Of Man, Sun and Stars

by Vasileios Kalampakas

that manifested around him and shivered. He took a deep breath and put the binoculars back on, now tracking the eba as well as two other figures too far away to positively identify them. Noone else was due out this far upstream today, none that he knew of.

  He could safely conclude that it was either them or someone equally stupid, which would be no small surprise as of late with every number dwindling except for the amount of idiots running free. Sigmund kicked in the ’sediment’ mode on the buggy, and its metal wheels - a memory metal - reshaped itself in a thin-faceted, gear-like, Eden-proven design. A few indicators lit up and the screen showed energy estimates. Gobbling down more power than the solar panels could provide, the battery would be exhausted before they reached Landing.

  Sigmund snarled something in German and pressed on with the buggy, following eba towards the two figures, hoping the emergency fuel cell would be enough. He said to noone in particular, for no particular reason:

  “Called me a fool did he? Chen, you are a dick.”

  As Sigmund and the eba approached the two young men it seemed they were indeed in need of help. The eba arrived first and was standing guard, looking out for whatever danger might still lurk around. The boys seemed in one piece. Jared, a thin lad with wiry hair, had met a sand-ant up and close and it looked like it wasn’t much fun at all. He had several cuts and scrapes all over him. Possibly a torn calf muscle as well. He was limping on his left leg, putting his weight on Ernst both trudging along westward.

  Sigmund slid to a stop nearby, and started walking towards the two boys, spear in hand, aggravation written across his face. He could not help himself chastising the two young men:

  “So you went too far upstram searching for water. And you thought you’d become heroes or something. Used up the buggy’s power still miles away from Landing and you went on foot. And got jumped by a sand ant. Feel proud for yourselves?”

  Jared, the wounded one, immediately retorted, his tanned face looking smoothly impervious to any sort of guilt:

  “You know we need the water and it was a small pack, three of them; we killed them all.”

  Ernst was sheepishly taking a look at the verbal confrontation, while packing their gear on their buggy. Sigmund went silent for a few moments, staring at the two boys with an uncertain look between anger and worry. At length, he pointed an accusing finger at Jared, trying to maintain an even though strict tone of voice:

  “You’re naborns and maybe you think you have adjusted better than the rest of us, but dying never helped anyone, did it? Killing three sand ants just messed you up so you won’t be able to work again for at least a couple of weeks, and another buggy is lost somewhere out there and someone will have to go get it tomorrow, if it survives the storm! And all this to satisfy your adolescent craving for pack superiority. Very much so like animals! As if growing hair meant you’ve grown brains! Did you ever pause to think?”

  The comment about the animals spurred some heavy eyebrow movement and piercing eye shots from the eba towards Sigmund, but once he shot back an even glance, it quickly retrained its attention towards safeguarding the rest of them until they loaded up.

  “And what would you have us do, Teacher? Wait around till one of you provides a miracle? Until Eden decides to turn upside down for our own sake? You know we need water more than ever, so stop excusing yourself. Coward.”

  The vehemence of Jared’s last word was such that it struck everyone with numbness and amazement. Everyone except Sigmund who inspite of himself dropped what he was carrying to stand still in front of Jared for just a moment, nostrils covered with dirt flaring up. Jared sat still but calm, and then his mouth turned into a slight, almost childish grin. Sigmund slapped him in the face, making Ernst and the eba freeze where they stood. Jared was dumbfounded; Sigmund had a reputation for being mild-mannered and strictly against any form of violence. While he was trying to come up with a defying insult, Sigmund kept him at pause saying in a calm but determined manner:

  “I spent one hundred and twenty years in cryogenic storage. A hundred and twenty years of still life and REM brain function. I almost went half-mad getting here for the so-called betterment of mankind, and all I got was a fucking desert planet trying to kill me and teenagers who think this is fun! While I’m risking my neck looking out for you dimwits with a death wish, there’s a sandstorm coming that can eat your flesh to the bone, and you have the audacity to call me a coward. How I wish I really was one and never stepped foot in here in the first place. Stayed back on Earth, do a round trip to the Jupiter belt and write a book. But I wanted the full ride, so here I am. And here you are, as well.”

  A moment of stillness ensued, their gaze interlocking and reapproving one another. Jared measured Sigmund’s stare and tone. He seemed to accept his place, at least for now.

  “Here we are indeed, Teacher. What of it now?”

  Ernst picked up the last of their gear and equipment and fastened it to the buggy, which was now looking very much like a metallic pack mule, minus the rustic charm.

  Sigmund sat in the driver’s seat and started the buggy’s motor, checking power gauges and estimations, selecting Landing’s position on the map and at the same time answering Jared:

  “Just shut up and get in the buggy. Maybe the storm will get close enough for you to show it some more respect the next time you decide to become a hero.”

  Jared remained silent, even though the look on his face implied he was itching to utter some sort of retort. With the help of Ernst he made his way to the buggy and sat quite uncomfortably among the heap of gear, his face contorting with pain. Ernst hadn’t spoken a word but his eyes showed how relieved he felt to be sitting down again, no claws at his back trying to rip him apart. He closed his eyes and made a small gesture to the sun with one palm, a newly found custom with superstitious overtones that the science being taught to the boys had not been able to discourage.

  Sigmund took notice; such overtly religious phenomena seemed to be on the rise. He decided to further enquire Ernst about it, at a more appropriate time. For the moment, the pressing issue was getting back to Landing as dast as possible.

  “Eba!Come. Storm front will be visible in four minutes. We’ll be cutting it close.”

  The eba seemed to tense up, feeling the air with its whiskers.

  “Yes, friend. The air is thick.”

  “Yeah, yeah, I know. I got the satellite feed, you got the whiskers. Now hurry!”

  The eba took a last glancing look daywards into the direction of the storm and gracefully leapt in the buggy next to Sigmund, managing to curl up and fit nicely in a space designed for a human buttock. Sigmund hit the emergency power button on the screen, and the buggy lurched forward with a sudden acceleration far greater than normal.

  Dirt,gravel, and rock were being spewn back from the buggy’s wheels which covered ground with astonishing speed. Sigmund glanced around to his back and saw the storm front finally appear within eyesight range. The closer they got to Landing the darker the sky and cooler the atmosphere became. The air was thick with sand and dust; the approaching overpressure of the daily sandstorm making itself felt on their skin. Sigmund connected with Landing’s cavemaster:

  “Dave, this is Ziggy. I need you to open C2, I’m coming in with Jared and Ernst. Have Elon or Chen come up as well, Jared needs some patchwork.”

  “You’re coming in hot, Ziggy. Can you make it in three minutes? I got the storm hitting in under five, telemetry reads you have a 30-second margin,” the cavemaster’s voice matter-of-factly and business-like.

  Sigmund mused with a grin forming on his face:

  “I know, I’m running on emergency power. Don’t leave me banging at the door, Dave.”

  “Hope I don’t have to, Ziggy. Good luck..”

  “Luck has shit to do with anything anyway, Dave.”

  “Call me sentimental.”

  The brief chatter was enough for everyone involved to realise that if they really couldn’t get inside on time, they would really b
e on their own. Which meant death in every recorded instance up to now. It made sense if you had nowhere else to hide from a three hundred mile-per-hour sandstorm two miles high.

  “Will we make it friend?”, the eba asked Sigmund, seemingly unafraid; it worried though for the well-being of its human masters, or as they had been engineered to consider them, friends.

  “Stick around and find out for yourself, eba.”

  “I will, friend,” answered the eba. Sigmund’s sarcasm was lost on the intelligent, but socially somewhat inept creature. The biological engineers hadn’t been able to compensate for sarcasm.

  The storm was now clearly visible hurling itself at the Wall with little more than three hundred miles per hour. Sigmund’s info panels gave an estimation of a minute and a half before it hit Landing and they were a minute out. He could make out the C2 gate from that distance, wide open with the emergency lights flashing like pearly diamonds in a rugged stone setting. That meant every second counted. The eba somehow knew; it took it upon itself to help as best as it could, and leapt off suddenly. It started running a bit behind the buggy and shouting over the din of the metal wheels:

  “Lighter this way!”

  Sigmund was completely surprised. He ventured a gaze behind his back, and saw the eba slowly but surely falling behind, even though it seemed to be making every effort not to.

  “Damn talking cats! Stupid talking cats!”

  Jared and Ernst were drawn to the sight of the cat running like they had never seen before, every muscle and joint moving with a fluid certainty, a vivid show of harmony, brimming with energy and power. But it was not enough, the eba could not catch up with the electric motors of the buggy, which were already running beyond design capacity, threatening to burn up before they reached Landing. Alerts were flashing across the buggy’s panel, providing Sigmund ample opportunities for cursing, along with the audible beeps and calm warnings in English, Chinese, Russian, and French.

  And right behind them, no more than five miles behind, they could see the storm front, a bleak wall of sand hurtling at them with a mindless rage only a thing of nature could endow itself with. They were nightside now, at the dusky side where Landing sat, the gates only a few hundred meters before them.

  Above all the sound warnings and the grating sound of the wheels on sharp granite gravel, the voice of Dave was heard:

  “You’re looking good, if only barely Ziggy. Starting to close the gates now.”

  Sigmund nodded to Dave through the cam on the comms panel:

  “Yes, fine. Going through in 20 seconds.”

  Seconds right after the buggy passed through the gates, they closed tightly shut. Huge hydraulic bars locked in place right behind the door, with a slow grinding noise. Sigmund stopped the buggy near one end of the large cave. Smoke with an acrid smell was coming out of the wheels, while Ernst helped Jared to a nearby workbench. Sigmund got out of the buggy with the whole ordeal seemingly having weighted him down. With slow motions he picked up his spear and his backpack. He shot a weary look at Jared and Ernst, who did not return it and rather went about unloading the buggy.

  At that moment they felt the storm hit the Wall, reverberating through the rock, grazing the doors of the gate. Cave Two was filled with echoes of an otherworldly din, and a shallow sound like hissing dominated the largely empty space. A metal door with a revolving lock opened, and Dave appeared, pipe in hand, a cloud of smoke forming from his nostrils. He cracked a wizened smile and asked with a jokingly formal tone:

  “Landing Gatemaster, accepting party of ..?”

  Sigmund walked past him without sharing Dave’s jovial manner:

  “You can count, can’t you?”

  “Where’s the eba?”

  Sigmund’s voice was now faint, as he walked down the metal stairs to the hab complex:

  “Out there, on Eden.”

  The Suit

  “Are you sure about this?” asked Schneider. He wasn’t wearing his trademark labcoat, just some shorts and a T-shirt with the phrase “Fuck Nobel, I’ll make my own award” shoddily stamped on it, the ’N’ in Nobel almost chipped out of existence.

  “No, not by a long shot,” replied Bob, his voice trailing off with a hint of anxiety. He kept fiddling around with his extravagantly bulbous red suit, nervously checking and re-checking seals, wristbands, valves and plugs. Schneider noticed what Bob was doing and gripped him by the shoulders pads, forcing Bob to make eye contact, an uncommon practice which almost everyone avoided.

  “Don’t. Touch. The Suit,” said Schneider. His words carried strangely ominous undertones. He then smiled sharply, as if he had made a joke. The look on both their faces told them they knew it wasn’t funny at all. Bob nodded his acknowledgement and stopped messing with the suit. Instead he sat motionless in The Chair, arms resting on its sides.

  The slightly morose look on his face implied he might just as well have been shackled to that chair. The thought that he had actually done cartwheels when they’d told him he had been selected, brought a smile of irony to his face. But he still found it almost impossible to just sit tight and wait, so he repeated the same technique that had kept him calm throughout all the field testing: he started counting everything around him, once again.

  There were forty-nine cooling lines, eighty-four power lines, one hundred and sixty-seven signal lines and twenty-three gaseous mixture lines. They were supported on two hundred and seventeen metal clips, poles, and columns. There was a metal grid with nine hundred and seventy-two panels, supporting the roof as well as the experiment’s infrastructure.

  There was himself, Schneider, fifty-seven technicians, thirteen PhD’s, four Nobel-prize winners and two soon-to-be. All in all, seventy-eight people, or seventy-seven souls. Schneider insisted that he had sold his own to the devil. He always smiled every time he said that, a sight that always gave the impression he wasn’t joking.

  Bob gave up on counting the rest; it didn’t seem to help this time around. This was the Big One, the real try, the make-or-break. He gave Schneider a wary look which went largely unnoticed. He then made a half-hearted attempt at bad humor, the sort which could only lead to nervous laughter at best:

  “Hey! This Suit’s a bit embarassing. Makes me look like Santa. What kind of impression would that make, eh? Shouldn’t we have gone with something in, let’s say, formal black?”

  “It’s the beryllium laminar coating on the outer two surface skins, Robert. There’s no proper substitute for the photonic cohesion exhibited by quasi-crystallic beryllium films. I knew very little people actually read the technical documents, but I’d thought you’d be at least interested in the design outlines,” said Schneider without pausing in his work. Bob rolled his eyes, realising he was trying to connect emotionally to someone who designed a robot as a pet when he was seven years old. He let out a sigh disquised as a deep exhale before replying unenthusiastically:

  “It’s supposed to be a joke, Kurt.”

  Schneider turned momentarily to smile at Bob, before adding:

  “Well then, I hear black is out of fashion. Red, they say, is the new black.”

  And with that, he walked away briskly, focusing his attention on another mystifying calibration task, leaving bob to just sit and think what it would be like to be the first living man to experience the afterworld.

  Bob’s eyes wandered uncertainly before settling on the observation pane, a hundred feet away, and only three feet wide. It was large enough for the observers to gape into the Labyrinth, the Intrinsic Enthalpy Facility’s pet name.

  He suddenly deeply wished he could see Lisa behind that pane; but all the faces he could glimpse belonged to top brass; emotionless, unwavering, rigid. People that had no idea what all this was about, having simply been convinced that it was more than worth the money that could’ve bought them a mass-driver on the moon, or alternatively, a near-infinite supply of paperclips. They just wanted to see if Schneider would deliver the goods; the significance of what would be accomplished was t
otally lost on them.

  Bob glimpsed the reflection of him on a cooling bank’s chrome surface. The crisp touch of ice on his reflected image made him feel warm and comfortable inside the suit. His head though was still swimming in the haze from the drug soup he’d taken that morning. He called out to Schneider who was standing a dozen feet away, running last-minute diagnostics on yet another control panel himself:

  “Uhm, Kurt? I think I’m nauseous.”

  “It’s the tetra-di-cynocytin-based inhibitors. There’s always some penta-thymo-ephedrin to counteract that, but it seems likely today you’re a bit more anxious,” replied Schneider coolly. He seemed to be handling everything as if this was just another dry run.

  “I think I need some more of that ephedrin,” said Bob somewhat weakly. Schneider shook his head slightly, indicating a terse ’no’. Bob tried to sound convincing when he said:

  “I feel like throwing up.”

  “By all means, Robert. The Suit will administer fluids to balance the losses, nothing to worry.”

  Bob gave up, and started taking deep breaths with practiced self-discipline, forcing himself into a state of serene calmness. It was part of a well-rehearsed checklist, and quite contrary to his human, innate instinct of fear.

  He ventured a look at the low-hung ceiling; the mess of cables, pipelines and ducts offering a dizzying spectacle. He continued his slow, deep, breathing pattern, muttering under his breath. When Schneider finished the last of his hands-on checks, he turned his attention on the Chair with renewed vigor. He noticed Bob had his eyes closed, mumbling inaudibly.

  “Say it out loud if it makes you feel any better Bob. I know what you’re saying anyway.”

  Bob shot an exasperated look at Schneider. He chased it up with a scoff:

  “Reading minds already, Kurt?”

  “Lips, actually. It works wonders at fund-raisers, especially with the ladies.”

  “Jesus, Kurt. Read it again: Fuck you. I’ve pissed inside this thing twice already. I’ve been stuck here for five hours. Are we gonna do this? Today?”

  Schneider took a few steps closer to Bob. This time, he seemed to have his flippancy switched to ’off’:

  “Look, Bob. This isn’t a dry run. This is the real thing. You can still back out. I’ve been waiting for this moment for almost twenty years. It’s not like it’s going to go away. There’s always tomorrow. Piotr is practically gnawing at his Suit in E-3. He can take your place, recalibrate in under one hour.”

  Bob suddenly jerked himself upright, even with all the Suit’s bulk. His eyes suddenly flared with the same gleam like five years before, when he had first entered the project, and laid eyes on the Chair. He didn’t seem fond of Schneider’s idea at all.

  “Fuck Piotr! I’ve seen his stats. You don’t need