They followed a path to a clearing in the middle of the forest. Here stood a home. It looked like a ring of silver igloos linked together by passageways. A red-furred creature was curled on the front stoop, but stood at their approach. It looked to Morgan like a squat ostrich with six legs. It sniffed the air, then retracted its long neck and scurried off into the underbrush.
“That’s Woof,” Annie said. “He’s shy.”
Morgan’s mind grappled with the scene and the implications. Avery, Christine and Nick had settled on Tula and started a human colony. It seemed an impossible outcome to the tragedy that had stranded the three astronauts on Callisto, but unless Morgan was locked in the most surreal dream ever, it was true.
As they entered the home, Morgan set Annie down, and the girl tugged on his pant leg. “We need more friends. More mommies and daddies. Can you help us?”
CHAPTER 21: RIDE OR DIE
Tula habitat — Suhkai spacecraft Ethel
In orbit around Saturn moon Dione
September 11 —September 12, 2019
Over a meal of squishy-gray bread, berries and Nick’s nectar of the stars, Morgan listened to Sarah, John and Annie recount the oral history of their parents’ settlement on Tula. They rejoiced in the beauty of their home world — a world that Annie spoke about with authority though she had yet to visit it. And of course all three children peppered Morgan with questions about their parents and the mystical planet Earth.
Through it all, Annie sat in the lap formed by Zoor, and three Cytons weaved in spirals, trying to avoid the girl’s sweeping hands. If they’d been on Earth, Morgan would have thought she was trying to catch fireflies.
Woof eventually worked up the courage to slink into the house. Morgan held out his hand, and a tentacled-covered tongue flicked out and attached to his fingers. Annie laughed. So did Morgan.
Zoor then took over the storytelling, reciting the tale of the three lost astronauts. It was a tale the children had clearly heard hundreds of times, because they interrupted on multiple occasions to interject details the Suhkai omitted — details Nick Reed had ingrained in their memories.
Avery, Christine and Nick had left Callisto in a Suhkai cruiser, Zoor said, with a swarm of Cytons leading the way. Within a few months, the Cytons came upon a dormant magnetar, and these alien seeders of life stimulated a starquake that propelled the cruiser at light speed toward the closest Suhkai-occupied base.
“It was an asteroid,” Annie said. “We stopped there on our way here. It has the neatest caves! They shine like a sun!”
Zoor described the asteroid in more detail. Morgan explained that on Earth, such an asteroid was referred to as a pallasite — a mix of glittering gems, magnetic basalt and rock. But the conversation about asteroids reminded him of a lingering question, and he asked it.
“Why was a Zikzaw lurking in the asteroid belt?”
“They are parasites,” Zoor said. “Any time there is a large cosmic disruption in which large amounts of radiation are expelled, Zikzaws show up to feed on the aftermath.”
“But there’s not much radiation in the belt. I mean, compared to Jupiter and Saturn, it’s a radiation desert,” Morgan said.
Annie interrupted again. “This is boring! Tell him about meeting Nicky.”
Zoor smiled and continued her story. When the Suhkai on the pallasite met the three astronauts, they offered them sanctuary. “The Suhkai were impressed that they had survived the long journey on one of our ships,” Zoor said. “Your friends credited their survival to the Cytons that accompanied them. Through those Cytons, your friends said they were excited to explore the galaxy. They wanted to know if there were other worlds with humans, or worlds capable of supporting human life.”
Annie, clearly frustrated with the pace of Zoor’s storytelling, asked Morgan, “Have you ever seen a brown dwarf?”
He confessed he had not. In a matter-of-fact tone, Annie informed him that her parents had lived on another asteroid caught in the orbit of a brown dwarf for a period of time.
John said, “Nicky said it was like a desert motel with a convenience store.”
Zoor added that the Suhkai don’t seek out perfect environments for settlements in the galaxy. “We find what’s available, make the best use of it we can, and then reach further.”
“I understand. The asteroid was a stepping stone,” Morgan said.
“I see your thoughts,” Zoor said. “Yes, a stepping stone.”
As she described the sub-star that nourished the asteroid with heat and a small amount of light, Morgan began to appreciate Nick’s black eyes and the dim orange-red lights that dominated the Suhkai ship’s environs.
Holding cell – Suhkai refinery
Saturn moon Dione
September 12, 2019
As the door to Kiera’s quarters opened, the Cyton informed her it was time for more medicine. Lying on the bed, Kiera peeked from a half-closed eye and saw the Suhkai enter.
Kiera gritted her teeth, rolled off the bed and made a run for the open doorway.
While the Suhkai were strong and graceful, she’d also noticed they were also as slow as grazing elephants. She easily dodged the lumbering alien and sprinted into the hallway. Her Cyton shot after her in pursuit. “Stop! Come back!”
Kiera had to pick a direction and chose to break to the right. She dashed down the hallway. But as she approached an open door on her right, another Suhkai stepped out, blocking her path.
The Cyton zoomed up from behind. “Don’t hurt! Don’t hurt!”
The Suhkai relaxed its stance and stood aside. Kiera passed by so fast she didn’t see Ajay step out behind the Suhkai, but she heard him call her name. She turned back only long enough to scream, “Run!”
Her bare feet scraped the stone floors as she rounded a bend. A short wall on her left overlooked an atrium. A short wall for Suhkai, that is — it was almost as tall as the five-foot-three Kiera. She hoisted herself up and peered over. It was a long way down. “Fuck.”
She hopped back down and kept running.
Shadows of approaching Suhkai appeared from around a turn ahead. She stopped and spun back around. A swirl of pulsing light was racing toward her — a swarm of Cytons. She heard the thoughts of the Cyton that had been monitoring her. “Don’t run! No escape!”
Kiera was trapped. Nowhere to run. Nowhere to hide. She frantically assessed her limited options.
Ajay’s bony figure came running around the bend.
The Cytons were within two feet of Kiera when she blew Ajay a kiss and leapt over the wall.
Cargo bay — the Rorschach Explorer
Flying through the asteroid belt
September 12, 2019
The Rorschach Explorer shuddered when the Recon and Cargo engines rumbled to life. Julia Carillo, anchored to a safety tether in the open cargo bay, her gloved fingers pinching the docking control system joystick, yelped. Inside the ship, Robert Shilling belted out a lusty cheer.
Carillo had been unable to discern whether they were still in the asteroid belt or not, but she had been able to see the gleaming twinkle of Jupiter in one direction and the Sun in the other. Only a couple of weeks had passed since they had looped around to gaze at Earth one last time, so Carillo knew just where to look for it. She played with the Cargo thrusters until the vessel was flying in the general direction of the twinkling star to the right of the Sun.
After descending back to the dock controls, Carillo paused, staring at the stars moving past the open hold, and said a silent prayer for Morgan, Kiera and Ajay. There was nothing else she or Shilling could do for them now but pray.
“You okay in there, Bob?” she asked when she was finished.
In Shilling’s first display of levity since the Hawaiian party, he answered, “Roger dodger. Found what’s left of the mai tais.”
“Copy that,” Carillo said. “Save some for me.”
Tula habitat — Suhkai spacecraft Ethel
In orbit around Saturn moon Dione
; September 12, 2019
Zoor and the children continued to relay the saga of the Cetus Prime astronauts. After leaving the brown-dwarf-asteroid, they were led by the Suhkai to a habitable moon in a distant star cluster, but they soon discovered the environment was too harsh for Christine to produce offspring. Through their network of outposts, the Suhkai then identified a more hospitable planet in a star system a few light years farther away. Tula.
This was where Haula and Zoor entered the story. They were tasked by their elders with transporting Nick, Christine and Avery to the new planet. And two years later — a total of twelve years since the astronauts left Callisto — they arrived at Tula. During the trip, Christine had delivered two children, Tina and John. Sarah was born a little over a year after their arrival on the planet, making her the first true Tulan.
When both the meal and the story were completed, Zoor dismissed the children and led Morgan back out into the rainforest.
“So the idea of building a colony originated before they reached Tula,” Morgan said.
“Yes. Your friends made an agreement with the first Suhkai they met. In exchange for our help in searching for human worlds, they agreed to spread life like Cytons and Suhkai.”
Droplets pelted Morgan’s face as he looked up at Zoor. “How did they go from building their family on Tula to splitting up and sending Nick to fetch more humans from Earth?”
Zoor extended her palm above Morgan’s head to shield him from the rain as they walked. “Once it became sufficiently clear to us that Tula would sustain humans — this was shortly after Sarah was born — we told them the reason the Cytons from Callisto had brought them to meet the Suhkai.”
This admission caused Morgan to halt. His mind drifted back to the Cetus Prime video log in which Nick explained why he believed the Cytons were flying the ship toward Callisto instead of Earth. Nick had said, “I asked them to take us home, but it looks like they thought I asked them to take us to their leader.”
In a later log, Nick clarified that the crew believed the Cytons’ leaders were the aliens who built the spaceport on Callisto — the “beekeepers.” They’d arrived at this conclusion because of the large Cyton hive they discovered inside the structure. And when the three astronauts left the moon in a Suhkai cruiser to go in search of the beekeepers, Nick’s final log said they felt it was a better option than starving to death on Callisto.
But now that Morgan thought of that comment, he realized it wasn’t true. He recalled the water and nectar Nick had plied him with earlier; Nick had told Morgan they had survived on that very nourishment during their journey to meet the Suhkai. Presumably that meant there had been supplies of both in the spaceport and aboard the cruiser.
The implication: the Cytons had deceived the astronauts in order to lure them onto the Suhkai ship. They led them to believe they would starve to death if they didn’t take the ship. The Cytons didn’t reveal the stores of nectar and water until after they left Callisto.
“Deceived is too strong a word,” Zoor said.
“You’re wrong. It’s the perfect word.”
“Regardless, the Cytons had good reason.”
“And what would that be?”
They reached the airlock and stepped inside. “I will show you.”
A blast of frigid air filled the chamber, and the droplets of water on Morgan’s face, hands and clothes turned to ice. He shivered and brushed the crystals off.
The opposite airlock doors opened, and Zoor led him to another room across the hall. A large disc in the center of the floor was matched by a disc of equal size on the ceiling.
“Watch,” Zoor said.
Between the two discs, a three-dimensional image appeared: a spinning black star. As in Zoor’s earlier vision, a fissure ripped across the star’s surface and a bolt of energy fired out. A second later, the twirling star shot forth another gamma burst. Still more followed after that.
The star dissolved and a depiction of Jupiter formed in its place. The gas giant’s clouds churned like cream stirred into coffee, then the swirls began to ripple as if a blast of wind had disturbed their lazy curls around the planet. The ripples soon turned into shockwaves — and with a blinding flash, Jupiter was no more.
In that moment, Morgan understood why the Cytons had led Nick and the others to the Suhkai…and why Nick was hellbent on taking two hundred humans to Tula.
“How long does Earth have?” he asked.
“Who is to say? An Earth day? A year? A few thousand years?”
Morgan thought of the gamma burst that had crippled Juno.
“Yes, it was a weak magwave from the same star that will one day destroy Jupiter and Earth,” Zoor said.
“And the Cytons were aware of this star and what it would do twenty-four years ago when they encountered Cetus Prime?” Morgan asked.
“Yes.”
Zoor told Morgan the Cytons use their ability to detect rising magnetic tensions in dormant magnetars to help them determine which are stable enough to stimulate magwaves for space travel purposes and which ones are too volatile. “This star has been unstable for four thousand Earth years.”
Four thousand years? A curious number. “So that’s why your people left our solar system,” Morgan said. “The Cytons told you the magnetar was going to blow. It had nothing to do with the Zikzaws.”
“That is not entirely true, but neither is it entirely inaccurate. Recall that I said Zikzaws are drawn to cosmic disruptions.”
Morgan put the pieces together. Four thousand years ago, the Cytons had detected a burst from the unstable magnetar, but so had the Zikzaws. They gathered in the asteroid belt near Jupiter to partake in the radiation feast that would result from the planet’s destruction and, in so doing, they took notice of the Suhkai miners. While the Zikzaws waited for the big show to start, they sated their appetites on the Suhkai cruisers hauling liquid metallic hydrogen and helium collected from Jupiter’s lower atmosphere. The threat of the magnetar, coupled with the presence of the Zikzaws, was too much for the Suhkai. They closed up shop and left.
“Have the Zikzaws lingered in the asteroid belt ever since they arrived?”
“No.”
“So their return is not a good sign.”
“Perceptive once again, Skywalker.”
“How do the Cytons know the magnetar’s beams will hit Jupiter and Earth?” Morgan asked. “Couldn’t starquakes rip open fissures that direct the beams elsewhere?”
“Yes, that is possible,” Zoor said. “Many of the magwaves the star has produced in the past have not crossed Jupiter’s orbital path, but many have. The question is: are you willing to bet your planet’s survival, your species’ existence, on the chance the beams will miss Jupiter and Earth when the magnetar fully awakes, when its beams reach full intensity?”
“I see your point.”
“I thought you might. Come. Follow me.”
Cargo bay — the Rorschach Explorer
Flying through the asteroid belt
Carillo checked the digital display of her spacesuit’s life support module. “I’m heading inside now. Getting low on O2.”
“Roger,” Shilling said. “Do you need any help?”
“No, I’m fine. I’ll join you on the flight deck after I repressurize.”
Carillo powered off the probe engines but left their radios active. She spent the required interval to rebalance her oxygen inside the airlock, then removed her EMU and propelled to the battery closet. They had an additional problem to deal with, one she hadn’t shared with Shilling.
The ship’s batteries were rechargeable, but they still needed a power source in order to stimulate the recharge. And while the Recon and Cargo had solar panels to accomplish this task, Rorschach did not. The ship normally relied on channeling a portion of the energy created by the ship’s VLF engines back to the closet for recharging purposes, which meant the batteries would run out at some point unless Carillo came up with a way to restart the ship’s engines.
T
hey could get by for a while by limiting life support to certain sections of the ship and turning off just about everything else to lessen the battery drain. In addition, she could swap out the Cargo’s battery after it was recharged and use the probe’s solar panels to recharge depleted batteries from Rorschach. But the ship required far more battery power to operate than the probes did, and she wouldn’t be able to swap out batteries fast enough to offset the drain. If she tried to duplicate the effort by swapping out the Recon’s recharged battery, she would have to perform additional EVAs, which meant depleting their reserve O2 tanks, not to mention additional radiation exposure. And it still wouldn’t be enough. At best, after all that effort, she’d only be buying them some time.
The only real solution was to reactivate one or more of Rorschach’s engines. If she couldn’t do that, they would lose life support long before they reached Earth. Even if Mayaguana and NASA sent relief probes with fresh batteries, more oxygen and parts to repair the ship’s critical systems, the help would arrive too late.
As Carillo stared into the darkened closet, a light glowed from behind her. At first she thought Shilling had arrived with a flashlight…until she noticed the tint of blue. A thought filled her mind. “Help. We will help. We are friends.”
Human breeding ward – Suhkai spacecraft Ethel
In orbit around Saturn moon Dione
Zoor led Morgan to one of the car-pod elevators, where they descended to a floor that looked like an empty hospital ward. Glass walls lined a wide hallway, revealing rooms with rows of sleep-pod like chambers, and other rooms stocked with what looked like medical equipment. Clusters of workspaces that reminded Morgan of nurses’ stations were positioned at intervals all down the center of the hallway, which extended for at least two hundred meters.
Magwave (The Rorschach Explorer Missions Book 2) Page 29
