Ice Moon 2 The Io Encounter

by Brandon Q Morris

  “It must be excited sodium ions,” he explained to Francesca.

  “Doesn’t matter what it is. It’s absolutely beautiful. We couldn’t see it during the day.”

  As planned, they reached the crater in about an hour. If Francesca had not pointed out they were there, he would not have recognized their destination. There was quite a bit of work ahead of them, but on the whole he was satisfied. The crater was deep enough, and its circumference even a bit larger than he had hoped for. What bothered him were the numerous stones covering its ground.

  “We have to clean up a little bit before we can start,” he said.

  She pointed. “Those rocks there?”

  He nodded and then realized Francesca would not see his head moving behind the visor in the darkness of Io’s night, so he said, “Yes, those.”

  Martin placed the large bag on the ridge surrounding the crater. Due to the low gravity, clearing away even the largest stones posed no problem. It was just that they had to walk around so much. Martin started to sweat, had to drink, and knew what that meant—he was glad he had put on the diaper. Now and then he would stop and look up at Jupiter, which hung stoically above them, seemingly unconcerned with what was happening here.

  Once Francesca came and stood next to him. “And, what do you see?”

  “A ball of gas weighing as much as 318 Earths, and so large that it would hold over 1,300 Earths, which would squash us into metal if we tried to land there.”

  “Indeed?”

  “Well, that is what it would do to the hydrogen in our bodies.”

  “Which hydrogen?”

  “The one in water...” He stopped his disjointed explanation and said, “Okay, I get it. I was just talking nonsense, just to impress you. But it is true—hydrogen becomes metallic under the high pressures in the mantle of Jupiter.”

  Francesca kicked against the lower part of his spacesuit, which almost made him fall. “Get on with it. We have to finish this, and Jupiter will still be up there afterward,” she said.

  After two hours of hard work, Martin looked down into the crater and was satisfied. In the center they built a small pedestal of large rocks they had deliberately left there.

  “And now?”

  He still had not fully explained his plan to Francesca. It was good that she was so pragmatic and did not demand explanations until they were needed. Any other person might have gotten on his nerves during the last three days.

  “You know about the Chinese FAST telescope?”

  “You mean—the radio dish in the mountains?” she asked.

  “Yes, exactly. They dug a depression and gave the slopes a reflective coating, creating a huge antenna. Something like that.”

  “I see, so our crater is the depression.”

  “Exactly.”

  “And how will we make it a reflector?”

  “I’ve got it in the bag.”

  Francesca looked at the bag. “You have got to explain this,” she finally said.

  “I removed mercury from the stabilizers,” Martin said.

  “You did what? Are you crazy? How is our next landing...?”

  “There will be no ‘next landing.’ If we ever reach Earth, they will pick us up.”

  “I understand,” she said. He was right, absolutely. If this plan failed, there would not be another lift-off, let alone another landing.

  “Mercury is very reflective. We only have to cover the crater with it.” He bent down and opened the bag. Then he took out a small barrel, a kind of metallic umbrella, and four bricks of C4 explosive.

  “The barrel goes on the pedestal in the center. It contains a heater unit that keeps the mercury liquid. Otherwise, it would freeze at minus 39 degrees—and we don’t want that to happen. We put the umbrella over it. It is supposed to prevent the mercury from splashing in all directions.”

  “Why should it splash?”

  “I think when we detonate this stuff,” he said, pointing at the explosive, “it won’t have much choice.”

  “But the explosion will hardly create a perfect film of mercury, or anything close to an even thickness.”

  “We don’t actually need it to be. We only have to increase the sensitivity of our sender and receiver. If a signal hits a metal surface, it will be reflected toward the center, where we can receive it. That way, we will definitely receive more photons of the signal than by just relying on the receiver in the middle. The larger the area, the more gaps we can allow ourselves.”

  “But most of the time Io is not facing in the right direction for our antenna to receive anything, is it?” asked Francesca.

  “Right. So we will have to make optimal use of the short moments when the antenna is aimed at Earth or ILSE for our messages,” Martin answered.

  “Didn’t you originally mention receiving messages?”

  “Maybe so, but sending works the same way.”

  “Phew,” Francesca said. “Sounds rather complicated.”

  “I ran the calculations several times. It’s going to work.”

  “Then let’s get started.”

  Martin nodded. Francesca offered to help him, but he declined. It’s my plan, he thought. He placed the heated barrel on the pedestal. He did not bother to mention to Francesca that this part of his plan was the weakest. What if not enough mercury stuck to the floor of the crater? The metal, which was liquid at room temperature, might freeze before hitting the ground and then it would form granules. Or perhaps the force of the explosion would vaporize it, preventing it from reaching the bottom of the crater. He shook his head. ‘You learn by doing,’ his physics teacher used to say.

  He situated the umbrella on a rod above the barrel. On Earth, it would be blown away by the explosion, but with no atmosphere there would be no shockwave. While the mobilized mercury particles would give the umbrella a substantial shove, they would at least change direction, deflect, and remain in the crater. He connected each of the four explosive bricks to a detonator. Then he placed them at the four points of the compass around the barrel. The trick was to let the explosion give the mercury particles a strong enough ‘kick’ that they would spread in all directions.

  Okay. So much for preparations, Martin thought. He waved at Francesca and walked toward her location at the edge of the crater.

  “Is everything okay?” she asked.

  “Everything’s set. We should hide behind the ridge.”

  “Do you expect a shockwave in a vacuum?”

  “No, but I don’t want my spacesuit to be covered by a layer of mercury.”

  “Good answer,” Francesca said. They knelt behind the ridge to avoid getting hit by the mercury. Then Martin activated the detonators.

  Nothing seemed to happen. Annoyed, he looked at Francesca. She gave him a thumbs-up. Of course. They were too far away to feel the ground vibrations caused by the explosion. He looked and saw that the attempt had been a success. Within a radius of about 50 meters, the bottom of the crater was shiny. Martin was relieved. He reached into the bag, took out a box, and went to the center of the circle. The umbrella and the rod were still there, but the barrel had been destroyed. No matter, they would not need it anymore.

  Martin placed the box on the pedestal and pushed a button. The box was a receiver powered by a radionuclide battery, but it could also be used as a transmitter. As a receiver, it would work almost indefinitely, but when it transmitted, the power output was important. The radionuclide battery provided a low amount of energy that remained constant across a long period of time, but was not sufficient to send messages to Earth. Therefore he had installed a buffer battery that gradually filled up and then could give off its stored energy as a burst. That way they could send messages for a few seconds every few days. It would be vitally important to shout into space at the very moment when Earth was in the ‘field of view’ of the transmitter crater.

  Martin gave Francesca the signal to start the return trip.

  “Don’t we have to stay here to listen?”

 
“No,” he said, “the receiver works independently. We can wirelessly connect to it from the lander.”

  “Then let’s go!” exclaimed Francesca. “I am really curious to know what Earth has to say to us.”

  April 21, 2047, ILSE

  Water vapor covered the small room like fog. Jiaying knew she should not take long showers, but she experienced the only real downtime of her day under the warm jet of water. She turned the water so hot it almost hurt. This forced her mind—which otherwise dwelled on guilt, death, her friends, and ILSE—to concentrate on the heat and to tell her to leave the shower soon. Otherwise she would be boiled alive. For a short time she felt only her body and its pain and was shielded from the world. She was utterly alone.

  The negative thoughts returned as soon as she left the shower, and with them her misery. She picked up the towel from the floor to dry herself off and saw the new letter. Jiaying was glad Amy had come up with the idea. On paper, one could communicate very differently, and she told Amy things she would have never said aloud.

  She had the feeling that this particular letter was somehow different, but did not know from where this intuition arose. Once she had read the text, she felt, one section of her life would end and another one would begin. How could she know this? She was probably going insane. Nevertheless she put the towel aside, sat down on the little stool, and read the letter.

  Dear Jiaying, it began. Amy always started her letters this way, never with ‘Hi’ or other abbreviated or informal expressions.

  Your parents are alive and free. Her insides seemed to cramp when she read this. How could this be, and how could Amy know of it? Was this some stupid kind of joke?

  I am sorry to spring such a message on you like this. I thought you should find out as soon as possible. You had to wait so long for this letter, so I wanted to say it right at the beginning. In her mind, Jiaying heard Amy’s casual tone, which calmed her, and she imagined the kind, understanding face of her friend. She still could not imagine that the message could possibly be true, but Amy seemed to believe it.

  Marchenko succeeded in contacting me. If you happened to notice some movements of the surveillance cameras—that is him. But do not look at them too conspicuously, or Watson might notice! Marchenko uses Morse code to send signals. I hope you still remember it from your training. They actually had learned to use Morse code during basic training. Jiaying never imagined she would ever have to use this skill. She really hoped Amy was right! But she could not just have imagined it.

  Unfortunately, we cannot answer him. I suspect he received a message from Earth, since Watson obviously did not cut him off from his senses. This sounded logical—if the message was true, it had to have come from Earth.

  I have got an idea how we can wrest away control of the ship from Watson. I need your help with it. Jiaying briefly put the letter aside. So this was it—Amy asking for her help. And what if the message was not true? What if Amy only wanted to save her own life? Could she imagine the commander doing something like that? Jiaying shook her head, but then she remembered Dimitri Sol. How far would she go for the sake of her own child? How far had she gone for her parents?

  Perhaps you do not trust me, Amy continued. She had anticipated it! That is logical, as we are in an extreme situation. Your parents, versus me and my child. But if you help me and find out I cheated, you could still continue your mission—if you still want to. Then it would be one versus one, and with Watson’s help your chances would be pretty good. But in the best-case scenario you save the expedition and all of your friends.

  Yes, this was the grand prize Amy was promising her. The risk was manageable. Jiaying really wanted Amy to be telling the truth. Everything could return to the way it used to be. Except for the fact she had betrayed the entire crew—would they ever forgive her? She would have to live with this guilt. Could she do it? Or was it better to get unpleasant things over and done with? She still had a bit of time before making a decision.

  The only way to restore the previous power structure on board is to completely reboot the computer system. Watson’s ability to circumvent my authorization must have arrived as an update by radio. If we close down and restart the systems, the AI would once more only have its old authority.

  Now it was clear why Amy needed her. The computer possessed no main switch. They would have to cut the power supply, which only worked if they had access to the lab. Once the computer was rebooted, Amy could retake control as the commander. If someone on Earth noticed, though, it would be possible to make Watson the boss again by once more using the backdoor program.

  There is one problem—what will happen to Marchenko? There is no place assigned to him in the read-only memory. Therefore we have to copy him to a storage device of sufficient size and restore him after the reboot.

  We? Jiaying thought. I will have to do this. Should she trust Amy? Of course this could be a trick to get her to cooperate, yet the very idea of her parents being free made her happy. How she would love to see them again! And she could save the other three who were stranded on Io, even though Martin definitely would not forgive her. The price for this was the risk of being betrayed now, just like she had betrayed the rest of the crew. It seemed like a fair deal.

  Jiaying summed up her tasks: backup Marchenko, reset computer, restore Marchenko. It sounded doable, if Watson would let her. It depended on whether he would consider the backup as something endangering the mission. The AI would not be able to prevent her from manually cutting the power supply.

  So that is my plan. As far as I am concerned, we could start as soon as possible. I am looking forward to hearing from you. Best Wishes, Amy.

  Jiaying shivered. The life support system had managed to draw off most of the water vapor. She placed the sheet of paper where it could not be seen from the outside. Then she rubbed herself dry with the towel and put on her clothes. Now she knew what her reply to the commander would be. She had once chosen betrayal over trust, and it brought her bad luck. This time, she would choose the other option.

  April 22, 2047, Io

  “First of all, we have to warn Earth. The sooner scientists there know about this threat, the better they can prepare for it,” Francesca insisted. Leaning forward, she placed her arms on her knees. She alternated looking between Hayato and Martin.

  She is right, Martin thought, but do a few days really matter? If only we knew when the volcanic eruption would occur! “I think we need to listen first.”

  Hayato seemed to agree with him. “Yes, we first have to find out whether Earth wants to tell us anything. Who knows what has happened there?”

  Unfortunately, the time window for communicating with Earth was very brief, and they would have to make a quick decision. In about two hours their antenna—the modified crater on Io—and Earth would be in alignment in space allowing for a direct connection. However, both objects would be moving in different directions at enormous speeds. Martin estimated they would have a maximum of two minutes, and conditions allowing a transmission would only exist in the middle of that time span. That was not enough time for switching modes, so they had to decide whether to listen or to talk.

  Martin understood Francesca’s worry about their home planet, even though some people there seemed to be intent on preventing the return of ILSE. But he did not think a warning would be of any use. It seemed more important to find out about the current situation at home.

  “Francesca, even if we warn Earth,” he said, “it wouldn’t reduce the danger. It is impossible to create a perfect shield around the planet, preventing the tiniest of particles from entering the atmosphere.”

  “And it is not that dangerous, because even if a propeller zeppelin reached Earth, it would burn up in the atmosphere due to its high speed,” Hayato added. Martin was not so sure about that, but he did not say anything. Of the multitude of spores, a handful might survive, if they for some reason slowed down earlier. If they slowly infiltrated the atmosphere, became alive in the uppermost levels, and then m
ultiplied quickly, a worldwide rain of these extraterrestrial organisms might fall a few weeks later.

  “We have to solve the problem at its root, and I have an idea about it,” Martin said. “Sending a warning would not help anyone. Therefore I suggest we listen during our first communication window.”

  Francesca opened her mouth, but then said nothing. She must have realized the discussion was over.

  “Concerning a solution,” Hayato said, “I had an idea in a dream. Well maybe while I was just dozing, as it seemed quite realistic to me.”

  Martin had also pondered for a long time before finally falling asleep. He thought of the umbrella he had used to distribute the mercury more evenly. If they managed to contain the expected explosion with a giant cover... it did not have to be some metal shield—a huge piece of fabric or a flexible foil would suffice. Unfortunately, they did not have enough fabric or foil on board. They either would have to produce the material or have it sent from Earth. Only the first of these two options seemed even halfway realistic.

  “According to my calculations, the spores will achieve a maximum velocity of 70 kilometers per second,” Hayato said. “The error might be relatively large, as we simply do not have enough data, and the calculations are based on terrestrial models that might not apply here. The decisive factor in all scenarios is the pressure in the magma chamber.”

  Martin had a feeling he knew what Hayato was aiming for, and he was not happy about it. He saw both surprise and horror expressed on Francesca’s face.

  “You want to relieve the pressure?”

  Hayato nodded and smiled. “Yes, that is the idea. We can achieve this by using explosions. If the eruptions were not concentrated in one location, but the magma found outlets in many places, that would automatically reduce the pressure.”

  “You want to blow up an active volcano right before an eruption?” asked Martin. The idea seemed crazy, but there might actually be something to it. At the same time it scared him quite a bit. He would prefer witnessing the coming catastrophe from a safe distance, rather than having to push the button himself.