Possible Worlds of Science Fiction

by Groff Conklin

  Whether Dione’s life forms are “possible” or not, they assuredly constitute a vivid and circumstantial creation of the human imagination.

  ~ * ~

  THERE was an interval of tense silence in the control room of the Pegasus. Then a bell clanged sharply. Immediately thereafter came a dull thump as the ship made contact with the surface of Dione, and for a second low-pitched vibrations raced to swift death up and down that drum-tight, molybdic alloy hull.

  “Hall, take an atmosphere test immediately.” Captain Egard’s voice was edged with more than a trace of strain. “And be sure you don’t let any of that stuff loose here inside the ship! Griffin, what’s the temperature outside?”

  “Still subzero, captain; but the meter’s slowly rising.”

  “Norm—if you can pull your head out of that port—run down to the rocket room and tell McDill and Perrin I want ‘em up here just as soon as they can leave things. Get Rives and Talbot, too.”

  Eric Norm, junior member of the crew, tore himself away from the port through which he had been staring. That scene of alien grotesqueness had held a peculiar fascination for him. Black rocks jutting up between fernlike mounds of frozen vapor; ice crystals sparkling and throwing back the light of the tiny, but still-brilliant Sun in delicate tints of purple, rose, and golden-green.

  He entered the cartridgelike car, which shuttled through a tube from stem to stern, and a few seconds later emerged into the rocket room. McDill and his mate, Perrin, appeared to be in exultant moods—as well they might.

  “Hey, there, Norm,” grinned the solidly-built chief, welcoming Norm with a hearty slap on the back. “We made it, son!”

  “Cap wants you and Perrin in the control rooms,” said Norm.

  “Why didn’t he phone?” asked Perrin, tossing aside a handful of waste.

  Norm shook his head as he turned back to re-enter the lift. He didn’t like to mention Captain Egard’s unprecedented display of jitteriness.

  On the deck above the rocket room he found Rives and Talbot staring from a port. They had evidently just finished giving their oxygen suits a last careful inspection.

  Talbot was speaking: “... a green mote! I saw it drift past the port.”

  “You’re seeing things,” scoffed Rives.

  Five minutes later, the entire crew of the Pegasus—nine men including the ship’s surgeon, Dr. Frontain—were congregated in the not too spacious control room. That is, all except Hall, who was still busy with his atmosphere analysis.

  “Men, here we are on Dione—fourth moon of the ringed planet,” said Captain Egard, his shrewd, bushy-thatched eyes stabbing around to rest for an instant on those of every man present. “You’ve all done your duty. I’m proud of you—so proud I want to take you all back with me.”

  “Cap,” spoke up the irrepressible McDill, giving Norm a sly nudge in the ribs, “none of us figure to desert ship.”

  Grins and a tense laugh or two followed, but they quieted immediately. Nerves were keyed to a high pitch, as must always be when men face the unknown.

  “You all know our purpose here,” continued Egard. “We’ve sworn to collect thought-nuggets and take them back to Earth—or die trying! But what some of you don’t know is the exact hazard we’re up against. You were all warned of the danger attending this voyage—but not in detail. Until now I’ve withheld just a little of the slight information I possess, so that our morale might be maintained—not that you’re men inclined to flinch, but anticipating dangers too far ahead is bad. So far as I’m aware, no man ever set foot here on Dione and lived to tell about it.”

  Navigator Griffin cleared his throat. “But, Captain, that can’t be right.” Bronzed, square-jawed, he was leaning against the chart table, his light-blue eyes regarding the older man steadily. “What about Morgran, the explorer, who brought back the first thought-nugget—ten years ago?”

  Captain Egard answered slowly, “Explorer Morgran used a radio-controlled mobile robot to do the actual ground work. His ship touched here only for a few hours; the airlock was never unsealed.”

  Griffin nodded. “Right, Captain—pardon the interruption.”

  “Unfortunately, Morgran died before his ship reached Earth,” continued Egard. “We had only his notes to go by—and the thought-nugget. Here,” he added, fishing a small object from his pocket, “this is an imitation, made to resemble closely the original, so we’ll know what we’re looking for. Pass it around. Milk-white, the size of a peanut. The original was of crystalline structure, but whether an organic product or a mineral is something we don’t know.

  “You are all aware of what happened when that thing was turned over to scientists. They soon discovered that it was thought-sensitive— capable of receiving and amplifying telepathic impressions—an element long sought by physicists.

  “Enthusiasm waxed feverish over this astounding discovery. And during the years that followed, ship after ship left Earth for this remote moon, to collect more of the treasured nodules. But not one of them ever came back—”

  “Captain Egard,” interrupted Hall at this moment, elbowing his way into the crowded control room. Tall and lanky, he was able to stretch an arm over Norm’s shoulder. “Here’s the atmosphere formula.”

  Egard grasped the slip of paper, his eyes sliding quickly over the penciled symbols.

  “Hm-m-m. Quite an envelope for a body only twelve hundred miles through—mostly inert gases, nothing poisonous—and no oxygen, either.”

  A mutter of voices had started up among the crew.

  “The old boy don’t sound any too cheerful,” husked McDill in Norm’s ear. “Don’t take it too seriously, though. He’d cut his throat before he’d lose a man here on this confounded chunk of rock. I know him!”

  Norm nodded, in full agreement. “But I wonder what else he’s got up his sleeve.”

  Egard raised his hand for silence.

  “One or two things more, and then we’ll get busy. Ill fate was met with by our predecessors. From Morgran’s report we know there is life here on Dione. We know that this life is parasitic and uses a symbiosis—a damned queer life form, deadly to anything else that’s alive, and even to itself—”

  “I don’t get that,” broke in Rives, eying first Egard and then Talbot, his inseparable companion, but with whom he maintained a serial argument about everything within and without the cosmos. “About that symbiosis—”

  “I can’t do better,” said Captain Egard, turning to fumble in the files under the chart table, “than to read you Morgran’s own notes. Then you’ll know just as much as I know. Here they are, as published in a monthly report of the Academy of Science, dated May, 2371—or roughly ten years ago: ‘Green Animals of Dione: There is no such thing as a distinct plant life on Satellite IV. The primary substance composing Dione’s green-animal life is somewhat comparable to the protoplasmic base of all earthly life, insofar as the fluid entering its composition is, in both instances, water; but in the case of Dione, an unidentified chemical reagent renders this solvent free from crystallization into ice at low temperatures.

  “‘This living animal matter is perfectly transparent, to allow the passage of sunlight to the millions of chlorophyll-bearing vegetable cells within its substance; hence its green color. Here we observe what might be called an instance of perfect symbiosis between animal and plant, the animal cells supplying carbon anhydride and nitrogenous matter to the vegetable cells, and they in turn supplying oxygen and starch to the animal cells.

  “ ‘Thus we have organisms maintained almost entirely by sunlight. But growth and regeneration can take place only by the absorption of fresh protein from another living body—hence the evolution of parasitism. Constant, insidious warfare must necessarily be carried on against one another by Dione’s individual life units.’”

  There was a moment’s silence after Egard finished reading.

  “Parasitic life—hell,” muttered Rives. But his exact meaning, if any, was not clear.

  “There you have
it, men,” concluded the captain. “Now we’ll get busy. I know there’s not one of you but would volunteer to be the first to go outside the ship. But that would be side-stepping good judgment on my part. Rives, you and Talbot jump into your oxygen suits. But just because you’re supposed to be good at outside space work, don’t try anything fancy. Take every precaution. You’ll be in constant communication with Norm here, by microwave. Stick close to the ship until we find out where we stand.”

  ~ * ~

  The conference broke up quietly. Rives and Talbot were hustled into their oxygen suits. Backslapping and rough joking followed, such as men sometimes indulge in when their nerves are on edge; then the bubblelike hoods of transparent glassoplast were clamped down and the two men prepared to leave ship.

  Norm watched these activities with mingled feelings. Although naturally of a rather unobtrusive disposition, he had often wondered if his job as communications technician wasn’t robbing him of certain adventurous thrills, such as Talbot and Rives must now be experiencing.

  “Norm, get to your post,” ordered the captain. “They’ll be outside in a couple of minutes.”

  Seated at the microwave panel in the control room, directly in front of an observation port, Norm clamped earphones on his head, adjusted various switches. A moment later the shuttling car brought Captain Egard.

  “They’re outside,” he growled, snatching up an auxiliary headset.

  “Talbot! Rives!” Norm spoke into the transmitter.

  “Sure, son,” came Talbot’s matter-of-fact voice.

  “Keep your shirt on,” advised Rives. “There’s nothing to it, kid.”

  Almost at once the two figures, bulky in their oxygen suits, appeared outside and below the port. They were walking slowly away from the ship on the brittle frost crystals that covered the rocks.

  “Is everything right?” queried the captain sharply, speaking into the transmitter attached to his own headset.

  “Okay,” reported Talbot.

  “Same here, Cap,” came Rives’s voice.

  There was an interval of silence while the two men drew farther away.

  “Any sign of life?” asked Egard, his tone easier.

  Talbot answered, “Something floating in the air—green motes.”

  “Not motes, you blockhead,” Rives’s voice cut in. “Nor spores, either. Too large, some of ‘em. More like burrs—”

  “Yea, that’s it—burrs,” conceded Talbot grudgingly. “Like green chestnut burrs.”

  “Do they try to attack you?” asked Egard quickly.

  “Well—not exactly,” said Talbot, after a momentary pause. “But they kind of swarm around. Hear that tapping? That’s them hitting against my hood.”

  By peering intently, Norm himself could now catch a vague glimpse of these green dots in the air.

  “But you’re safe in the oxygen suit?” persisted Captain Egard.

  “Sure, Cap. Now we’ll start looking for thought-nuggets.”

  With a gusty sigh of relief, Egard removed his earphones. He turned to Griffin, the navigator, who had entered quietly and was watching from another port.

  “There’s our answer,” he declared. “A man in an oxygen suit is safe. The real danger lies in the chance that some of those burrs may get inside the ship. In the construction of the Pegasus’ airlocks, this was all foreseen. With the ordinary lock, a pocket of outside air follows a man in through the neutralizing chamber when he enters the ship. That was undoubtedly the fate met by our predecessors. Dione’s atmosphere is contaminated by parasitic life. Some of those burrs got inside their ship. But with our locks, the neutralizing chamber is automatically cleared by a blast of sterile air before the inner slide opens.”

  Griffin nodded. “Then there’s no reason why the rest of us shouldn’t go out and give a hand with the search.”

  After some hesitation Egard agreed. “You and Hall can go. But don’t get separated. What I’d like to do, if possible, is to collect a few of the nuggets and leave before darkness sets in. The sunlight period here on Dione lasts for thirty-three hours, which may give us time enough. I think I’ll let McDill and Perrin loose, also. That will make three searching parties, leaving Dr. Frontain, Norm, and myself to take care of the ship. I don’t think that this is being incautious. I’m of the opinion that these burrs are the only life on Dione. The ship itself will hardly require any defending, and the more men we have outside, the better chance of helping one another in case of accident.”

  Norm cursed softly under his breath at this arrangement. He wanted to go out and join in the search. Meanwhile, Rives and Talbot had moved out of sight from the port, but he could still hear them chaffing each other in their half-serious fashion.

  “This stuff isn’t ‘snow,’ as you call it,” Rives was saying. “It’s too cold to snow here on this lousy moon.”

  “Oh, yeah? Well, notice that haze floating a few feet above the ground,” rejoined Talbot. “That’s due to the Sun’s action on patches of bare rock. And see how those mounds are building up all around. Miniature snowstorms in action, I call ‘em.”

  “Shucks! Norm—ask Cap where’s the best place to look for those nuggets.”

  “Cap isn’t here right now,” Norm said into the transmitter. “Besides, you’ve already been told all that. Look where the rocks are bare; in chinks—you know.”

  Hall and Griffin, clad in oxygen suits, were soon leaving the ship. A few minutes later, McDill and his mate Perrin also joined in the search. Each was promptly surrounded by a convoy of floating green burrs.

  Time passed. Presently a rousing report came from Rives.

  The first thought-nugget had been found!

  Captain Egard received the word with elation.

  “We only need a few,” he explained to Norm and Dr. Frontain. “Then, with information as to where and how more can be obtained, we’ll have accomplished our purpose here. Norm, tell Rives to bring the thing in; I want to make sure it’s genuine.”

  Rives arrived a few minutes later.

  “There’s nothing to it!” said he, hood tipped back from his alert-eyed countenance. “Those burrs can’t hurt you—they can’t get at you to touch your flesh. Here—”

  He dropped a milk-white nodule into Egard’s hand.

  “It’s real!” breathed the captain, after a close scrutiny. “Rives—you’ll be a blasted hero when we get back to Earth!”

  ~ * ~

  Again the search went on. Rives departed to rejoin Talbot. And during the next hour, with six men outside the ship to be kept track of, Norm’s attention was so thoroughly occupied that few spare moments remained in which to bewail his own enforced nonparticipation.

  Meanwhile, no more nuggets had been found. But, as time passed, Norm began to gain a kind of vicarious familiarity with the immediate locale. The Pegasus was resting in a wide, saucerlike depression. Fantastic mountain chains, serrated and ice-spangled, rimmed this depression. But even close to the ship, the moon was very rough, being crossed by innumerable chasms and littered with fragments of rock and other mineral detritus.

  The search gradually widened as the men began wandering farther and farther from the ship. Still no more nuggets were found. It was perhaps two hours later when the first untoward incident occurred.

  Then, without giving notice of anything amiss, McDill, the rocket engineer, returned to the ship, bearing on his broad shoulders the body of his mate Perrin—no great muscular feat, however, in the weak gravity of Dione.

  “The clumsy son took a fall in the rocks,” he explained to the three men waiting in the ship.

  “Why didn’t you send in word?” demanded Captain Egard, scowling darkly as Dr. Frontain stripped the oxygen suit off Perrin.

  “Didn’t want to tie things up,” McDill confessed, grinning broadly. “He isn’t hurt bad.”

  “Broken leg,” reported Dr. Frontain, after a short examination.

  “You big sap!” McDill said to the injured Perrin unfeelingly. “You could have done th
at by falling downstairs at home.”

  Perrin groaned.

  “So long. I’m going out again,” said McDill.

  “You join up with Griffin and Hall,” ordered the captain. “And don’t try anything smart. We’ll need you, now that Perrin is laid up.”

  “I’ll have him on his feet in three days,” promised Dr. Frontain. “A shot of B-X-44 in the fracture will do the trick.”