The Battle of Titan

by Sudipto Majumdar

  For example, the time between when they entered the influence of Titan’s gravity and hence its orbit, and the time they settled into the final synchronous orbit over a particular spot over Titan was between 3.60 and 3.63 days, depending on when you consider they went into orbit.

  My hypothesis is that the period of 3.61 days holds some special significance to the aliens culturally. It could be the equivalent of an Hour, or more likely the equivalent of a day for them. My speculation is that this is probably the time it may take for their home planet to turn once on its axis, and hence truly could be one alien day. To avoid confusion with our time measurement units, I call it one cycle.

  We have narrowed down their time of departure from orbit to a window of about 3 hours now. If I calculate how much time that is, from the time they settled into that particular spot over the camp, it comes out to be a figure between 31.97 and 32.03 cycles.

  I have another hypothesis, based on observations so far, but the data is even less in this case. The hypothesis is that there is a special place for the numbers 4, 8, 16 and 64 in their culture. That might seem random at first glance, unless you realize how few data points we have till date about them.

  If we were to extrapolate, I believe that the numbers would fall in a series of 2, 4, 8, 16, 32, 64 and so on. Now I can see Dr. Srinivasan smiling, and I must thank him for pointing this out to me in the first place, these numbers are basically all powers of the number 2, used in human computer science all the time. This is because computers work in binary.

  We humans have special significance of the numbers 1, 10, 100, 1000 and so on which are powers of 10, because we naturally calculate in decimal number systems, some say because we have 10 fingers in our hands. Now I am not suggesting that the aliens have only two fingers, or for that matter they have fingers at all, but what I am suggesting is the these aliens might be using binary the way we use decimal system.

  If you take these two hypothesis together, then the alien ship left exactly after 32 of their cycles, as a matter of procedure, just like a human may wait for a certain operation to stabilize for 10 days and then proceed to the next task.” Mischa finished her discourse looking around if there were any questions. There were none.

  It was now Jorge’s turn to add to the conversation. Jorge was perhaps the most famous member of the ship, along with Ramesh. Both of them were considered the co-discoverers of two of the most famous discoveries made by humans. He had a PhD in Astronomy, but he had not sat on his laurels since his famous twin discoveries.

  He had dedicated his life to studying every aspect of the aliens, whom he and Ramesh also had the honor of naming. He was considered the biggest expert on the Shaitans. Like his wife, Jorge had also returned back to college, this time to study engineering, applied physics and materials, especially pertaining to space engineering. These were now the fastest growing human engineering fields.

  “Assuming that we do not find the alien ship anywhere else, there is one place it could have gone. I would say even likely that it has gone, though some may not agree due the engineering difficulty involved. The alien ship may have gone skimming the atmosphere of Saturn.

  We have analyzed the light spectrum of the ejection of their ion plasma drive, and are quite certain that it consists entirely of Helium – 4. Based on this we have a fair idea of the mechanism of their power source as well as their ion plasma drive. They have a fairly efficient and compact fusion drive compared to humans. To power this fusion reactor they need hydrogen. The best place nearby to fill up their hydrogen tank would be the atmosphere of Saturn.”

  Daniel wanted to be sure of what Jorge was saying so he asked. “I think I am aware of the concept, but could you explain this skimming business to all of us just to be sure?”

  “Gas giant skimming is a fairly efficient way to collect hydrogen, if you are skilled enough a pilot and your space ship is good enough to do it. You basically keep lowering the orbit of the ship towards a gas giant like Saturn, till you get close enough to be touching the extremely thin upper atmosphere.

  All planets with an atmosphere including earth have a very thin wispy layer of atmosphere where it meets empty space. This atmosphere is so thin that for all practical purpose, it would feel like being in empty space. However there are a few molecules per cubic centimeter of atmosphere out there, enough to collect in the open maw of the space ship as you plow through it at the high speed of orbit.

  There isn’t enough atmosphere to cause any turbulence and hence any danger to the ship, just a very small drag on the ship which would need to be compensated by small bursts of thrust. If you didn’t compensate for the drag, then it would eventually drag you in further into the atmosphere and then the ship would be in trouble.” Jorge replied.

  “So if I understand it right, between you and Dr. Mischa what you are suggesting is that the aliens came to Titan, and understandably after the long journey were low on fuel. It waited for a certain number of days to ensure that their camp got settled and that there were no threats to it. Once it was fairly certain that things were fine, then according to its navigation protocol, it went ahead to the atmosphere of Saturn to fill up its fuel tank.” Daniel summarized.

  “Yes that is what we think is possible, although we cannot be sure about it.” Jorge replied.

  “So if they went to fill up their tank, how long do you think they will take to fill it up?” Daniel further asked Jorge. Jorge was a bit reluctant to answer, but finally said. “I can give you a figure, but out of the five input variables needed to make that calculations, I have no idea about four of them, so I am not sure how reliable those figure would be.”

  “I am not going to bet our lives on your figure doctor, so don’t sweat on getting it wrong. I just want some educated guess. It is better than having no idea.” Daniel assured Jorge.

  Jorge seemed sufficiently assured to speak out. “We have estimated from their drive ejection characteristics, that they will require about 43 thousand tons of Hydrogen to make the journey from Shaitan to earth. They would not design the ship to reach here on empty, so the tank would have a higher capacity. I would say that after taking into account the amount of fuel it may already have in its tank, it would fill in at the maximum 45 thousand tons of Hydrogen. This is the easy part.

  What we don’t know is their intention. Does the captain of the Shaitan ship intend to top up its tank, or just fill up a little, say 10 thousand tons and proceed to some other task it needs done within the solar system. Unfortunately we will not know, so the estimate I am going to give is the maximum time it would take to fill. Please keep that in mind captain, the ship could always return faster than that time.” Jorge looked at Daniel who nodded back in understanding.

  “There are two kinds of fusion reactors possible, one uses rare isotopes of Hydrogen – Deuterium and Tritium for fusion, while the other can theoretically use normal Hydrogen which is 99% of the hydrogen available. We humans use in our primitive fusion reactors the rare isotopes, which is why we have to produce the fusion fuel specifically, instead of just taking some water and using the Hydrogen out of it.

  It is estimated that the other process requires so much heat to convert normal hydrogen to Deuterium and Tritium before fusion that it is well beyond any technology we have to achieve it. It may be a thousand years into our future if ever. The aliens are advanced, but not that advanced, so I expect them to be using the rare isotopes of hydrogen as well.

  This means that they will have to take in the atmosphere of Saturn, first isolate the Hydrogen from the rest of the air, and then isolate those rare isotopes. The entire process is limited by the amount of Tritium you can collect which is even rarer than Deuterium.

  Fifty percent of the fuel required is Tritium. It is estimated that to collect one ton of Tritium, you will have to trawl through almost 9,000 tons of raw hydrogen. Since Saturn’s atmosphere is over 90% Hydrogen, they would probably have to trawl through about 10,000 tons of the atmosphere.

  To fill up th
eir tanks they would require about 22,000 tons of Tritium, which would mean…” Daniel did a mental calculation before answering. “220 million tons or about a quarter billion tons of the atmosphere.

  How long they would take to trawl through a quarter billion tons of atmosphere depends on how deep they dare go with their ship and how fast is their filtering capacity to extract the Deuterium and Tritium. If humans were to dare to do this, then with our current technology, and a ship the size of the alien ship, it would take us between three to four weeks.

  However given that the aliens do this probably routinely and are much more advanced, they would probably go deeper, assuming their filtering capacity is fast enough. I would guess they can do it within a week.” Jorge finished.

  “That helps more than you realize doctor.” Daniel told Jorge. “It gives me a time frame. Even if your actual figure is wrong, it tells me that I am looking at days and probably a week before the alien ship returns. I will have to plan accordingly. As you all know, according to our original plan, the Charles Martell is running in faster than us, and the Jiānjué even faster.

  So despite them leaving at an interval of 7 days each roughly, The Charles Martell is scheduled for arrival in three days’ time, and the Chinese a day later. The remote possibility of having to land and meet the Shaitans on the surface, has become a lot more likely with this changed situation.

  As you all know our protocol dictates that we cannot directly approach the alien camp from space on a shuttle. It requires that we make camp on Titan, and ensure all the representatives of the three ships are present when we approach the camp.

  We are to observe the camp closely and then along with consultations with mission control, decide on the best way to approach the camp, which could well be on foot. This means we need to identify an appropriate camp site, which hopefully will not be very far from the alien camp.

  Dr. Matsumoto is involved with the crew in conducting detailed geological and topographical scans of Titan even as we speak, I would invite him to let us know his preliminary thoughts.” Daniel yielded the floor to Yusuke.

  “Thank you captain. As you rightly mentioned, this is very preliminary, but our original intended primary site at Sotra Facula is checking out absolutely as we thought it would. Coincidentally it is not very far from the alien camp, only 130 Km away. We are checking out the alternate candidates identified from earth, as well as some new ones we identified after arrival. However till now Sotra Facula looks like the best bet.” Yusuke said.

  “I hope it turns out to be so. Sotra Facula is the best strategic option from a military standpoint.” Capt. Alex Parkinson pointed out, reminding everyone, why it was their primary candidate.

  “We cannot start making the base till the Charles Martell is here with the equipment anyway, so we have three days to make sure. Thank you doctors for your valued opinion, please let me know even the slightest new findings you may come across. Our lives may depend on it more than you might know.

  Capt. Parkinson could you please stick around, I would like to discuss our options on the ground with you.” Daniel said, indicating that the meeting was over. The scientists filed out going back to their science stations, while the two soldiers talked shop, working out various scenarios they anticipated.

  Chapter 20

  The landing

  The spot was perfect. The robotic drone had confirmed what the radar & infra-red images had shown from orbit. It was decided by consensus of all the specialist aboard USS Friendship, that Rose 31 would be the landing site. The site had been chosen well.

  Discovered in the first few years of this century, by the mission which also landed the first probe on this moon, Rose was one of the largest and most active cryo-volcanoes on Titan. It is not really rose shaped, but it appeared so in the first photographs taken from the Cassini Probe in 2009. Officially known as “Sotra Facula”, everybody calls the cryo-volcano region and its caldera the Rose.

  Sotra Facula is located around 15 degrees south latitude, 40 degrees west longitude, which is perfect because it is less than a hundred miles from the alien landing site they want to investigate and yet far enough for some tactical comfort.

  By far the best feature was its geography and topography. Rose was part of a string of mountains running east to west. So it was approachable only from two broad directions easily by a large force – North and South. The caldera is a steep sloping one almost conical in shape going deep down into the mountains.

  It is impossible to go down the steep slope without rock climbing gear. It has only one entrance facing west where the walls of the caldera have been eroded by a river of liquid methane. The river is fed by the heat of the volcano, which causes frozen methane on the slopes of the caldera to melt and form channels, which feed into the river.

  Heat is a relative word on Titan. At the bottom of the caldera where cryo-lava erupts from many spots continuously, the temperature of the lava measures a scalding -30° C. The lava is mainly water mixed with Ammonia, with traces of Methane, Hydrogen Cyanide and other nasty stuff.

  It flows with the same consistency as lava on earth, slowly hardening as the temperature cools it to solid ice. It is weird to think of water as lava, but on earth ground that one stands on is made out of rocks and silica, so lava is made out of molten rocks and silica. So it is natural that on Titan, where the ground is made out of ice, lava would be made out of water.

  The number one reason the engineers and scientists chose the place was the temperature. If they can build the landing site on top of the lava flow using deep stilts as they promise, then they would have an ambient temperature around the site of -45° C.

  That is like winter temperature on an Antarctic station. Humans have survived with their equipment functioning in those temperature for many decades now. Even then, they could not have survived there for long, but for the micro nuclear fission reactor they would be taking along with them.

  The reactor would be one of the first piece of equipment to go down. It was not really a marvel of engineering, given the fact that nuclear fission reactors are more than a century old technology. However what is unique about this reactor is its size.

  It would never have been possible if this was being installed on earth, it simply would not have been allowed. The reactor had almost nothing in terms of containment, and containment forms 99% of the bulk of a fission reactor.

  It was basically a cylinder with embedded cylindrical tubes in it, where plutonium rods and control rods (rods which control the neutron emission rate in the chain reaction to prevent runaway reaction and meltdown) could be inserted.

  Titan’s ice molten into liquid would be inserted into one of the cylinder, heated by the plutonium rods, driving a set of turbines on the other end of the cylinder, generating energy. The liquid would then be cycled back to the input end of the cylinder to start the cycle all over again.

  Primitive but robust and reliable. You can trust the Russians to build these things and they did. The design had been developed expressly for this mission.

  Since it did not have any radiation protection, it needed to be embedded within a thick layer of ice, as far as possible from the landing site. The reactor would leave the site within which it would be embedded, with dangerous levels of radiation for more than a million years, with the additional likelihood that ice molten from the heat of the reactor would flow over hundreds of years carrying radioactivity further downstream.

  Obviously this would not have been allowed on earth, and was barely allowed on Titan. It got the nod due to the urgency of the mission, which made it impossible to design anything better, and the mission was not possible without this source of power.

  This did not stop green fanatics from screaming murder. They obviously did not mind the possibility of hostile aliens wiping them off the earth, as long as they could save a square Kilometer of a remote moon, on the furthest part of our solar system, in the most inhospitable climate, where man would never ever go otherwise!

 
; Daniel really did not understand the logic of the green fanatics, and suspected that they were incapable of logic. Fortunately these people consisted of an infinitesimal minority of humanity. The majority of the humans understood the need and agreed to it, including the green parties albeit grudgingly.

  That’s why the reactor had to be installed first, to ensure that it was far enough and in a topography, such that ice molten from the heat would not runoff towards the landing site.

  It would also be the power source for all the tools that would be required to build the landing site into habitable station. There is no fuel that was being taken down. No use taking hydrocarbon fuel, there is no oxygen there to burn it.

  Safety protocol dictated that only one of the two precious shuttles be in use at any given time. The other should be within the ship refueling, under maintenance or simply waiting. This was to ensure that if the ship had leave orbit immediately in case of an emergency, it would not depart without at least one of the shuttles.

  Captain Kormas of Charles Martell gave a one-time waiver of this protocol for unloading the nuclear reactor. It had too many dis-assembled parts and was too bulky to be loaded into one shuttle. Even with both the shuttles being used, one shuttle will still have to make a second trip.

  Since the reactor would not be installed in the warm -30° C lava flow, but far away from it at the edge of the caldera, where it could get as cold as -170° C, the engineers could not be waiting for hours for parts to arrive and then assemble it.

  Other than serious risk to the engineers, exposed parts could get brittle and break on handling. Most metals have the tendency of getting extremely brittle in such extreme cold and the slightest impact can shatter it. While the reactor had been designed to handle the cold, one could never take a chance.

  All the parts to be assembled in-situ would be taken together in two shuttles. Both the shuttles would return. One of them will make an additional trip to haul the fuel rods and the long power cables which would run over a Kilometer down to the bottom of the caldera, where the base would be located.