by Eric Klein
At the center of the station is another set of airlocks into a cylindrical room. To the left of the door is a mosaic view of the fountain of Aphrodite Mountain, taken from its base looking up; to the right is a print of the fountain from Mexico City of the same name. Fay leads us inside. “This is the beanstalk capsule. We have this floor with the lounge and seating around three sides to look out or down, and below is a restroom and two small sleeping chambers for those who prefer not to look out as we descend. The trip down will take about an hour and a half, at an average rate of thirty kilometers per hour. As you enter can each of you stop in front of the grid by the door? This will allow the capsule to scan you and then print out your pressure suit for the surface as we descend. Please watch your step as the doors seal and we begin our descent.”
Kneeling by his son, Bert says, “But isn’t that speed too fast? Won’t the atmosphere slow us down?”
Coming up the stairs from the lower level, the capsule technician responds, “The atmosphere of Venus is so thick that terminal velocity is about forty-eight kilometers per (universal) hour. We will not get even close to that and should have a smooth ride down. Now, who would like some refreshments while we descend?”
The set of double doors closes. As we descend, it gets a little harder to see details further away. Kneeling next to Almóinn, Fay explains it is just the clouds, and we will see better when we are a little lower. As we watch, a drop forms and crawls up the window quite fast, leaving a clear trail for a few seconds before the window mists up again. Fay jumps up and grabs me, and starts to dance around the small cabin, “It worked! Seeding has already started to work!”
I hold her until she calms down enough to explain that the water droplet on the window means that the ice shots have done their work. There is now sufficient moisture in the atmosphere to condense on the colder beanstalk capsule as it descends into the warmer regions. The previous clouds wouldn’t have created this kind of misting and runoff. With more ice asteroids, in time there will be water rains on Venus.
On the surface, there are beds of fuchsia flowers all around the area below the beanstalk. They have spread for several meters beyond the base, and we need to be careful not to step on them. Looking under the capsule, Fay points out how the water is dripping down the cable and watering the plants so they can expand beyond the original test bed.
“We are now in the Ovda Regio of the Aphrodite Terra, approximately five kilometers above the mean surface. This is one of the plateaus that we are looking to inhabit first, as the pressure and temperature are more reasonable than on the lower surfaces. As you can see, we can move around in just simple protective suits and rebreathers.”
Looking around the yellowish-white surface, we can see small patches of other colors: greys, greens, even some yellow or orange. Almóinn points to a sort of vivid green spot, “What’s that?”
“Ah, those spots are the lichen we have spread on the surface, to start breaking it down into a proper soil to grow plants. The plants here were started in a special combination of local stone we broke down into something like sand and compost from Cloud City’s hydroponics farms. As you can see, they are spreading downstream as the water moves the nutrients further from the initial flower beds.”
After an hour of guided tour showing us the landscape and how it is beginning to change, it is necessary for Bert to carry Almóinn as he is getting too tired to walk himself. We all walk back to the capsule, and, with a bit of effort, get Almóinn out of his protective suit and into one of the rest chambers. His protests fade as fatigue takes over.
Harvey Parry, the capsule attendant, does a head count, seals the capsule, and initiates the two-hour ride back up. “Who would like some refreshments? And how about a little music?” He has the computer play a very old classic, “Somewhere Over the Rainbow,” followed by “Up Where We Belong,” followed by “Let’s go fly a kite.” It seems he has a theme list prepared for a captive audience.
Chapter 12
“The contemplation of celestial things will make a man both speak and think more sublimely and magnificently when he descends to human affairs.”
— Marcus Tullius Cicero, c. 48 BCE.
Surprisingly the exit procedure from Cloud City is almost non-existent. There is a simple revolving pressure door that opens to my ident chip, and that is all. Seems they are more interested in counting those leaving than checking them.
We arrive at the Captain’s table before him and sit down to wait for him. A few minutes later he comes in on crutches and with a prosthetic replacement for his right foot. Fay jumps up and starts towards him.
Holding up his hand to stop her, “Before you ask, there was a small problem with the bridge lift. I was stepping in when the door closed on my leg and the lift went down. Ethan was quick to apply a tourniquet and got me down to the sickbay. Doc Hippe said that I was lucky that she was able to put on this temporary prosthetic as they don’t usually have them in my size. If she did not have it, I would have to wait for her to print the prosthetic, only marginally quicker than the few days needed to print me a replacement biological one. I guess I have to use this temporary mechanical one until then.”
“Damn it, Dad! Look at how long it took for you to recover when they printed you a new left hand after your accident last year.”
“Yes, but a hand needs more fine control than a foot. I’ll be fine. But enough standing around; let’s sit and eat.”
“Welcome to this workshop session. Today we are looking at ways to improve the techniques of para-terraforming.” Carroll Dunning looks at me. “For those who are not part of the para-terraforming community, para-terraforming is the concept that it is not always appropriate or desirable to terraform an entire planet, moon, or another celestial body. Instead we dome or cover over an area and terraform the area under cover.”
The discussion covers the main problems: protection, size, and power. Seems that they were looking to set a standard for a new hex pattern that would replace the standard transparent aluminum (aluminum oxynitride) with one coated with transparent iron oxide. The new composite seemed to have both better strength and better insulating properties than aluminum and can be combined with interconnecting solar film or gel between two layers to both protect and power the dome. They are predicting that it will be fifty percent stronger than the current design and better able to deflect small meteorites when properly angled. Also, there is an analysis of the best places to locate these domes. Seems that building in the anti-spinward side of hills and mountains had a decreased chance of being hit by meteoroids, as these tended to hit the spinward side. This need not negatively affect the solar exposure or view. For three hours, the workshop discusses and used 3D holograms to design, rotate, adjust, and run simulations for cost vs. strength based on the configurations of variously shaped domes and enclosed canyons.
After dinner, we enjoy the pageant presentations. In an effort to expand on the move from a purely appearance-based pageant, the contestants are required to show that they have made some social or scientific contribution. For this year’s contestants, these include presentations on everything from helping people suffering from the flooding due to global warming on Earth, to working with children injured or suffering from solar burns on Ceres.
Some of the contestants have done serious work towards advanced degrees in the field of space medicine, and one is also participating in the symposium as part of her degree completion. The presentations were broadcast live across the system with the hope that they would inspire the next generation, and were the second-highest-viewed feeds of the whole pageant with more than ten million likes before the presentations were over.
On Sunday we take it easy. We relax in the pool lounge and even get in some time practicing underwater. I’m able to spend a few hours reading a book from the library while Fay reads her own and uses me as a pillow. It is so comfortable and familiar that it is as if we had been doing this
for years.
After dinner, we go to the main ballroom for dancing. The changes from lecture layout to dance-hall mode is always startling, but this time the changes are absolutely striking. The room looks like the inside of a giant barn, complete with hay loft and even hay. Now I understand why the AI suggested blue overalls for me and floral dress for Fay. There is a band with someone in front calling out instructions as people are dancing around in a square. We are encouraged to join with three other couples to form a square. There are three more squares, each in a corner of the room. We are instructed to not hold the hands of our partners unless a move calls for it.
The music starts, and the Caller calls out, “Couples enter the square; bow to your partner; bow to your corner.” So the couples facing towards or away from the stage enter the square and bow or curtsy to each other and then turn to bow to the people who have not moved.
“Couples return, and alternate couples enter the square; bow to your partner, bow to your corner. Couples return. Join hands and circle left.” We each take the hand of our partner and one from the person on our corner and start moving towards our left until we are back where we started. “Enter the square and give her a twirl, then find your partner and promenade back.” We enter the square and I do a twirl with the woman opposite me, while Fay is twirled by the man opposite her. I then take Fay and promenade to where we started.
As everyone gets the hang of following the instructions, the band and Caller start to speed up. As the dance progresses I find myself dancing with each of the women and doing several turns and twists of just the men in the middle. After 10 minutes Fay and I are back in our original positions and again bowing to the couple opposite us.
The caller now calls for the next set of squares to form up from the people who were watching from around the walls.
Leading Fay over to where they have refreshments set up, “Fay, do you mind if we duck out of this? I much prefer dancing with my partner than with whomever the caller feels like mixing me up with; I’m not looking to meet someone else.”
“Sure, let’s go.”
By silent agreement we find ourselves back at Callahan’s.
Looking over the topics for the day, I head over to the Evolution of Communications session, as one near and dear to my own line of work. As the group comes to order, one of the Ph.D. students, Jennifer Gertler, gets up to present. “I don’t think I need to go all the way back to the rivalry between Alexander Graham Bell and Antonio Meucci over the invention of the telephone in eighteen forty-nine. I would like to note that history has eventually corrected the fallacy that Bell was the first to invent the telephone - rather, it was Meucci. Bell was just first to the patent office, and Meucci died before his legal case against Bell was resolved. Nor will I go into detail about Guglielmo Marconi’s demonstration of wireless communications in eighteen ninety-four, other than to say that it also turned into a demonstration of the first communication hacking. The major turning point that is of interest to us is with the work of Mehul Malik and his colleagues that proved the first examples of quantum entanglement which has led to our current real-time communication solution. How important this discovery would become was only apparent in twenty thirty-five, when President Donald Trump Jr. was on an inspection visit to Farside station on the Moon, and North Korea detonated an above-surface nuclear weapon. President Trump was unavailable for several hours before a satellite was in line of sight to allow him to be briefed and formulate a response. He was frustrated at the over-a-second lag in the radio communications. Once the first test Quantum Entanglement Radio (QER) was operational it became apparent that distance and line of sight no longer were limiting factors on communicating. Initial communication was limited to fluctuations based on the old Morse Code with changes on the entangled particle at one end causing the other to respond. The advantages of this are readily apparent: near real-time communication that cannot be tapped or modified. Over time the system was enhanced from a single pair of particles to multiple pairs of particles, enabling full bits and bytes to be transmitted simultaneously. Experiments in twenty sixteen enabled the system to be enhanced to allow for three particles to be entangled rather than just pairs. This allows for three sites to communicate in near real-time. Over time they worked out how to add more entangled particles, enabling more connected sites. The problem was that this then led to a lot of cross-talk as they all transmitted at once.
“Currently there is a standard configuration that has been working for the last twenty years. All planets, satellites, colonies, etc., are connected to two other sites for regular communications. All inter-colony communications are routed via the administrative country and the UN administration station on Ceres. On-planet, we use direct connections to our wristpads that are then routed to the international links as needed. But, it was determined that the majority of communications are within the same geographic area or planet. As an aside, this is similar to the reason that facsimiles – or, as they were known, faxes – took more than a hundred years to become useful. It was perceived that anything you would want to send would be to a person within walking distance.”
“Returning to the present. Major government broadcasts are using the multiple entangled particles. However, that is mostly government-to-government information with little need for a response. Until now, the equipment for these entangled particles was too big and power intensive, so spaceships are all on a single link to Ceres for distant connections, and use radio for close communications. A recent breakthrough has enabled the L.S.S. Venture to be the first ship with multiple entangled connections back to Earth and Ceres. Each of the ship’s life craft is connected to the Venture and Ceres.”
Chapter 13
“Out, out, brief candle!
Life’s but a walking shadow, a poor player
That struts and frets his hour upon the stage
And then is heard no more: it is a tale
Told by an idiot, full of sound and fury,
Signifying nothing.”
Macbeth, Act V, Scene 5 by William Shakespeare
Stepping out onto the main stage, Ivan Thomas – the DJ and master of ceremonies – announces, “In honor of our twelfth night on this journey, we present our Shakespearean competition inspired by his play The Twelfth Night. We invite you all to come up and brush up your Shakespeare, either using the original or your own verse inspired by the great bard. Our first piece is from Madame Sul-Te-Wan and is entitled ‘To Breathe or not to Breathe, an Ode to My Helmet.’”
Madame Sul-Te-Wan steps to the center stage. “Thank you. I started writing this while recovering after losing my hand in an accident at Messina Chasmata on Titania. In the bed next to me was a ring rover who had been lucky enough to be saved after a problem with his suit’s air. It seems he was in debt and had tried to save some money by growing and compressing his own air. He had gotten the mix wrong and was lucky enough that another ring rover was close by when he started to send out his mayday. He was there for two weeks, tied to a breathing machine while they printed out and then implanted new lungs for him.
“To breathe or not to breathe, that is the question:
Whether ‘tis nobler to farm and grow my own air or suffer
The slings and arrows of the outrageous prices that the commissary charges.
And if I should compress my own air, what of the sea of troubles it could entail?
And by growing them, to risk getting the mix all wrong and to sleep - perchance to dream: ay, there’s the rub!
For in that sleep death may come.
Thus leaving in orbit this mortal coil
That makes calamity of so long life.
For who would choose to float off out of time
When he himself might his quietus make?
Thus conscience does make cowards of us all,
And thus the native hue of resolution
’Where’s the respect for th
ose who sell a safe product,
With a bare bodkin? Who would these fardels be - these merchants who charge so much but do not walk in space?
‘Tis better to pay for quality than
To grunt and sweat under a weary life,
Or to live no more.”
The room broke out into whistles and applause.
Ivan took the stage. “Settle down, please. Thank you, Madame Sul-Te-Wan, for that breath taking …” (The crowd groans.) “… and insightful look at the economy of our breathing gear. Next up are crew members Bill and Larry Fisher doing a scene from Romeo and Juliet.”
The two men come out in Shakespearean-era dress with Bill in a long sweeping gown and Larry in tights and a cape, his face covered by a Venetian mask with a long nose.
Bill:
My true love’s passion: therefore pardon me,
And not impute this yielding to light love,
Which the dark of space hath so discovered.
Larry:
My love, by yonder blessed moon I swear
That tips with silver all these fruit-tree tops -
Bill:
O, swear not by the moon, the inconstant moon,
That monthly changes in her circled orb,
To wax and wane, from full to naught.
Lest that thy love prove likewise variable.
Larry:
