Version Innocent

by Pete Molina

Chapter 48

  They all saw the Fleet lander fly overhead, following the hopper’s trajectory. They waited another hour until the sun was just beginning to rise and the dark ice started to show some of its blue white color. Sam jumped, grabbed the edge, and pulled himself back onto the surface on his stomach. He surveyed the surrounding area with the passive sensors his suit afforded him and determined that they were alone here. He flipped over on his back and didn’t see any launch hovering. There were several bright objects in the sky but he couldn’t get sufficient magnification out of his suit to tell if it was the Powel. He hoped not, but they couldn’t do anything now even if it were. They had no method of transport.

  “Come on up,” Sam urged. “There isn’t anything we can do now to prevent them from finding us.” He had his camouflage change to a white blue to match the surroundings so the others could see him again. The others changed their suit colors to match.

  “What now?” Sam asked.

  “I guess we start looking for whatever it was we were supposed to find here.” Jeff said, starting to head for their landing site.

  Sam and Terra followed, and they all began to inspect the area looking for any sign left to guide them. After ten minutes Sam sat down on the ice, hoping that his other version hadn’t abandoned them here after all that they’d been through. His other version was so removed from him in experience time that he couldn’t know what his other version would do.

  “Giving up already?” Terra asked. She was now twenty or thirty meters away searching but not finding anything.

  “This is an ice plain, and there aren’t even boulders or terrain features to hide anything, sign or otherwise,” Sam said.

  The full sun was on them now. Even though it was quite a bit less bright than it was on Earth or Mars, it was still comforting. Sam stood up again, surveying the scene. It was very flat for several kilometers, except for the rift.

  Sam looked down at the ice below him. This was the exact spot they had jumped to from the hopper, and now that it was fully illuminated Sam could see something dark at least a meter under the surface buried in the ice. “Guys, over here,” he radioed.

  Terra and Jeff bounded back to his position where he was trying to peer into the ice.

  “It’s big, whatever it is,” Terra commented. Indeed the black object was four or five meters in diameter, and it was circular.

  “What is it, though?” Jeff asked trying to sweep some of the loose surface ice away so he could get a better view.

  “I think it might be a ship or something. Maybe it’s an entrance to an underground facility,” Terra guessed.

  Sam kicked at the surface. “No, I wouldn’t locate a facility here. Too much visibility, and too many people. I’d put a secret base somewhere no one would find me.”

  “So how do we get it out of there?” Jeff asked. “I don’t see how we can break up that much ice.”

  “We don’t have to break it up. We can melt if we can get something hot enough,” Sam said.

  “Can we use our space suits somehow? They have heaters,” Terra suggested.

  “Good idea, but I don’t think that they have enough power to go through that much ice,” Sam said. Then he had an idea. “Well, what about the fog from our camouflage. Could we get it to form some kind of lens to focus the sun?”

  Terra looked up at the sun. “I don’t know, Sam. The sun is pretty tenuous out here. We’re several orders of magnitude less power per square meter this far from the sun than at Earth. But I guess we have to try, don’t we?”

  “I’ll try to have Ralphie make a design for a lens.” Sam interfaced with Ralphie. So what do you think, Ralphie. Can you design us a fresnel lens or something? Sam queried.

  I believe that I can get the proper shape parameters for your camouflage fog, Ralphie responded.

  Sam could see in his displays that Ralphie was expending considerable computation on the problem. Sam interfaced with his camouflage and set up the system so it could adapt to a non body conforming shape. When Ralphie indicated that he had the parameters, Sam had the camouflage flow into a ball in his hands. Then he had Ralphie upload the parameters. The camouflage became translucent and formed a large flat fresnel lens.

  What’s the focal length? Sam queried Ralphie.

  Your height plus your arm reach, Ralphie informed him.

  “Here, help me hold it up,” Sam requested. It wasn’t heavy, but he didn’t want to be directly underneath it like a bug under a magnifying glass. Terra and Jeff grabbed at the edges, and they all stood, acting as the pillars for this large lens. The light focused on the spot they intended, and it began to melt the ice, slowly.

  Terra noted the slow rate at which the ice was melting. “This is going to take hours.”

  “We need a bigger lens,” Sam decided and immediately had Ralphie redesign a larger lens with hand holds that would enable the lens to be held up a few more meters so it could collect more sunlight. “I’m going to need one of your camouflage systems to merge with mine.”

  Jeff immediately had his camouflage form a ball and he handed it to Sam who placed it on top of the lens. Then Ralphie uploaded the new parameters. The places they were holding formed handles and the lens rose up above them expanding in diameter. It was quite a bit larger than before. It was now eating through the ice at a much higher rate.

  “Still slow, but it won’t take forever,” Terra said. “Would one more unit help?”

  Sam had Ralphie do another redesign that would lift it up further and grow it larger. “Just throw it up on top so it can merge with the others and switch its command controls to me,” Sam instructed.

  Terra formed the ball of camouflage fog and gently tossed it onto the top of the lens with one hand while she held the handle with her other.

  The ball spread out and the lens enlarged again. They all had to take several more steps backward. The palm sized bright spot on the ice began to eat through the ice much faster now that they had a larger lens. It would reduce the time to get to the object to less than an hour. They all stood there guiding the light beam to eat through the ice. They focused on clearing the tip of the object first.

  “It is a ship, buried here for us. I think the hatch is on this side. I can see an rectangular shape,” Jeff exclaimed. They all shuffled over so they could clear away what they hoped was a hatch.

  “I just hope we don’t have to clear off the whole thing,” Terra said.

  They worked diligently for another twenty minutes until the hatch was completely clear, and then Sam had the lens break back down into its three separate camouflage systems which they all donned again, in a deactivated state.

  “It’s like having a much better Swiss Army Knife,” Jeff commented on the fog’s utility.

  Sam hopped down the hole they’d made to the doorway and passed his hand over it. “I don’t see any controls but there is a circular discolored section here at the center of the door,” he told them. He pushed his hand at it tenuously to see if it would open. Nothing happened, so he pushed harder. After a few seconds he was startled to feel his hand being absorbed into the circle with his spacesuit being peeled back inside. The ship gripped him. Sam tried to tug his hand free, but it wouldn’t even move.

  “Hey, what’s going on?” Terra asked from the top of the ice hole.

  “I don’t know. It’s got my hand, and it won’t let go.” Sam tugged futilely. Then after a few more seconds his hand was released. Sam flew back and smacked against the ice. His hand was momentarily exposed to the near vacuum conditions, and Sam hissed because of the cold. His space suit reformed over his hand almost instantly, however, preventing any permanent damage.

  “You okay, Sam?” Jeff asked with the concern showing on his face through the transparent membrane of his suit.

  “Yeah, I think so,” Sam said. Then he looked up at the doorway and found that it was open. “Hey, it’s open!” he shouted.

&
nbsp; “Must have been one of those biometric locks, only opens for you, Sam,” Terra surmised. “Can you see anything inside?” She was down on her stomach trying to peer into the darkness of the unlit ship.

  “No, it’s really dark. I’m going to try going in.”

  “Is that wise? I mean, it almost didn’t give you your hand back, and you want to go in there?” Jeff said with a snicker.

  “Not like we have much of a choice,” Sam muttered.

  Sam had Ralphie switch on the lights from his suit that were mounted on his wrist and pointed his arm at the opening. Nothing reflected back at him. It was still pitch black. “Well here goes,” he said taking a step towards the opening.