As far as he was concerned their obligation to the mission was over. They had provided the drill hole that NASA needed to get their sub below the ice. The rest of the mission was only as a support role; to provide the primary source of power for the operation and fill the fuel tanks for the return capsule.
He could feel the latest swish of moonshine hitting his nerves, relaxing him as he began to lay down. He realized he’d been tense, like Johan was. With a hand behind his head he listened as the generators and machinery hummed in the distance, keeping them all alive. The sound of the life-giving machines helped settle his nerves along with the alcohol. He prepared to put his work suit on to help with the ice collection.
But then a dark figure rounded the corner at his door and stood facing him. The figure occupied the space in the doorway like it would prevent him from ever leaving the small confines of his bunk. The man drew a heavy breath and spoke down at him. Hanson could tell from the silhouette it was his captain.
“I been thinking about our arrangement, Jack,” Johan said.
The use of his first name had caught Hanson’s attention. Johan only used it when he was taking something very seriously. He knew this would likely be a long conversation.
“I heard you in there talking to the men… I’m thinking… maybe it’s time for you to have your own rig; your own crew,” he said. He looked at Hanson as if he knew it would be big news to him.
Hanson sat up on his bunk quickly. “I’m ready. I’ve been ready,” he said.
“I believe you are,” Johan continued. “What I’m thinking is that we need to get off this moon and back to the colony. We take on supplies for another mission, change out some crew like usual, and I’ll call ahead and see what’s available. See if there is something you can take out on your own. Astromine’s had a couple rigs under construction for years now. One of them’s got to be close. You can even stay at the colony and wait for it if you want,” he said, slapping Hanson’s back as he sat down next to him.
“I’ll take it,” Hanson said as the sting from the slap dissipated.
“Maybe you will,” he said. “Look. What happened was a long time ago. I told you to forget it and put it behind you. But, it’s still going to be on your record with Astromine. They’re going to need my convincing if they’ll let you captain a rig. I’d be sticking my neck out for you. But… we get through this and you get us off this ’berg… I’m gonna get you your rig. I’ll make sure you are a captain.”
Hanson listened impatiently. It had been twelve years on the Zephyr for him, and he’d been second in command for almost nearly as long. This was a chance to take his future into his own hands. “Finally,” he thought. The waiting had been excruciatingly long and filled with sacrifices, but his chance was finally here.
Johan leaned in toward him. His damaged skin and the scars from years of mining and radiation exposure showed easily in the harsh artificial light. His rugged jaw and jagged whiskers seemed to project right into Hanson’s personal space, and he could smell the moonshine on his breath.
“Jack, I want you to know something,” he said. “Running a rig is full of tough decisions. Astromine will push you beyond your comfort levels. The men will test you,” he said. “You’ll need to make tough decisions and not compromise. You do that, and you will become a leader. Push your men beyond what they think they can do.” He sent a cynical look toward him. “You can’t have none of this safety and caution bullshit that you’ve talked about before. The men respect risk-takers, Jack. Decision-makers… They aren’t going to follow you if you look weak.”
Johan spoke with a ragged voice and heavy words. He had a way of intimidating men. He would find a way to get uncomfortably close and use their sense of discomfort against them. In a small room such as this it was easy to want to get the conversation over by being more agreeable than one would be otherwise. Hanson found himself doing so now, even though he disagreed with Johan.
“The safety thing is…”
Johan stopped him with a hand gesture, then leaned further into him, the scars on his face all the more difficult for him to ignore. “You can’t always think about it that way,” he said. “Remember what happened? Remember the consequences of your actions? You act on your impulses, and it gets you in trouble.”
Johan paused as if he was giving Hanson a lifetime’s worth of advice. “You have to be able to think of all the angles at once, not just your instincts. Lives are lost out here, they always are, and you need to understand that more will be lost in the future. You can’t sacrifice yourself or the rig for them. Just look at how long you’ve been here, all because of one bad decision. You have to always consider the long-term consequences.”
“You know I was…”
“Impulsive,” Johan interrupted, drawing out the word for effect as he finished the sentence for him. He let out a burst of air from his nose.
“I heard you in the bunk room with the men. I heard that tonight… and I liked it. Decisiveness means you act with conviction, with the interests of the rig in mind, no matter the danger. That is what I’ve been waiting for — waiting to see from you.”
Hanson nodded, but another hand gesture prevented him from saying anything.
“The interests of the rig,” Johan repeated. “One more mission, Jack. Get us through this mission and I will consider your debts paid off. You get us off this iceberg, and I’ll get you your rig.”
Johan then slowly removed himself from Hanson’s space and walked out the door. The large man barely fit through the porthole. He stopped in the hallway and nodded a good night into the room as he began to walk down the corridor.
Hanson had heard this speech about safety and taking risks and losing lives before, but he still disagreed with it. He always did. He had come to terms with his decision a long time ago. His debts that were left from his actions, however, had never been settled with Astromine. Maybe now they would be.
He lay on the bed once more and thought about what Johan had told him. “A rig of his own,” he thought. It had been his dream for years to be his own captain. He would be able to take on his own missions and direct the rig to the best locations. He would make better percentages. He could run his crew the way he saw fit. He would care for his men better, no matter what Johan had said. He would give better bonuses for hard work and for taking risks. He would make sure they operated more safely. He would not take the extreme chances that were asked of them now. He knew that would be his way, and he felt his men would be more loyal and appreciate him more for it.
Hanson’s mind raced with possibilities. He had wanted to explore the further reaches of the solar system. There were virgin asteroids and more moons beyond Jupiter, far beyond Europa. There were dozens of unexplored worlds, each ripe with minerals and wealth. Suddenly all of these would be open to him, but he knew he would need to get his crew to follow him out into the further reaches of space. He expected that would happen if he put stricter policies in place. He realized for the first time in a very long time he was planning his own future.
Then his mind turned to home. He thought about returning to Earth. He could only just now consider it with this exciting news. He had a little brother he hadn’t seen in years. The little boy in the picture with him. He hadn’t kept in communication with him, but the hopelessness of returning to see him prevented him from wanting to try. They had drifted apart. “Maybe that could change,” he caught himself thinking.
Hanson let himself think about spending some time on Earth with him. Maybe he would get his “Earth legs” back as some of the old-timers called it. He’d spend time on the beach like they had when they were young. It would need to be someplace warm and sunny, just like he had pictured it.
Crews had come and gone as he’d spent time on the Zephyr with Johan. The dust on the walls of the rig had been a record of the wear on his mind and spirit. He had aged with the rig; aged with the Zephyr. He had se
en the work and the sacrifices levee their toll on him just as they had the steel and aluminum of the ship. They had grown old together. And now they could part ways and plot new destinations, a new life.
He felt a surge of relief, and of pent up tension and frustration. He was overwhelmed with the positive thoughts of his impending liberation. He turned to his communications console as these revelations came to him. Such a change from only an hour ago. He decided to do it before he changed his mind or had second thoughts. He needed to act now, or he feared his optimism would fade, to not ever return. He lifted his hand to the buttons and pressed for a call he had wanted to make for years. He would record a message. He would let his brother know where he was and how he was doing.
He turned to the communications monitor. The “press to record” message flashed on the screen. He held his finger on the button, then depressed it into the wall to make a recording. A blank screen waited for him to speak. He sat silently for a minute just thinking of what to say. Then he began:
“Jimmy. This is Jack. I wanted to say hi. It’s been a while. I’m out near Jupiter. I wanted to see what you were up to. I found out I might be getting my own rig. I just need to finish this mission. Johan says I’m ready to become captain. He says my debts are paid off. Can you believe that? I’ve been going through a lot out here. Wasn’t sure I’d ever get to come home. That’s why I haven’t bothered to call. I wasn’t sure you wanted to hear from me. I’m thinking of coming home for a bit if I can. It would be a long time before I could even get back. Send me a message if you can. Let me know how you are doing. Miss you…”
Hanson waited an uncomfortable length of time thinking of something else to say before quickly hitting the “end” button. He felt like he had left a terrible message, but he didn’t think there was much chance he’d hear an answer anyway. He continued looking into the monitor, then another prompt came up saying message recorded.
He watched that message flash on the screen, then another appeared. The new message said ready to transmit.
He hesitated. His finger stretched out to the flashing button, calling him to press it. The pad of his finger rested softly on the face of the button.
As he sat with his arm extended, he saw his brother’s face. He could picture him just as he was, only 17 when he had last seen him. Hanson remembered the last time he saw his brother. They had been training together. His brother was about to be accepted into a space-pilot racing league. Memories of them practicing together swept through his head. The simultaneous flights, daring maneuvers, and training and safety classes all flashed through his mind. He remembered their time on the beach. He remembered dunking his brother in the water, teaching him to swim, and then floating out away from the dock on their rafts to ride the waves. He remembered how he cared for his little brother, and how his brother had looked up to him. Minutes passed as the memories flooded back.
He stared into a blank screen when he realized he had lost his thoughts to his memories. He took a deep breath, and in his moment of optimism he pressed his finger into the button. A minute later a final message appeared on the screen. The monitor read message transmitted.
Sol 8; Mission time - 20:52
“Mission Control is monitoring the situation closely,” Stenner said to the crew. “We’re lucky there hasn’t been significant damage. They’re ready to call us off the mission if there is another one.”
Mara sat urgently forward in her seat. “I don’t believe what I am hearing,” she said. “We’re on the verge of getting below the ice. We can’t call the mission off now.”
“Nobody is calling off the mission, Mara. Mission Control wants under there as bad as you do. But our orders are to prepare for an early departure,” Stenner continued. He was centered on the monitor in the conference room as he was during the party. “Prepare only,” he reinforced. “You realize we haven’t heard from the sub at all? Zephyr says the crane is still damaged. There’s no reason to stay if we don’t have a submersible.”
Mara fell into her chair.
“Now, we need to see if Dr. Dugan has any insights on the moon’s condition since the quake,” Stenner said.
Dr. Julian Dugan composed himself to add his assessment. He was an older gentleman, tall and thin with wire-rimmed glasses and thinning bushy hair. His face was covered in a ragged white and greyish beard. He was highly intelligent and scientifically minded. He possessed degrees in planetary-geology and volcanology, and he had been a professor for most of his life. NASA had made an exception to put him on the crew despite his age. At sixty-two years, he was by far the oldest member, and well beyond the typical age NASA was comfortable sending into deep space.
Despite being part of the surface crew on a moon composed of mostly ice, he wore a tropical print button-up shirt and cargo shorts with leather sandals just as he had on campus. His eccentric personality seemed to require him to wear the most ridiculous shirts, and on the icy moon here, the playful irony of the tropical print shirt agreed with his tendencies to flaunt convention. He spoke with a thin voice that matched his stature.
“The seismic monitors I placed had been quiet for nearly a week,” he said, holding his hands together as if in thought. “Until these latest quakes, there was only that one tremblor after we landed.”
He massaged his fingers together as he spoke. Mara pictured him giving lectures this way during his time teaching.
“Aside from those minor quakes at first, it’s been quiet. However, there has been significant movement since drilling began. The ice is shifting more than we expected. We don’t know if it’s associated with the drilling. There simply isn’t enough data or imagery from before our arrival to know, and we don’t have good data from the mining crew. We’ll have to continue to watch and hope for the best.”
“I’m updating our surface imagery now,” Luis said. “The surface is showing signs of stress, but nothing major or unexpected,” he told them. “When we get the updated imagery, I’ll be able to make a more accurate assessment of the danger.”
Luis Alvarez was the mission astronomer and had stayed in the orbiter above. Only he and Stenner had remained in orbit on the command ship while the rest of the crew descended to the surface. “It will take several passes, but we’ll have a good idea what we’re dealing within a couple days,” he finished.
Luis was young but had already made a name in the astronomy field. He’d helped determine the landing location for the mission based on his work examining surface topography and radiation patterns on the moon.
His assessment of the ice-rift they had landed within was an important aspect of the mission, placing the crew at the thinnest possible point on the shell of ice that encapsulated the ocean below. His work, and his suggestion to land where they had, had been based on previous unmanned missions to the Jupiter system. The measurements and calculations from that data, and his familiarity with them, had helped him earn the spot on the team.
“Do you think the ice movement could be associated with volcanic activity? Mara asked him. “We expect vents or volcanoes below the ice, so couldn’t we detect that on the surface in your images?”
“It’s hard to know, Mara,” Julian answered, adjusting his glasses slightly. He massaged his fingertips together again. “There just isn’t any record or indication that there are volcanic vents down there to begin with. We assume there are, but it’s only a hunch. And if the ice is shifting because of them, we would have no way of knowing it from up here.”
“Our mission posture is going to depend a lot on what you tell us, Julian,” Commander Stenner interjected. “You need to be able to tell us how much danger we are in. Tell us what you need from us to make a fair assessment.”
Eyes turned to Julian. A concerned look indicated he understood the pressure he was under. His jaw wavered as he thought about the situation, but he had yet to say anything.
“Just buy us some time,” Mara told him be
fore he could formulate an answer. “We have proof of life under there. We need as much time here as we can get.”
“I understand,” Julian replied. “But I think what Mission is telling us is that we don’t want to risk our safety any more than we need to conduct our research.”
Mara exhaled a burst of air. “There is a certain amount of risk we all agreed to just to be here. We’re already committed. We need to stay and determine what exactly is under there,” she said.
Dr. Aman spoke quickly. “We all want to complete the mission to the fullest extent possible, but think about the rest of us,” he said. “Everyone has their line… you need to understand where that is. We all want to know what is down there just like you do, but we need to be safe doing it.”
Mara pursed her lips and tried not to argue. She realized she was pushing the crew further than they were comfortable.
“None of this will matter until you have the fuel to launch,” Luis interjected. “You need to ask the Zephyr to top you out so the tanks are ready,” he said. “You’ll be sitting ducks down there until then. And my advice is to assume that we’ll need to leave at a moment’s notice,” he added. “So, don’t venture too far from the capsule.”
Mara threw her hands on the table, hitting it rather forcefully. “Does anybody want to stay and find out what is down there?” she complained. “You sound like you would launch us back to the orbiter at the slightest tremor.”
“I’m just saying you need to be ready to launch quickly,” Luis said. “Safety should be the priority, not the research. And be careful not to overextend yourself,” he told her. “Be aware that if you venture too far away the capsule may be forced to launch without you.”
“This crew understands there are risks just being here,” Mara told him. “You all agreed to and understand them. We should be even more willing to accept that now that we know there is life down there.”
Diamond Moon Page 7
