Rescue (an Ell Donsaii story #11)

by Laurence Dahners

  Opening the grid over the port, he passed the smoke generator through the port, then got back into the waldo controller gear and picked up the smoke generator from where it lay on the floor of the tunnel out on Mars. Blowing a little smoke out of it, he saw that the smoke drifted deeper into the tunnel instead of out toward the balloons blocking the opening. Walking the waldo deeper into the tunnel, he squirted little puffs of smoke ahead of himself to continue confirming the direction of the airflow.

  Twenty meters deeper into the tunnel the smoke disappeared into a crack a couple of millimeters wide running through the walls. It looked like a porous layer of rock that had formed separately. Geological processes had tilted the layer so that it intersected the tunnel obliquely.

  Carter passed a tube of silicone sealant through the port to the waldo. It took the entire tube and part of another to caulk the leak to his satisfaction, but it seemed to work. Once he’d done it, a puff of smoke stayed put, suggesting that he’d found the leak. He’d been worried that the low Martian temperatures or melted glassy surface would keep the silicone from working.

  A hundred meters in he came to the first large cavity. There they’d had the AI make the tunneler begin doubling back on itself. First it doubled back horizontally a number of trips to make a wider passage, then it went down a layer and made some passes to make a taller chamber. It did this while carefully leaving some occasional columns of rock to support the roof. He used the jets in the waldo to lift it up to the ceiling of the chamber and stuck a “glue on” port to the ceiling. Landing again he had the port open on a ten-percent open duty cycle, flooding the chamber with light from a solar parabolic mirror. Turning off the waldo’s headlight, he could finally see around the chamber without deep shadows everywhere except where the waldo’s headlight was pointing. The lighting port didn’t have to be very big because it sat at the mirror’s focal point. Just before the focal point sat a special filter that deflected most of the UV light back out into space so it wouldn’t be toxic. This was needed if they were going to live and grow things in the tunnels of Mars since the light wouldn’t be passing through a thick atmosphere and ozone layer like on earth. Also, as opposed to the asteroid mining mirrors, there wasn’t a sapphire lens on this parabolic to convert the light into a beam. Instead, it passed through the focal point at the port and then spread back out inside the chamber. A ground glass diffuser helped spread the light even more widely into the chamber.

  Carter increased the duty cycle to nearly full; flooding the chamber with so much brilliant light that it would begin warming it up. Before leaving, he put a thermostat on the wall so that an AI could control the temperature by adjusting the duty cycle of the light port. After a last look around, he moved on to the next cavity to install another parabolic light. Once he’d installed lights in all of the chambers, he left the waldo parked in a tunnel so it could monitor the temperature at a distance from the heat sources.

  They wouldn’t be able to plant anything in the chambers until the temperature rose from its current frigid Martian to a balmy Earthlike.

  For a moment he felt proud; then he laughed internally as he wondered what his ever so practical daughter would think of their small Martian outpost.

  ***

  Stell and her mother walked into the ophthalmology clinic. Dr. Jenner had sent them an appointment with a little note saying that he had some new contacts for her to try. True to his word Dr. Keller had gotten her some contacts that not only had pale blue irises, but also had black pupils in the middle of them. They looked better than contacts that showed her milky cornea in the centers, but Stell was really hoping they had something that looked a little more natural.

  While her mother went over to check her in, Stell glanced around the waiting room and was excited to see Dr. Keller sitting there. She went over and plopped down next to him. “I didn’t know you were coming! I’m only here to pick up some new contacts, so I didn’t think there was any reason for you to show up.”

  “I wouldn’t miss an opportunity to see my best girlfriend!” Dr. Keller said. “How are you liking your new eyesight?”

  “It’s wonderful! At first I had a lot of trouble telling what things were when I saw them. But now I can figure out what almost anything is when I see it. It’s only occasionally that I have to ask my mom or go feel something before I know what I’m looking at.”

  ___

  Ryan felt a great feeling of satisfaction wash over him. “So, are you ready to have the other eye done sometime soon?”

  “Oh yeah! I know I’m only here for a contact fitting, but I’m hoping to talk Dr. Jenner into scheduling the other eye too.”

  “Well, I have some other news. It doesn’t really apply to you anymore, but I thought you’d be interested. We’ve finally got optic nerve axons growing in to our neurotrodes in rats.”

  Stell clapped her hands together excitedly. “That’s wonderful! So, you think you’ll be able to help other blind people sometime soon?”

  “Well, I don’t think the FDA will approve it until we’ve shown that it will work in other animal models. And of course, when we do try it in people it will have to be in just one or two. But, yeah, I think we’re on the road to helping quite a few of the blind people out there.”

  Stell’s mother came over and sat down with them then. “It’s going to be a little while, Dr. Jenner’s nurse said he had two patients with really complex problems that put him behind schedule.”

  Stell told her mother about the good results from the rat neurotrodes and the three of them talked excitedly for a while about what this could mean for patients with seriously damaged eyes. Stell had several blind friends and she was dying to tell them about even the possibility.

  ___

  They didn’t actually have time to get bored before they got called back. The nurse did the basic check in and testing of Stell’s eyes and vision, then they did have to wait a little while for Dr. Jenner to actually show up.

  When he did, he was quite excited about how Stell’s eye was performing and how healthy it seemed to be. “Well, this has really boosted my day. I was pretty depressed after having to give a couple of patients some bad news earlier this clinic.”

  “Oh, are those the complex patients that put you behind schedule?” Stell asked.

  “Well, they weren’t really all that complex. They had macular degeneration, which will make them go blind eventually. There really isn’t any treatment for it like they’d been hoping. Giving people bad news always takes a little longer. Unfortunately, then it backs all the other patients appointments up and they’re often angry.”

  Stell said excitedly, “Dr. Keller’s neurotrodes are working in rats now! Is macular degeneration something that might be fixed if he could give a feed directly to the optic nerve?”

  Jenner looked up at Dr. Keller, “Really?”

  Dr. Keller nodded, “It’s looking pretty hopeful now.”

  Jenner looked back at Stell, “Yes, macular degeneration is a problem with the retina. So if Dr. Keller could feed an image directly to the nerve it would bypass that problem. If this really works, it’s going to make a lot of people very happy.” He leaned back and looked at Stell for a second, “Are you ready to try this new contact?”

  “Yes,” she squirmed excitedly, “is it going to look better than the old one?”

  Jenner glanced at Keller, who gave him a slight nod. Then he looked back at Stell, “We hope so, we’ll just have to see.”

  They busied themselves putting in the new contact. A minute or so later, Stell said, “Can I go look in the mirror?”

  Jenner glanced at Keller and gave him a little nod. Dr. Keller said, “Hang on one second, we’d like to try something, if you’ll give us control of your AI for a second?”

  Stell did, and a moment later, after Dr. Keller had given a few commands, she squeaked. “Something happened to my vision!”

  Dr. Keller sounded concerned, “Can’t you see?”

  “Yeah, and the image is n
ice and sharp, but it shifted. Also there’s something blocking the side of my visual field,” she said, sounding concerned. She reached up and touched her headband. “There’s nothing blocking my cameras,” she said querulously. Then a startled expression crossed her face. Slowly, expressing amazement, she said, “I can still see when I block my cameras!” Her hand slowly slid downward in front of her eye, “Oh my god! I’m seeing through my eye, not my cameras!” She turned to stare at Dr. Keller, then reached up and touched her nose. “It’s my nose that’s blocking my vision!”

  Keller took her hand, “Actually, there’s a port in your new contact that feeds a camera. That camera is the one that’s feeding you your new vision. Pretty cool, huh?”

  Stell jumped up out of her chair, and ran to the mirror. She turned excitedly back to them. “I thought a contact with a camera in it might look like a machine, even worse than my old contact. But this looks… this looks like a normal eye!”

  “Yep,” Dr. Keller said, looking inordinately proud of himself, “light goes both directions through the port in your contact. So we set up a pale blue “iris” behind the port, so that from outside your eye, it looks like you are seeing a normal iris through a cornea.”

  Stell ran to Keller, throwing her arms around him, and hugging him hard. “Thank you, thank you, thank you!” Without taking her arms from around him she turned to look at Jenner, “When can you do my other eye?”

  Chapter Five

  Gary turned to survey Allosci’s corner of the sports bar. Everyone looked like they were having a good time. Mentally he thanked Ell for her suggestion that he take the Allosci research group out occasionally. He felt like their morale had significantly improved since that first event out to Jordan Lake. They talked to one another more easily and generally seemed to get along better.

  As his eyes passed over the group, they hung up for a moment on Viveka, speaking to one of the young optical scientists who she’d been working with on the VLGCs. She and Matt seemed to get along pretty well. Gary tried to tell himself that he felt glad for her. Matt was more her age.

  However, it was breaking Gary’s heart.

  “You two are acting like a couple of sixth graders,” Cindy’s voice said behind him.

  “Huh?” Gary said with some confusion, as he turned toward Cindy, wondering who she was talking to. Or about.

  Cindy pointed her chin at Viveka, “You, and Viveka over there. When you’re not looking, she’s making moony eyes at you. And I see you, trying to pretend you’re sweeping your eyes over the entire group, but your eyes always hang up on her for a second or two. It’s like you’re both trying to pretend you’re not hung up on each other, the way grade school kids do.”

  Gary’s first impulse was to deny it, but then he realized he did need advice. He shrugged, “I’ll admit that I’m … very distracted by her. But, I think you’re wrong, I’m pretty sure that my feelings for her aren’t reciprocated.”

  Cindy snorted, “You two might be all ‘science’ brilliant, but you’re ‘socially’ impaired! My little niece understands love better than the two of you.”

  Gary glanced back towards Viveka momentarily, “Really? You don’t think she’s pissed at me?”

  “Oh no you don’t!” Cindy laughed, “The next thing I know, you’re going to have me going back and forth between the two of you carrying stupid little messages such as, ‘he likes you,’ and, ‘she likes you back.’”

  Gary gave her an embarrassed grin, “Well I know I’m that clueless. I’m a guy after all. But do you really think she’s as out of touch as I am?”

  Cindy snorted, “Yeah, she’s got ‘geek’ stamped on her forehead in big bold print, can’t you see it? You really should try talking to her,” Cindy winked at him, “That’s what normal people do, you know?”

  “I would, but I took her out on a date several months ago, and I think I really pissed her off.”

  “Well, apologize! That’s what grown-ups do in those situations.” She wrinkled her nose at him, “It ain’t rocket science.”

  Gary turned to look musingly at Viveka, “You’re right.”

  ***

  It was Christmas Eve and the family had settled into one of Ell’s properties in the mountains of western North Carolina. Because Ell feared the FBI would be especially vigilant about watching Kristen around the Christmas holidays, Ell had had Kristen make several false starts as well as changes in cars and appearances on her way up. Gram and Duncan had gone with her and suffered through the same extra effort.

  Now they were all settled around a fire with hot chocolate. Zage had been put to bed and they were just talking. Kristen turned to Ell and Shan, “Zage is 15 months old now, is he walking more?”

  Shan snorted, “We think so. But he never walks in front of us. He just puts up his hands asking to be carried. However, if we leave him in a location where he doesn’t want to be, he will eventually appear somewhere where there is a video screen for him to watch. We have a couple of security camera clips of him walking from one location to another at times like that.”

  Ell nodded, “It feels like a strange game he’s playing with us. It’s as if he doesn’t want us to know he can walk. We also haven’t figured out how he manages to turn on the videos and select biology shows like he wants to watch.”

  Kristen frowned, “He only watches biology shows? What about cartoons?”

  “I found him watching a cartoon once, but then it turned out to be an educational cartoon!”

  “Yeah,” Shan shrugged, “He sometimes watches shows that aren’t biology, but they always seem to have something to do with science.”

  Ell wiped at an eye and huskily said, “Sometimes I feel proud that he seems to watch programs that are almost exclusively educational. Other times I feel sad that our child is so weird.”

  Kristen shrugged, “Every child is different.” she winked at Ell, “And as you so thoroughly proved, different is not necessarily bad.”

  Ell produced a Kleenex and blew her nose, “Maybe, but I can’t help but worry.”

  “Well,” Kristen said with a grin, “Duncan had an idea for a Christmas present that might help.” She winked at Duncan. He grinned back.

  Ell looked back and forth from Kristen to Duncan. “What is it?”

  Duncan smiled, then said, “I’m not telling. I think it will be a fun surprise for you too.”

  Ell raised an eyebrow and mock glared at him. “It had better not be something that’ll piss me off.”

  Duncan raised his hands in counterfeit surrender, waving them back and forth, “I hope it won’t, but I’m still not tellin’.”

  ***

  In the morning, as they gathered to open presents, Ell found herself more excited to find out what Duncan had brought for Zage than she was about any presents of her own. Disappointingly, just like Zage had exhibited little joy over the peek-a-boo game, the opening of presents did not seem to excite him very much either. She wondered if he was just too young, and asked Kristen and Gram what they thought.

  No one was very sure how a 15 month old usually reacted to presents, but the consensus was that real Christmas excitement wouldn’t come for a few more years.

  Finally, it looked like they had opened all the presents. Ell wondered if she had missed it when Zage opened the present from Duncan. But then Duncan came in from the other room carrying a medium sized box which he brought over to Zage, setting it in front of him.

  Zage looked at the box placidly like he had his other presents, but then the box wiggled. Ell’s eyes widened as she noticed a couple of holes in the top of the box.

  Zage leaned forward, grabbed the tail of the bow in the ribbon and pulled. The knot came undone and with a delighted expression Zage lifted the lid off the box.

  As Ell had feared, a small, chocolate brown, short haired puppy sat in the box, tongue lolling out. Zage reached out to him and the puppy licked his finger. With an excited squeal Zage picked the puppy up behind its front legs and pulled it out of the box
and up against his body. Rolling backwards, Zage and the puppy wound up next to each other on the floor, Zage’s arms around his dog, his face lit by a happy smile.

  As Ell, who had never had a pet herself, opened her mouth to protest, the puppy wiggled free and scampered clumsily across the room. The adults’ eyes all widened as Zage rose to his feet and gave chase.

  The puppy might have looked clumsy, but Zage did not.

  Over the next several days, as their family enjoyed the holiday together, Zage and his puppy, now named “Tanner,” scampered inseparably around the house and, bundled up, outside in the snow. The remainder of Zage’s new toys lay lonely under the Christmas tree.

  Though the adults were ecstatic about Zage’s newfound physical activity and his surprising degree of coordination, their concerns soon rose again. Zage might be walking, but when would he start talking? Most babies were saying some words by age fifteen months. Zage had never even said “Mama.”

  ***

  Dupree Fallon looked out over the assembled members of the SCDF. He’d taken the unprecedented step of gathering them all in one location rather than communicating through their cell structure like he usually did. They’d each had to leave behind all of their electronics to gain admission to the area. Redman and Brick had met them up at a rendezvous by the highway where their vehicles had dropped them off one at a time. After each man had been wanded and patted down to be sure they hadn’t forgotten any electronics, they’d been hiked two miles through the woods to the actual meeting.

  Wearing coats in the cold weather, they were gathered now, all fifty seven strong. They met in a small clearing in the woods where Dupree could speak to them from atop the trunk of a fallen tree. He watched them, waiting for them to quiet, finally staring directly at the last few who had continued carrying on their own conversations. They stumbled to a stop.