by Ben Bova
“Data capsule,” Westfall repeated, uncertainly.
“The vessel is down so deep in the ocean that it can’t transmit messages by radio or laser, so it’s programmed to send capsules up into orbit.”
“Ah! I see. And the capsules contain information about what the ship has been doing.”
“Exactly. The first capsule came out of the clouds and established an equatorial orbit late yesterday.”
“And what information did it carry?”
Deirdre shrugged slightly. “All the ship’s systems are performing as designed. Faraday’s down at the depth where the leviathans are usually found.”
“And?”
“No leviathans yet. None of the creatures have been detected.”
“None? Not one?”
“Not one.”
“What do the scientists have to say about that?”
Hearing the impatience in her voice, Deirdre thought, She’d never be able to be a scientist; she wants results too soon.
“Well?” Westfall demanded.
“They’re sort of surprised. The vessel was sent to a region where there’s always been leviathans swimming and feeding. But right now there’s nothing.”
“How can that be?”
“That’s what they’re trying to figure out. The vessel’s following a stream of organics, the stuff the leviathans feed on. Sooner or later they’ll find some of the creatures, unless…”
“Unless what?”
“Unless the creatures have gone so deep the vessel can’t follow them.”
Even in the starlit dimness Deirdre could see unalloyed anger twisting Westfall’s usually composed features.
“They’re hiding something!” she snapped.
“No, that’s what the data capsule showed,” said Deirdre.
“Either they’re hiding vital information from you or you’re hiding it from me. Either way, I want to know everything they’ve found. Everything! Do you understand me?”
“But that is everything!” Deirdre said.
“I don’t believe you. I don’t believe any of you! You’re hiding the truth from me and—”
Westfall stopped in mid-sentence. Deirdre saw a reddish glow starting to light her face. Turning, she saw that Jupiter was sliding into view once again.
Westfall stood open-mouthed, staring.
“My god,” she whispered. “My god.”
Deirdre fought down the urge to snicker at Westfall’s sudden awe.
“It’s overpowering, isn’t it?” she whispered, extending her hand toward Westfall once more.
“Overwhelming,” Westfall said, in a little girl’s frightened voice. “As if it’s going to fall down on us, crush us…”
She turned and bolted for the hatch, fumbled with the keypad lock, and pushed out into the passageway as soon as the hatch clicked open.
Deirdre went after her. Westfall was standing pressed against the passageway bulkhead, eyes closed, breathing hard.
“Are you all right?” Deirdre asked.
With an obvious shuddering effort, Westfall pulled herself together. She took in a deep breath, opened her steel gray eyes, ran smoothing hands along the thighs of her metallic jumpsuit.
“I’m fine,” she said calmly. “I was merely … surprised. I’ve never seen Jupiter like that before. It seemed … so close … so … so immense.”
Deirdre nodded. “It’s a powerful experience.”
Straightening her spine, Westfall said, “Be that as it may, I expect you to find out what the scientists are hiding.”
“But they’re not—”
“They are,” Westfall snapped. “And if you value your life you will find what it is and report it immediately to me. Immediately!”
With that, Westfall turned and strode up the passageway, leaving Deirdre standing there, stunned and frightened.
ATTACK
Faraday watched as the group of predators split precisely in two. Half of the sharklike beasts continued on the course that the pack had been following; the other half was speeding directly toward Faraday.
Calculating their speed as they approached, Faraday’s central computer estimated that it could outrun the predators, if necessary. The beasts were big, several of them slightly longer than Faraday’s own diameter. The programming’s primary directive of self-preservation flared to the top of the computer’s priorities, replacing the directive to find and observe the leviathans. The human analog program pulled up another aphorism: “Those who fight and run away live to fight another day.”
Faraday awaited the predators’ attack.
The beasts swarmed all around Faraday, completely englobing the vessel as they swam sleekly in slowly tightening circles. Faraday made no effort to evade them; the vessel merely maintained its course heading and speed.
Closer and closer the predators glided. Faraday’s sensors studied them intently while the central computer ordered a fresh data capsule be prepared for launching.
Each of the predators had a row of glistening circular objects running the length of its body. Faraday assumed they were visual sensors. Checking its own auditory receivers, the central computer realized that the predators were sending out sound waves, possibly using them as sonar to measure Faraday’s size and distance.
Suddenly one of the beasts darted in toward Faraday on a collision course. It pulled up at the last instant and merely brushed against the vessel’s metal hull. Faraday’s sensors measured the force of the impact; internal monitors reported that no damage had been inflicted.
Another of the creatures bolted in and banged harder against the hull. Then a third, harder still. Internal monitors registered the jolt. Central computer’s decision tree showed that if the impacts increased in strength it would be necessary to initiate defensive maneuvers.
A human brain, awash with emotions, would have felt fear, and perhaps curiosity. Why were these predators banging into the vessel? What was their objective? It must be clear to them that the vessel is not edible: It can’t be prey. Why were they attacking?
Faraday’s central processor, though, merely recorded the attack so that the data capsule could send off the information once it was launched.
From several rungs down the priority directives came the conclusion that the other half of the predators, those that had continued on their original course, must still be tracking the leviathans. But that was of secondary interest now. Self-preservation was most important. That, and getting all this new data out on a capsule so that the human directors could benefit from it.
Another predator slammed into Faraday, hard enough to throw four internal pressure monitors off-line for 3.0025 seconds. Puzzling behavior. Checking the decision tree again, central computer found that it was time to test the theory that the predators were behaving territorially.
Faraday activated its secondary propulsion system, leaping upward on a jet of superheated steam. The predators bolted out of the vessel’s way and Faraday left them far behind, milling about, emitting sound waves on at least four different frequencies. They avoided the plume of steam that the vessel spurted out, sensors reported.
Faraday checked the data capsule, making certain that all these observations were filed in its memory core, then released the capsule.
At the extreme range of its sensors, Faraday saw that the predators who had attacked it had now re-formed into a group and were heading in the same direction as they had been before they broke off to attack. Their speed was much higher than before. If a computer could be surprised, Faraday’s central processor would have whistled with astonishment.
CONTROL CENTER
Linda Vishnevskaya twitched with surprise. She sat at her console in the control center, alone except for the forlorn figure of Max Yeager, dozing in one of the visitor’s chairs up by the curving bulkhead. The rest of her crew were not needed; no data capsule from Faraday was expected for another twelve hours. She could have left the center completely unattended; if anything happened the comm system would automatic
ally alert her.
But she sat stubbornly for hours at the console, knowing that nothing was going to happen, but unwilling to take the chance that an emergency might arise that would need her immediate attention.
Yeager hovered around the consoles endlessly, taking only brief breaks. He even brought trays of food in, littering the area where he sat with crumbs and emptied cartons. Vishnevskaya at least had the good sense to take an hour for each mealtime and go to the galley before she hurried back to her console.
She was half drowsing when the message light began flashing and the audio pinged. Startled, she saw the main screen automatically power itself aglow and a list of alphanumerics began scrolling across it.
A data capsule! Unscheduled. Vishnevskaya realized something unusual must have happened down in that deep, dark ocean of Jupiter.
She started to turn to shout the news to Yeager, but saw that the burly engineer was already standing at her shoulder, peering intently at the symbols flashing across the screen.
“What’s gone wrong?” he demanded, his voice hoarse, growling.
* * *
Andy Corvus was swimming with the dolphins again. The aquarium was big, filled with fish that everybody said were bright and colorful, but to Andy they were merely varying shades of gray. And the sleek, grinning dolphins chattering to each other. The translator built into Andy’s face mask picked up only a few words:
“Squid below … warmer … fast current…”
Baby was growing fast, he realized. He almost failed to recognize her as the young dolphin glided up toward him.
“Hello, Andy.”
“Hello, Baby!” he said, happy that she was speaking to him.
“Race?”
Andy shook his head, not an easy thing to do in the water with the breathing mask. “You always win. You’re too fast for me.”
Something like mirth seemed to emanate from Baby’s whistling reply. The translator told him, “You’re slow, Andy.”
“I do the best I can.”
“Two legs not good.”
Andy thought for a moment, then replied, “My two legs work fine on land.”
Now Baby fell silent. Andy watched her circle around him, then go up to the surface for a gulp of air. When she came back she said, “Water better. No fish on land.”
* * *
Deirdre watched the display screen as the enlarged image of a Volvox aureus colony swam busily through a drop of simulated pond water. She had worked very hard to alter the purified water of station Gold’s drinking supply into the rich brew of pond scum that tiny Volvox thrived in.
The microscopically small green sphere was in the process of reproducing. Deirdre watched, fascinated as always, while the creature’s cells began to fission, splitting into specialized gonadal cells, male and female.
No privacy for you, she thought. It seemed silly to be studying these microscopic algae in hopes of learning more about the gigantic leviathans. Then she remembered that Dr. Archer had also asked her to look at the images that the leviathans displayed on their mammoth flanks. Pictures, Deirdre thought. He believes the leviathans communicate through pictures. And he wants me to interpret them for him.
With a resolute shake of her head she told herself, It’s crazy. He’s grasping at straws, just like he said. Looking back at the screen’s display of the reproducing Volvox, she thought, We’re all grasping at straws. Like the blind men and the elephant, we don’t really have the faintest idea of what we’re dealing with. But I promised him I’d look into the imagery and see if I can make any sense of it. I’ll have to fit that in, somehow. When I’m not talking with Andy’s dolphins or studying these little buggers.
The new cells were faithfully arranging themselves into a another colony, but—as usual—the cilia that propelled the colony through the water were on the inside of the newly created sphere. Deirdre leaned forward intently, watching as the spherical creature dutifully turned itself inside out, and the cilia began chugging away, moving the newcomer out of the microscope’s field of view.
Turning to the smaller readout screen beneath the main display, Deirdre saw that the sensors had acquired the data she needed: a detailed list of the chemicals that flooded the interior of the colony’s tiny sphere. Those chemicals were what triggered the reproductive phase, she knew. They guided the tiny creature’s creation of a new version of itself: the microbial analog of the pheromones that trigger human reproduction.
“Gotcha,” she murmured, with a satisfied smile.
* * *
The galley was crowded when Deirdre arrived, but none of her usual friends were in sight. She picked up a tray and took a salad and a mug of fruit juice, then found a table for herself. Before she could sit down, though, she saw Andy Corvus enter the galley, looking glum despite the garish orange slacks and emerald green pullover he was wearing.
She waved to him and waited while he packed his tray with a vegetarian lunch and sauntered over to her.
“How’s it going?” Deirdre asked as Andy sat down.
He made a loose-jointed shrug. “Baby talks to me, but I’m not getting any new information, really. Not adding to the vocabulary.”
“Maybe there’s nothing more to get,” she said. “Maybe you’ve got their entire language down.”
“I’d hate to think that. They’re smart, Dee. They must have more in their minds than just fish and water temperatures.”
She said nothing, stuck a fork into her salad.
Corvus’s phone jangled. Frowning, he pulled it from his shirt pocket. “This is Corvus.… Yes … yes, I did. Uh-huh…” Suddenly his eyes lit up. “You did? And the record shows it? No doubt about it? Wow!” He positively beamed at Deirdre. “Okay, thanks! Thanks a lot!”
“Good news,” Deirdre guessed.
“The report from Scripps, in California, just came in. Baby’s mother was culled from the Pacific Ocean by a research team when she was practically a newborn. Younger than Baby is now.”
“And?” Deirdre prodded.
“They pulled her out of the ocean because sharks were attacking her pod. One of the other young females had already been killed.”
“Her sister,” Deirdre said.
“Just like she told you!” Corvus was almost bouncing up and down on the chair in his enthusiasm. “Just like she told you! That’s the confirmation that we need! You made real contact with Baby and the rest of the dolphins!”
Corvus jumped to his feet. “You know what this means?”
Before Deirdre could reply he went on, “This means you really did make meaningful contact, Dee! We can prove it now!”
Deirdre had never seen a grown man look so excited. People at other tables were turning toward Corvus, staring. She half expected Andy to jump up on their table and dance a jig.
* * *
In the control center, Max Yeager was eagerly leaning over Vishnevskaya’s shoulder, staring at the multiple screens on her console.
“The bastards’re slamming into her!” he growled.
“No damage,” Vishnevskaya muttered.
The display screens showed Faraday’s sensor views of the predators and the reading of the internal monitors as, one by one, the big sharklike creatures banged into the vessel.
“No damage,” Vishnevskaya repeated each time one of the beasts attacked.
Yeager felt each lurch as a punch in his gut. Anger seethed inside him. Why are they assaulting her? What in the name of hell do they expect to get out of such a stupid, pointless attack?
Vishnevskaya tapped an enameled fingernail against the central computer display screen. “It’s making a decision to get away from them,” she said.
“About time,” said Yeager. “I didn’t design her to be a punching bag.”
“Propulsion activated…” Vishnevskaya leaned back in her chair and exhaled a relieved sigh. “Ah, she made it. She got away.”
“Stupid goddamned sharks,” Yeager grumbled. “Maybe I should’ve designed some defense weapons for the
ship. Electric fields. A few megavolts would show those damned fish to back off.”
Vishnevskaya smiled up at him. “Not to worry, little father. Your baby took good care of herself. The danger is past.”
Yeager nodded. “Yeah, maybe. But if the sharks keep putting themselves between our baby and the leviathans, how’s she going to fulfill her primary directive? How’s she going to study the leviathans if the sharks stay so aggressive?”
CONFERENCE ROOM
Grant Archer took careful note of how the quartet of people arranged themselves around the conference table: Corvus sat on his right, with an unhappy crooked pout on his face. Deirdre Ambrose sat beside him, looking radiantly beautiful even in a casual white pullover and dark slacks. Corvus is color blind, Archer recalled. Is she wearing black and white because of that?
Max Yeager looked tired as he pulled out a chair on the opposite side of the table, dark bags under his eyes and a two-day beard darkening his chin. His tan coveralls were wrinkled, as if he’d been sleeping in them. Archer’s nostrils twitched as he caught a whiff of stale, musky body odor. Yeager’s sour scent didn’t seem to bother Linda Vishnevskaya, though: The petite, intense chief of mission control sat beside the beefy engineer with a contented smile on her heart-shaped face.
“We’re all here,” Archer said, by way of starting the meeting. “Good.”
“Is this all of us?” Vishnevskaya asked, looking surprised. “Shouldn’t Dr. Johansen be here?”
Clasping his hands on the tabletop, Archer replied, “He’ll join us later. At the moment he’s showing Mrs. Westfall through the fluid dynamics lab down in wheel three.”
The four of them looked puzzled.
With a slightly guilty smile, Archer said, “I want to get the latest information you have directly from you, without Mrs. Westfall in the way. Johansen is serving as a decoy, for the moment.”
Deirdre said, “She’ll see through that soon enough.”
“I know.” Archer sighed. “But I do want to hear what you’ve accomplished without all the politics that Mrs. Westfall and the IAA carry with them.”
