Racers of the Night: Science Fiction Stories by Brad R. Torgersen

by Brad R Torgersen

  When Kendelsen had extracted enough liquid to fill his container to four-fifths capacity, he put a pincher on the IV tube and uncoupled it from the container’s mouth, screwing an air-tight cap into place before carefully hefting the container over to a small, wheeled sled that we’d brought down from the rover. On it were all of the samples arranged according to Bednar’s ad hoc categorization scheme.

  “Want more?” I said to the captain.

  “Maybe. If I am not satisfied after taking a closer look. Let’s get all of this back to the descent module for safe keeping.”

  “What about the rest of the structure?” I asked.

  “It’s not going anywhere,” she said. “And neither is our alien friend here. There will be time to do a more thorough examination of the hardware once I’ve sent a full preliminary report back to the return module, for transmission to Earth. Thus far we’ve not disclosed anything specific to Mission Control. That’s going to have to change, or they’re going to begin getting nervous.”

  Truth be told, I wasn’t exactly sure what else it was I could be looking for. I’d already given the room at the bottom of the ramp a thorough examination, and had found no other doors leading to any other parts of the pyramid. There were no obvious display panels or control boards or knobs or switches of any kind. And when I ordered Kendelsen to apply a cutting torch to one of the walls, it didn’t even leave a scratch.

  I had begun to wonder if perhaps the alien pyramid wasn’t just an analog of Earth’s ancient pyramids: a tomb. Perhaps for some bygone alien ruler who’d decided he wanted his final resting place to be in orbit around Saturn? Not a bad choice, I thought. Assuming you could see Saturn’s rings through the murk in the atmosphere. Maybe the nitrogen air had been cleaner at some point in the past?

  Unable to break off or obtain even a sliver of the pyramid’s structural material, I hoped that a carbon dating analysis of some of the alien’s tissue would be able to give us an accurate estimate as to how old the thing might be.

  We gathered up what tools we needed to take back with us on the rover, snapped off the tripod lamps which had been giving us enough light to work by, and went back up the ramp, pushing our sled full of samples. An insulated lid over the top of the sled kept the samples more or less at their ambient temperature as we crossed into the cold. A thick power cable wound its way along the side of the ramp—like a piece of familiar string in a strange and forbidding maze.

  The cable took us unerringly to the top, and the open sky. I dutifully uncoupled it from the auxiliary power jack on the side of the rover, then helped Kendelsen and Majack get the sample sled into the rover’s cargo bay. Then I took shotgun as Captain Bednar slid into the driver’s station, with Majack and Kendelsen pulling rumble seat.

  We rolled in relative silence.

  If the first half of the day had been a cacophony of excited speculation and chattered hypotheses, the second half had slowly wound down to just occasional sentences and practical exchanges. The mood was … tense. Not the sort of overt tension that snaps tempers, but a very subtle tension that manifested as mildly creased brows, and put little downturns on the corners of every mouth.

  It was the damned place, I decided. Titan. Gloomy as hades. Like being stuck perpetually in the shadow of a range of thunder clouds, their bellies pregnant with water.

  The headlights of the rover lanced into the yellow haze as Bednar followed the mild ruts which had been worn in the ice over successive trips. We knew from experience we wouldn’t actually see the descent stage of the Gossamer until we were practically on top of it.

  Upon arrival we gingerly got the sample sled up the descent stage’s main ramp and into the airlock. Then Kendelsen, Majack and myself went to climb the ladder up to the auxiliary airlock. We’d not be exposing any of the samples to our living space. There was no defined protocol for handling xenobiological specimens, but even Captain Bednar wasn’t going to take chances. We’d leave them in the main airlock where they could be kept quarantined.

  Once Bednar was through with her examination we’d move the samples to one of the outboard cargo pods on the ascent stage. If they froze in there it wouldn’t matter. They’d have to be frozen sooner or later for the long trip back to Earth.

  We quickly moved some of the portable science equipment from the descent stage’s lockers over to the main ramp, where Bednar carried it all up: piece by delicate piece. Once she was satisfied she had everything, we all went back to the auxiliary air lock and went inside for the night. Quite exhausted.

  • • •

  Following dinner—and a quick check-in with the Gossamer’s return module—we retired. After months in microgravity, it felt good to lapse into the deep sleep afforded by a day of manual labor. I had barely gotten my bunkbag zipped when my mind swam and I was drifting off towards pleasant dreams of home.

  Only, the damned alien kept bothering me.

  Several times I startled awake as visions of the alien in the pyramid suddenly came to life, writhing and awful. The last dream was the strangest. Because it wasn’t about the alien. It was about the pyramid itself. I dreamt I was standing on the surface of Titan, only my eyes were able to penetrate the haze and survey the ice all the way to the horizon. One by one I saw the tips of pyramids identical to the one we’d found, all crashing up through the ice. Thousands of them.

  It terrified me. So much so that when the alarm went off and we each began to stir for the morning routine, I couldn’t quite wash the feeling out of myself. Seeing all of those identical pyramids come up through the ice had filled me with panic. I wasn’t sure why.

  I intuited that I hadn’t been the only one who’d had bad dreams. Nobody said much in between bites or slurps. I noticed also that all of us kept our eyes away from the portholes. The deliberately bright lights in the galley were a relief compared to what it was like outside.

  Only Captain Bednar seemed energized. She finished her food quickly and changed into a HAZMAT outfit—thinner, and more work-friendly than a coldsuit.

  I got up from the galley table and went with the captain to the main airlock doors. Unlike the auxiliary lock, the main lock was actually a double: an exterior compartment with a door to the outside, separated by a middle door, then an interior compartment, followed by a door to the rest of the craft. I could just make out—through the windows in each of the doors—the sample sled sitting in the outer compartment.

  “Make sure the recorders are running the whole time,” Bednar said.

  “Roger that,” I replied.

  The HAZMAT suit was like a head-to-toe body stocking, but with a helmet designed only to keep air out, and with a hose leading to a tiny backpack filter that ensured air coming in was clean and pure.

  I watched as the captain went into the inner compartment, closing the interior door, then entering the outer compartment through the middle door, which closed behind her. A red light on the airlock panel told me that the inner compartment was now in vacuum, so that the outer compartment was effectively sealed off.

  Captain Bednar’s monotone forensic-type narrative droned through the overhead speaker while Majack, Kendelsen and I finished eating. Today we’d let the alien be, and focus our examination on the pyramid itself. Since the artifact was invisible to most of our sensors, I’d gotten the idea to try some seismic analysis—to determine the pyramid’s full size and shape beneath the ice.

  We checked in again with the return module, prepped our coldsuits for the day’s EVA, and were just about to head for the auxiliary lock when Captain Bednar began cursing loudly.

  I was the first one to the inner airlock doors.

  I slapped a suited hand on the airlock communications panel.

  “What happened?” I said to mic grille.

  “Nothing Chief. It’s just that you won’t believe what this blood is made of.”

  She wasn’t angry or upset. She was in awe.

  “Try me,” I said.

  “The organic component is not too different f
rom ours. Simple oxidizing cells to carry oxygen to the tissue, several types of what appear to be antibodies and white cells for combatting infection, plus a couple of unusually-structured cells for which I can’t begin to guess a purpose.”

  “You said organic component … is there an inorganic component too?”

  “Yes,” Bednar said. “I’d call them nanotechnological devices, but far more sophisticated than anything we’ve ever manufactured on Earth. They make up one third of the blood’s total mass. Right now they’re just drifting in the fluid. Inert. I’m going to take a small portion and put it into a petri dish, then dip in some voltmeter wires and see what happens if I give the blood just a hint of an electrical charge.”

  “Do you know what reaction that might cause?” I said.

  “No, but that’s the point. If I had to guess, these nanomachines have been without a power source for centuries. Maybe longer. I want to see what happens if I supply them with energy, then observe their behavior under the microscope. To see if I can determined their function.”

  I was tempted to tell her that caution was the better part of valor, but decided to keep my lip zipped. I wasn’t a degreed scientist. I’d been brought along for my spaceflight experience: two landings on Mercury, and one flight to the asteroid belt. As long as Bednar wasn’t doing anything deliberately dangerous to the ship or the crew, she was more than welcome to exhaust her curiosity.

  I tapped the airlock communication panel again and asked Captain Bednar if we should leave someone behind to keep an eye on things. She said no, there’d be no point. So I grunted, switched off, and Majack, Kendelsen, and me went out the auxiliary airlock and down to the rover. Majack checked the rover’s fuel cell condition while I started the pre-drive warm-up, then Kendelsen drove with Majack in the right seat and me in the bed.

  The portholes and running lights of the descent stage were bright, but they rapidly faded into the distance. Eventually all I could see was the same old dirty-yellow mist.

  • • •

  When we came to the pyramid, I remembered my bad dream.

  All by itself, the pyramid wasn’t frightening. But I’d been thinking about what the captain had said. That the pyramid was a message for humanity—or at least contained a message. Given the dimensions of the monster inside, there didn’t seem to be any way it could get in or out of the pyramid using the door, ramp, and spiraling corridor we’d been using so far. What did it all mean?

  That question occupied my idle consciousness as we placed small seismic charges here and there, popped them, and observed the results on our computer aboard the rover. Seismographic analysis yielded an interesting picture. The artifact was a perfect quadrilateral pyramid. Moreover, each of the edges was nearly two kilometers in length. The tiny portion of the pyramid accessible to us above the surface was the tip of the proverbial alien iceberg.

  I had all three of us comb the interior one more time, yet still we found no hint of any way to explore the rest of the artifact from inside. I guessed that perhaps there were other exterior doors further down the pyramid’s faces? Doors we couldn’t access without a serious excavation project, for which we were ill-equipped. After all, the alien had gotten in and out at some point. Hadn’t it?

  With all of us yawning and eager for dinner, I ordered us back into the rover. When we returned to the descent module, all seemed as it should. The portholes glowed cheerfully, welcoming us home. Captain Bednar greeted us at the inner door to the auxiliary airlock. The HAZMAT was off. She was wearing her flight suit, and a serious expression.

  “Any answers?” was all the captain said.

  “Yes and no,” I replied. “I’ll show you the data once you and I can sit down. How about you? After we eat, we can combine our findings and put together an official presentation for Mission Control.”

  “I took care of that already,” Bednar said.

  “Oh?” I raised an eyebrow. “Don’t you think it’s a good idea to be a little more comprehensive? I know the alien corpse is the key item of discovery so far, but I thought it would be best if we—”

  “Mission control has been fully appraised of the situation, everything discovered to date, and I’ve made my recommendations for alterations in the schedule. We’re jettisoning the geology and atmospheric experiments so that we can focus solely on completing analysis of the pyramid and effecting the safe return of the alien samples to Earth.”

  “We’re leaving?” I said.

  “Do you really want to stay on Titan any longer than is necessary?”

  “Well, like, I mean, it’s not Cancun, but there won’t be another flight out here for perhaps as much as a decade. We’ve got food and oxygen for almost three weeks. The fuel cells will last twice as long. Why rush?”

  “I’ve made my report, Chief. If you check your updated calendar you’ll see all the details for tomorrow’s itinerary. Please ensure that yourself and Specialists Majack and Kendelsen are up to speed. I want us to get an early start tomorrow. Good night.”

  And with that she pivoted on a heel and walked away from us.

  Majack and Kendelsen looked at me, eyes wide.

  “heat up dinner,” I said to them. “I’ll be right back.”

  The Gossamer’s descent module was too small for anyone to hide in. But the galley, the sleeping compartment, the latrine, and all the other sections had been walled off from each other—both in case of emergency decompression, and also to give us the illusion of privacy.

  I caught up with Captain Bednar in the single-bed closet that more or less served as our medical bay.

  I closed the door behind us.

  “They’ll never let you set foot on another flight again,” I said sternly.

  “Oh?” was all she said.

  The arm of her flight suit was rolled up and she was applying tape to a patch of cotton bandage on the inside of her right forearm.

  “Yes. Do you really think anyone will be happy about you throwing away the schedule like this? It was bad enough when you added yourself to the descent team. Now you’re scrapping our entire survey plan. Hundreds of scientists just like you spent a lot of time building that plan, building the instruments that came with us on the trip, and now they’re going to be empty-handed. Pyramid or no pyramid, alien or no alien, people back home are going to be royally pissed off at you when we get back.”

  “Maybe,” was all she said, finishing up the taping and dropping her sleeve back to her wrist.

  “What happened to your arm?” I said, working hard to control my temper. My military side wanted to get up in her face and begin bawling. But given the cagey nature of her responses, I decided to keep a lid on it.

  “A small burn,” she said. “I gave that sample of alien blood a little too much current. It boiled over.”

  “You’ve been exposed?”

  “Hardly. The liquid burned me through the material of the HAZMAT suit without touching the skin. It’s second-degree. I’ll be fine. And if you don’t mind, I think it best if you and I stop having these kinds of face-to-face confrontations. It’s not going to reflect well in my final mission brief when we return. You might not be the only one who can’t get on any more flights.”

  Ordinarily, I hated the idea of hitting a woman. But standing there in the medical bay, I was seriously tempted to make an exception.

  “You’re a real piece of work, ma’am,” I said. “All through train-up and all the way out here after launch, you seemed like a team player. The kind of person I could work with. Now the scales have fallen and I’m seeing that you’re just an opportunist. So don’t you worry. I’ll make sure we wrap things up and climb back into orbit without a scratch. We’ll be home before you know it. Then I don’t want to ever see you again. Is that clear?”

  “You can’t possibly understand how much things have already started to change,” she said. “It’s okay. There will be a use for you when the ramifications of the alien discovery become clear.”

  “What the hell is that suppose
d to mean?”

  “Please check your calendar. Execute your assignment. That is my order. Understand?”

  Her eyes drifted to my fists which had balled furiously at my sides. Then she looked back up at my face, saying nothing. As if daring me to take action both she and I knew I’d regret.

  I glared at her, teeth clamped down hard.

  There was something about her … something about those eyes. Like a shadow had crossed briefly across the whites, then vanished. She never blinked.

  “To hell with this,” I finally said, and walked out of the tiny room.

  I found Majack and Kendelsen nibbling nervously on their dinner.

  “What’s going on, Chief?”

  “A lot of horseshit, that’s what,” I said, keeping my voice low. I leaned over the table, and they leaned over with me

  “Look,” I said, “the captain has ordered us home ASAP. So you can forget everything we trained for prior to the flight. I’m sorry. I know you were both chosen for your specific technical specialties as applicable to the Titan ground survey. But Bednar has decided all that matters now is getting home and showing off the pyramid data and the alien samples. She’s hot-dogging. I don’t like it. I think it’s wrong. But now I’m thinking we—us three—have got to stick together. Got it?”

  They both nodded in unison.

  “Tomorrow, when the captain takes Kendelsen out to the pyramid to wrap up her examination of the alien, I’m going to set up a two-on-one with Jibbley and Gaines, to make sure they know the score too. Basically it’s us getting our asses out of here, and hopefully the captain doesn’t have any more bright ideas.”

  “Wow,” Majack said, her eyes turned down.

  Kendelsen just poked at his tray with his spork.

  “I never saw any of this coming,” he said despondently.

  “None of us did,” I said. “I’ve been on flights where there were personality problems. Stuff people have to work out. That’s not too unusual. But I’ve never been on a flight where the goddamned CO turned everything upside down because she felt like it. Mission Control’s going to get an earful from me when we get back. Someone in screening messed up bad. Captain Bednar should never have been posted to this assignment, much less made it through selection.”