him and said, “What just happened there?”

  Hayato was carefully checking the drill robot. “It is sulfur in a gaseous state,” he explained. “We must have already hit magma.” He seemed to be thinking about it for a brief moment. He then announced, “I am afraid this is the end of the drilling, as the drill head is definitely broken. At least I will not have to carry the rest home with me.”

  “Do we have enough samples?”

  “I assume so. Let us see what Martin was able to do with the samples we collected the day before yesterday.”

  “Well then, let’s be nice, go home, and give him some more material. I hope he cleaned and cooked in the meantime,” Francesca said, laughing.

  Two times on the way back they felt the vibrations from tremors.

  April 20, 2047, Fort Meade

  Liberate them, shoot them, blow them up, or kidnap them? She had been pondering these options for a while, but Lining could not find a straightforward solution for her problem. Initially, it sounded quite simple—if Shixin’s plan to use the parents of the female taikonaut to exert pressure on their daughter were to fail, it would be his last mission. Then the progressive forces in the state security apparatus would eliminate one of the supporters of the old system. But so far, Tang Shixin had played his game well. By having the elder Lis held inside the U.S. base at Guantanamo, he placed them out of reach of friend and foe alike—and according to Lining’s experience, those were often identical.

  She used the day off to reconsider all of her options.

  There was Option 1: She would somehow get the two old people out of Guantanamo Bay. She saw two ways of doing this. She could either use force, which she estimated would require at least a ten-person team to have any realistic chance against the guards. And the danger of failure or betrayal was high in this instance, even if she disguised the attack as the action of Islamists. Or she could try to bribe the most important people there. Unfortunately, she knew too little about the base, and she doubted the necessary dollar amounts to accomplish this would be authorized by her superiors. And then there would be the issue of transport. Shixin had been very clever to send the couple to an island.

  Then there was Option 2: Mr. and Mrs. Li could only serve as bargaining chips while they were alive. If they died through violence, an accident, or a disease, their daughter would be unhappy, but Lining could not imagine Jiaying cooperating with her adversaries anymore. A bombing at a camp holding almost exclusively Islamists did not seem very logical. Lining considered food poisoning instead. She would have to gain access to the kitchen unless she had a chance of meeting the couple unobserved.

  She did not worry about having promised Robert Millikan she would get Jiaying’s parents out unharmed. Millikan would still play along and try to tell the crew the bargaining chips no longer existed. On the other hand there was the risk of Jiaying doing something unexpected, like taking her own life in despair. This would be a problem for Lining as well, because the taikonaut was now a national hero. It would be impossible to hide such a sad ending from the public, as too many people would know about it.

  Was there a third way? The perfect ending for the mission would be Jiaying returning as a glorious heroine, the evil plotters being punished, and Lining receiving her long-deserved promotion. How could she achieve the ideal outcome? She knocked her pen against the desktop as was her habit when she was edgy. The TV above the bed was on, but without sound. She had switched it to a news channel. Lining did not want to watch, preferring to concentrate on her task, but then she noticed the blue text scrolling at the bottom of the screen. It reported that a CIA member leaked agency-embarrassing details about an operation in Moscow, implying the leaker sought to curry favor with the Russian intelligence service.

  Right, Lining thought, in the U.S. you do not lose your head for betraying state secrets—instead you are celebrated as a hero by the media. Even if a traitor was caught and arrested, he or she would be admired by large parts of the population. How could this lead to any trust between the state, the party, and the people? The ‘root of all evil,’ she suspected, was the fact of there being more than one party. Even within her Communist Party two factions competed, the Conservatives and the Dawn Movement How could a multi-party system even function?

  What would happen if she used this strange phenomenon for her own purposes? Could she get Mr. and Mrs. Li home safely without dirtying her hands? Lining did some internet research about Guantanamo and quickly found what she was looking for. The next to last U.S. President had already officially closed the camp. ‘Officially’ meant there should not be any new prisoners placed there. There were exceptions for existing cases whose home countries refused to let them back in, or were just too politically unstable. The Li couple clearly was no existing case and the People’s Republic of China was politically
stable. Officially, the parents of the taikonaut never left their country, so the two would definitely be welcomed back.

  Lining savored the idea of Shixin’s superiors having to grin and bear it when the couple returned to their apartment in Shanghai, under the watchful eyes of global media, of course. The couple would be smart enough not to offend their saviors.

  Where should she leak what she knew? The Washington Post had been the first to spread the rumor of a hijacking by an allegedly hostile AI. Where did the reporters get these ideas that they considered facts? Lining’s anticipation turned into anger. Her colleague and competitor—the old fart, Shixin—must have used the same method she was considering, without her being aware of it. Let us see who will have the last laugh, she thought... but she could not approach The Washington Post as well. Otherwise, the reporters there might try to find some connections between these sources.

  This left The New York Times. Lining quickly discovered this news outlet even provided a secure mailbox for people like her. Supposedly, nothing she uploaded there could be traced back to her, but of course she was not foolish enough to trust this setup. She hid her internet tracks, as she had learned to do during her training. As evidence, she left very short sections of the video she had recorded for Shixin in Guantanamo. The snippets contained geolocation data, so the reporters could use that to verify the site. She made the sections so short it was impossible to reconstruct what they were saying, even using lip-reading.

  What exactly the Li couple was doing at Guantanamo Base should be of no concern to the journalists. The important thing was pointing out there were people imprisoned there who should not be there at all. Since the media in this country were once again in a fight with the President—something completely unthinkable in her home country—she was providing them with valuable ammunition.

  April 20, 2047, Io

  “It’s a miracle,” Martin Neumaier said. He turned the microscope so she could easily look through the eyepiece. “Just look at this cute little worm.”

  Francesca did not really consider it cute, this animal that probably was not really an animal. To her, it looked like a cross between a helicopter and a zeppelin.

  “What is it, actually?” she asked.

  “It’s definitely a multi-cellular organism,” Martin replied. “It feeds on anything it finds, which is quite some achievement. Too bad it doesn’t contain any organic material or Earth could solve the problem of hunger once and for all.”

  “No organic material?”

  “Well, the cells do not consist of carbon, hydrogen, and oxygen. No terrestrial creature could digest this thing.”

  “But could it digest things on Earth?” asked Francesca, who instinctively flinched and moved back from the microscope, because the “propeller zeppelin,” as they soon agreed to call the things, seemed to be coming straight at her.

  “As far as I can see, it could.”

  “That sounds dangerous.”

  Martin hesitated, rubbing his hand over his chin. “Perhaps it would be, in the wrong place.”

  “For instance… on Earth?”

  “I could imagine this life form having certain evolutionary advantages over terrestrial beings.”

  “What do you mean, Martin? Where would it get those advantages?”

  “Through adaptation, definitely. The conditions on Io are rather violent, as far as living organisms are concerned. There is a lot of energy available, but learning to use it would be tricky.”

  “We are not able to use it, are we?”

  “We could, with our technology. But, if we were dropped here naked... Well, you can imagine it.”

  Francesca nodded. “We should be careful to dispose of this thing properly before we start our journey back to Earth.”

  Martin uttered a worried laugh. “I don’t think that’s our biggest concern right now.”

  Francesca placed an arm around his shoulder. Sometimes Martin seemed like a little boy needing to be hugged by his mother. At other times he appeared to be very aloof.

  “Thanks,” he said. “Well then, I am going to start analyzing the new samples. Did Hayato find anything when he evaluated his drilling?”

  Francesca shrugged, feeling a bit superfluous at the moment. While Martin analyzed the samples upstairs in the CELSS, Hayato sat at the computer downstairs and checked the measurements taken by his drill robot. Was Martin hinting she should go downstairs because she was getting on his nerves? The German astronaut often gave her that impression.

  She obligingly climbed down the ladder. Hayato did not even look up from his work. Maybe he did not hear her. Who knew?

  “And how are you doing?” she asked.

  “The data are contradictory,” he said. “Too bad the drill broke off or melted so soon. I cannot even tell for sure which of those two things occurred.”

  “Could you... extrapolate?” She knew Hayato hated to make predictions without having enough data.

  “I am not ready for that yet. But I can tell you what we know so far. On Io, there are occasionally explosive volcanic eruptions that shoot large amounts of material to great heights.”

  “You are probably not saying that just to entertain me.”

  “No, I am not. Such eruptions do not happen overnight. First a lot of pressure has to build in an underground magma chamber.”

  “And how do you know an eruption is about to occur?”

  “Just like on Earth—the temperature in the affected areas rises. And the closer we get to the eruption, the more often the pressure discharges itself in the form of tremors.”

  “Like the ones we have experienced several times already?”

  “Yes, like those,” Hayato said, pointedly returning to his diagrams.

  Francesca turned around. She understood. Once Hayato found something out, he would tell her. Maybe in the meanwhile... she could find a crater for Martin? She sat down at the pilot’s station and started up the computer. During the landing the ground had been scanned by radar. This did not generate a complete map of Io, but at least a strip with a width of about 50 kilometers. Also, the crater must not be too far from the landing site. Francesca had an idea of what Martin wanted to do with it, and she was curious to know if she was right.

  On the monitor she zoomed into the radar scan. Then she had the altitude differences displayed in false-color mode, allowing her to better recognize shapes. The surface of Io looked fascinating indeed. The fault lines visible in the radar image showed how this moon was being kneaded by Jupiter. Considering its size alone, it should have become inactive a long time ago, but the forces of the giant planet squeezed and crushed Io in such a way that a part of its interior remained liquid.

  The hot magma was covered by a thin crust. If a meteorite impact punctured it, or it could no longer withstand the pressure from the interior, volcanic eruptions occurred. In the radar image Francesca saw how different these could look. Sometimes the lava oozed slowly from a vent, but then she also saw a ring of debris around a volcano that had exploded. Small craters, like Martin needed, were relatively rare. She suspected they were too quickly erased from the surface of Io by other phenomena. Astronomers considered the surface of this moon ‘young.’ Francesca laughed quietly—with all these cracks and wrinkles, young was the last thing that came to her mind.

  She centered the radar map on the location of the lander and zoomed in a bit closer. About four kilometers to the northeast she noticed a circular area that appeared different from its surroundings. She checked the data: diameter about 150 meters, depth up to 40 meters. Would this be sufficient for Martin’s purposes? She sent the data to his account and saved the coordinates. This time, he would have to venture out.

  There was a rattling sound. As if on cue, Martin was climbing down the ladder from the CELSS.

  “Take a look, Martin,” said Francesca as she waved him over. She could not quite interpret the expression on his face. He somehow looked like he was forcing himself to stay calm. This was odd, as she knew Martin
to be a person always confident and looking to the future. Even during the seemingly hopeless dive of Valkyrie in the Enceladus Ocean he had never really lost his cool—at least not that she could remember.

  “Here, less than an hour’s walk,” she said to Martin, pointing at the crater once he stood next to her. His face brightened.

  “We have to go there as soon as possible,” he said. “Could you come along? Would you mind getting ready right away, Francesca?”

  She was surprised. Why the sudden urgency? she wondered.

  “What is going on?” she asked. “The sun will set soon, and shouldn’t we wait until the morning?”

  “No, we can’t afford to wait for 21 hours.”

  “Could you tell us why?”

  “The samples you took, Francesca.”

  “Yes?” She hated having to pry every answer out of him.

  “They are full of the propeller zeppelins.”

  “Maybe the environment there is particularly nutrient-rich?”

  “I tested it. No, just the opposite—most of them even changed into spores.”

  “You mean without the propeller.”

  “Exactly. In this form almost nothing can damage them. I tried it out—vacuum, radiation, cold, heat...”

  “That is fascinating,” Hayato said. Francesca had not even noticed him coming closer. Was he finished analyzing his measurement results?

  “Yes, really fascinating,” Martin confirmed, “and a bit dangerous, too. Do you know the type of mushrooms called puffballs? They don’t look like anything special. Their fruiting bodies kind of resemble potatoes. When you crush them, though, they burst and distribute spores in all directions. As kids we used to step on them for fun.”

  “You mean these life forms use volcanoes to spread themselves all over this moon?”