Ocean Under the Ice

by Robert L. Forward

  Sam muttered to Cinnamon, “It’s just like a farmer’s grange meeting on Earth!”

  Her reply jolted him: “No, it’s not. You’re making an assumption, not stating a fact.” Tacitly, he admitted the truth of that.

  Still, he sensed what he would almost have dared to call an intense communal interest in the next speaker, an icerug which Josephine referred to as Big-Lump. Accompanied by a much smaller node, Big-Lump moved up onto the viewing platform on its verdant trail, two tentacles gently pushing the emerald node of the little one ahead of it, its dark blue eye with a single green streak blinking rapidly. Big-Lump absent-mindedly rubbed at the large lump on the side of its head with a third tentacle.

  “I have brought a young one for your taste and approval.”

  The room quieted. Then one by one, the other icerugs glided forward, looked the newcomer carefully in the eye, murmured some sort of comment, and then touched the young one’s head or pedestal with a probing tentacle tip.

  “They aren’t taking a bite, so they might be tasting with their tentacles,” guessed Cinnamon over the imp link. Finally the last icerug withdrew.

  “You have now all tasted this youngling. I have already taught it a few words, which was extremely easy to do, as the youngling is eager to learn and tries very hard to please me. I suggest it would be a worthy addition to this association.”

  Josephine’s translation seemed to be much briefer than the alien’s speech, for which the humans were grateful. It was becoming apparent that the icerugs were fond of speaking, and of using elegant and flowery phrases in an idiom which did not translate well into English. It would have been confusing to the visitors if Josephine had attempted to include all the local references.

  Throughout the long discussion of the youngling which followed, the humans heard only that its adoption into the community was accepted, and the selection of a name for the newcomer was thoroughly talked out. After many comments from the assembly, Big-Lump spoke again.

  “I have been calling the little one Green-Streak, because of the streak of green color in its otherwise blue iris. There was another Green-Streak once in a distant association, but that person died many years ago. I think the youngster should be given the name Green-Streak, and I further suggest that Green-Streak be given the area which used to belong to Eager-Blink.” While these statements were being commented on, the humans struggled to understand the implications of the speech.

  “Died?” whispered Cinnamon, excitedly. “If Josephine got that right, then these creatures are mortal — unlike the flouwen — who are essentially immortal unless they rock up to think through a mathematical problem that takes forever to solve. Must be because their nodes have differentiated cells, whereas all the cells in the flouwen are the same. Josephine, it’s important that we somehow find out their life-span, and the various causes of death…”

  “They are giving Green-Streak someone else’s territory. So territory is assigned by the local association, if I follow that right,” said Thomas. “Wonder what happened to Eager-Blink?”

  Sam listened intently. Despite Cinnamon’s admonition, he felt that extrapolating from context was the only way he would learn how this strange community functioned. He was rewarded when the next to speak alluded casually to the absent icerug.

  “I understand from the information passed to us by Yellow-Star, the communicator to the association inward, that Eager-Blink is doing well at the Center for Engineering Studies — its interest in architecture is still strong, and Eager-Blink will likely stay in the city indefinitely. I too believe the area which Eager-Blink extracted itself from, in order to journey to the city, would be appropriate for this Green-Streak.”

  “If all are agreed then,” concluded Big-Lump, “the youngling will stay with me in my area for some sixteen four-days, to assimilate more of our ways and customs. Then, when it is ready, I will install it in Eager-Blink’s area and have it attend Smooth-Brown’s primary school for tutelage.” Agreement to this proposal was reached, although only after, as nearly as Cinnamon could judge, every icerug present had spoken to the question.

  The final item on the agenda, as Sam rebelliously thought of it, was the singing of several more songs. The newest member of the association seemed to listen to the song with great interest, and swayed a bit in time to the rhythm, but took no part, nor did its sponsor encourage it to do so. When the vibrations of the last deep note ceased, the icerugs began to move in leisurely fashion towards the tunnel.

  Cinnamon moved quickly to intercept Big-Lump and the youngster. At closer range, Cinnamon could discern the tumor-like bulge in Big-Lump’s head region, which must have given the verdant icerug its name. She hoped the tumor was benign, then realized that it probably was, since Big-Lump had most likely been named when very young, as Green-Streak had.

  Blue-Stare joined them and she started to ask questions. She knew that questions about reproduction among civilized societies on Earth would not be tolerated, but her scientific training as well as her curiosity urged her to make the attempt. Carefully approaching the sensitive subject, she spoke to Big-Lump sweetly, trusting Josephine to make sure that her suit computer translated her questions tactfully.

  “Please. Do tell me more about this fine youngster. How long has it been with you?”

  Big-Lump answered readily. “It was some three four-days ago that I found it, out on the ice to the north of my area.”

  Startled, Cinnamon exclaimed, “You found it? Out on the ice?”

  “Yes. I had pushed a trail out onto the ice plains north of me to look for food and stones that might have fallen on the ice during the last large eruption of Manannan. Although I didn’t find any food, I did find this youngster in a snowdrift. It didn’t taste bad, so I let it follow me home. It seems an agreeable little fellow, and it settled down quietly in my area, so after a few four-days, I decided to bring it to this assembly for approval.”

  Cinnamon’s mind strove to accept this “found under a cabbage leaf” explanation of icerug replication, but failed. She turned to ask the physician Gray-Mote her next question, risking offense in her determination to learn more.

  “This young one … have there been other young ones? And are they all foundlings — not created by icerugs — simply adopted after being discovered under some snowdrift?”

  Josephine’s voice came over Cinnamon’s imp link as Cinnamon’s suit imp was using its wobble-film to boom out her translated words to Gray-Mote. “I didn’t include the phrase ‘not created by icerugs’ in my translation.”

  Gray-Mote, however, seemed unperturbed by Cinnamon’s curiosity. “Oh, yes. Younglings are found occasionally. Usually while we are out gathering.”

  Cinnamon was finally forced to ask the question more directly. “I hope you realize that I am ignorant of your ways and customs, and I may ask questions that you may choose not to answer. If this question disturbs you, do not answer. Please, if young icerugs are found, where do they come from?”

  Gray-Mote, seemingly unperturbed by the blunt question, answered her readily. “There have been many theories discussed by those at the Center for Medical Studies about the origin of young icerugs. The most accepted one is the theory of ‘Void-Filling Spontaneous Generation’. It is well known that no youngsters ever appear in the city, or even out in the country where the ice is fully covered by coverers-of-the-ice. They only appear in the ice plains, where there is a void of coverers-of-the-ice. The theory of Void-Filling Spontaneous Generation hypothesizes that Nature abhors a void, especially a void of coverers-of-the-ice, and so spontaneously generates new youngsters to fill the void. So far, the theory has shown itself to be correct.”

  “Have those at the Center for Medical Studies come out to look at the ice plains themselves to make sure that these new youngsters are really spontaneously generated, and not formed by some other mechanism?” asked Cinnamon, trying not to be critical, for spontaneous generation of lower animals such as worms and flies had been believed by human scientist
s only three hundred years ago back on Earth.

  “No. Of course not,” replied Gray-Mote. “They are too rooted in their own areas at the Center to think of traveling around like a wandering bard. They depend upon the observations of those of us here on the periphery of the nation, as passed on into the city by the communicators between associations. I believe, however, that the theory is correct, for I myself, many cycles ago, when I was using a stretch of Big Rock to warm myself on a sunny day, found a relatively large youngster wandering in from the distant ice fields. It had the wrong taste, however, so I ate it.”

  The two icerugs had continued to move slowly toward the tunnel, not disturbed by Cinnamon’s questions, but obviously ready to go their own ways. The combination, to Cinnamon, of the innocence and appalling savagery of the supposedly intelligent and civilized aliens, was enough to discourage her from further queries. She too was ready to return to her own kind, to talk over this unsatisfactory explanation of icerug reproduction with Deirdre and Katrina. Suddenly she grinned to herself: their reactions to the new information would certainly be interesting!

  * * *

  When Cinnamon arrived back at Victoria, however, it was Katrina who had the most interesting news about the icerugs.

  “The icerugs and flouwen are related!” exclaimed Katrina, as Cinnamon joined her in the small area on Victoria that served as combined laboratory and sick bay. “Their cellular structure is the same. In both of them, the basic cell is shaped like a fat dumbbell — two knobs connected by a thick neck. I haven’t had time to do any detailed scans yet, but the images from the tunneling array microscope show that both the icerug and flouwen cells have complex semirandom patterns on their surfaces that serve as both the genetic code and the long term memory for the creatures. And…” she continued, still punching icons on the screen as the imaging continued. “…they use the same basic genetic code patterns, indicating that the flouwen and icerugs definitely have a common genetic ancestor. The same goes for the coelasharks.”

  She looked up at Cinnamon and pointed at her screen. “This is a scan of some coelashark muscle tissue that Little White brought back. The cells here in the muscle tissue have specialized, and changed basic shape by joining into long strands of knobs, but the basic coelashark cell is also double-knobbed, and uses the same basic genetic code pattern, so icerugs and coelasharks have a common genetic ancestor.”

  “How closely related are they?” asked Cinnamon.

  “Not close at all,” said Katrina. “Again, I haven’t had time to get detailed maps of the genetic patterns in order to run comparisons, but just a quick scan shows a major difference. The coelasharks have two sets of genes, each slightly different from the other, one set on one knob of the cell and the other set on the other knob. That makes them diploid. The icerugs, however, have only one set of genes, the patterns on the two knobs of their cell are the same. So, they are monoploid while the coelasharks are diploid — that’s a major difference which indicates that they are not closely related at all.”

  “On Earth, a diploid genetic structure usually indicates a more complex and therefore a more advanced life form,” said Cinnamon. “Yet the icerugs seem to be much more intelligent than the icerugs.”

  “Since they only need one knob of their cell for reproduction,” said Katrina. “Perhaps they use the other knob for thinking — changing the patterns on the cell surface to store long term memories. Anyway, even though distantly related, they are related.”

  “If that’s true, then following the pattern on Earth, probably all life on Zulu is related to each other — and thence to the flouwen,” mused Cinnamon.

  “So far, they are,” said Katrina. “The sample of smallfish and the boardweed that Gray-Mote gave Little White also show a double-knob cell structure.”

  “I wondered how it happened? Did life from here go to Rocheworld, or the other way around? Rocheworld does come pretty close to Gargantua once every three orbits.”

  “The geyser here throws lots of biological material from Zulu into space,” said Katrina. “And the interplanetary waterfall between the two lobes of Rocheworld is an obvious method of getting life from that world into space.”

  “It could also be something as prosaic as a large meteorite hitting either planet, and throwing into space a chunk of dirt or ice with microbes in it.”

  “We’ll probably never know,” said Katrina. “But in any case the lifeforms on Zulu and Rocheworld have the same ancestor.”

  Sam came into the lab to see what they were talking about so seriously, and his entry caused Katrina to remember her other exciting piece of news.

  “Sam!” she exclaimed. “Remember how the icerug Yellow-Star jumped when you stepped on it?”

  “Yes?” said Sam, puzzled. “You two said something about super-fast reflexes.”

  “The reflexes were super-fast because the signals were carried by a superconductor! The icerug nervous system consists of specialized nerve cells that grow long threads which connect to other nerve cells. The threads have a poor conductor for a surface layer and a strong and flexible metal-organic polymer inside that’s a room-temperature superconductor! The microscope has a heated stage and I ran it up to a hundred celsius — as high as it could go — and I still measured zero resistance through a five centimeter strand — the longest I could tease out.”

  “That’s fantastic!” enthused Sam. “A room temperature superconductor that is also a strong and flexible polymer would revolutionize electrical technology back on Earth. That discovery alone might easily pay Earth back for the entire cost of our mission.”

  Katrina turned to look at Cinnamon. “You said that you had something interesting to tell me about the icerugs. What is it?”

  “Nothing really important,” replied Cinnamon, slowly. “You can read it in my report — which I’d better get to work on.”

  CHAPTER 07 — SUBMERGING

  Quietly and rapidly, the flouwen submerged, luxuriating in the slow surge of the ocean around them. As the humans had promised, the signals from Babble soon became only an occasional faint blip of sound at regular intervals — easily ignored. The three quickly discovered that swimming in the strange suits was a different matter altogether from the freedom to which they were accustomed. However, they soon adapted to the new sensation.

  *Takes work, to swim in this bag,* grunted Little Red.

  ^But, being more compact, the glide is longer,^ demonstrated Little White, forging ahead. The blobby, awkward-looking shapes increased their pace with practice, and with powerful lunges headed towards the depths.

  Although the light filtering down from the surface provided a weak amount of illumination, the superb sonar of the flouwen gave them a bright and clear picture of their surroundings, the highly flexible glassy-foil fabric of the suits allowing the sonar pulses from their bodies to penetrate into the water. Little Purple, emulating one of his favorite humans, commented frequently on what they were “seeing” as they swam along. His observations were converted by David’s software algorithm into a high reliability communications code, and redundantly transmitted over a number of channels by the sonar transmitter on Little Purple’s chestpack back to Babble, to be transmitted up through the commsat links to Joe on Dragonfly, who devolved the code to reconstruct the message and pass it along to David, while copies were sent to Josephine on Victoria and James on Prometheus.

  #Water getting warmer. No sign of anything moving. Tide is moving against us. Wait. A funny echo…#

  *Big!*

  ^Stop!^

  The three flouwen attempted to stop simultaneously. Their normal techniques, however, failed in the clumsy suits, so that instead of the easy cessation of motion they expected, there was a collision of the three, which distracted them. By the time Little Red had stopped blaming the other two, the large distant echo had vanished, but the three explorers now proceeded more slowly, surveying all the areas around them.

  #Sea bottom now in range. Large crater down below. Not deep. Ful
l of plants. Inside crater hear bubbling sounds of vent field. Water getting warmer as we go nearer. Funny echo again.#

  Little Purple stopped transmitting, and all three stopped seeing around them with their sonar pings, and instead switched to looking through the lenses built into their helmets. Down below them, illuminated by the reddish light trickling down from the surface above, a large and powerful form undulated around the rim of the crater, sleek and silent as a snake. It was a giant coelashark, larger than either a human or a flouwen.

  #Big. Four legs, with fins on the ends. Four tentacles, stubby too, coming from beneath, below mouth. Tentacles carry sharp stone. Moves in s-curves, sideways.#

  The coelashark’s attention seemed to be concentrated on the warmer, plant-choked waters inside the crater, and it did not notice or pay attention to the silent bulk of the three aliens above it. The coelashark moved slowly, effortlessly, but with a steady rhythm that seemed in no way idle; it was watching the plants for something, and waiting with a purpose. It swam off and disappeared around the opposite side of the seaweed bed, but the flouwen stayed quietly where they were, also waiting and watching. After some time the coelashark reappeared. It stopped to sharpen the already sharp point of its stone on a rock, and continued its patrol of the vent field, its attention still directed inward, and passed.

  With tacit mutual consent, the flouwen kept sonar silence to prevent being observed, swam over the edge of the crater to the inside, and began to drop slowly downward. Behind, they could hear the approach of Babble, its treads making a great deal of noise as it splashed across the ocean surface above them. Thankful this time for the presence of the noisy machine, the flouwen were able to use Babble‘s pings and tread noise to keep track of the large coelashark, while saving their own sonar chirps for the scanning of things near to them.