Diamond Moon

by B K Gallagher

  More questions flooded her mind than she could comprehend. Taking it in was overwhelming. There would have to be hours and hours in the lab just to study each creature. Everything needed to be studied, starting from the basics. “What was their cellular makeup, or genetics?” Mara knew she had her work ahead of her.

  Reese continued to break smaller branches of the structures and collected whatever creatures came with it. She moved on to the base of one of the larger formations.

  She attempted to clip a portion of the base with the collection arm, but it was too strong for the instrument. Reese hit a couple buttons on her controls and a saw came out of the arm. It spun quickly, creating a froth of bubbles outside the sub.

  Reese contacted the blade to the base of the material. It was far too hard for the saw blade to cut. Fearing for her equipment she chose not to try it again.

  “Mara, those branching structures are very hard. They are tearing up the collection saw,” she told her.

  Mara was taking notes and looked up from her notepad.

  “The saw won’t cut it?” she asked.

  “not a dent.”

  “Wow. There is not much that the saw won’t cut.”

  “What do you think?” Reese asked.

  “I don’t want to guess anything at the moment,” Mara said. “See what you can get. If you must, scavenge for bits and pieces off the seafloor. We’ll assume the larger structures are the same material as the smaller samples,” she told her.

  Reese directed the sub around the base of the largest structure. It was much bigger than the first. It was the size of any large cathedral on Earth. Mara could see the resemblance to a great cathedral in the jutting forms of crystal rising from the seafloor.

  Julian had been silent while taking his notes, but this largest structure forced Mara to ask him questions. “Julian, tell me what you think. Is this natural, or was it built by these things?”

  Julian raised his head so that his headset would pick up the image of the structure. He studied it for a moment. “I don’t know yet, Mara. I’d have to say it’s likely a natural formation, related to the vents as I said before. Volcanic vents can have a lot of dissolved minerals that can be deposited over time. Something like this, this size — it could be hundreds or thousands of years old,” he said. “Tens of thousands,” as he looked at it once more.

  “But it’s natural?”

  “I’d assume,” he said. “But I’d want to…”

  “But look at the way these creatures are using them. They are sending signals of light through them and sending them over vast distances. It’s as if… I think they designed them or created them for communicating whatever information they are sending.”

  Reese had continued gathering samples and had taken several branches of structures into the sub’s collection boxes. She was ready to begin a mass spectrograph of the material. She had cut one of the smaller samples into several very small pieces and placed them into the spectrometer.

  “Running a spectrograph,” she said. This will take a few minutes.” She played with a few buttons on the control panel and continued to hold the sub in place, monitoring the surroundings.

  “What do you expect it is, Julian?” Mara asked.

  Julian looked at the structures through his visor again.

  “I’d say it’s quartz, but it’s unusual to be under the water like this. Quartz forms as water evaporates. Hard to imagine that happening at the bottom of an ocean.”

  Then Reese interrupted them.

  “Results are coming up on the spectrograph,” she said. “Wait just a second more.”

  “That was quick,” Mara said.

  “Whoa…,” Reese said. She stared at the results, not saying a word. Julian and Mara turned their focus to her, waiting for her to tell them anything about what had caught her attention.

  “Spectrograph is reading mostly carbon,” she told them.

  “Carbon?” Mara asked. She thought about it for only a moment. “But that would mean…”

  Julian turned his head toward her. “Those are diamonds?”

  “Carbon,” Reese confirmed. “Spectrometer is reading correctly… it’s carbon.”

  “That’s impossible,” Julian said. “The pressure and heat aren’t great enough.”

  “You’re telling us those branching structures are diamonds?” Mara asked. “Pure diamond?”

  “I’m telling you it’s carbon. It’s a strong signature.” Reese said.

  “Holy shit,” Mara said aloud.

  All three of the scientists peered into their headsets again as if it was the first time. It took a second for Mara to confirm in her mind that they were looking at structures made entirely of diamonds, huge diamonds. They were silent as they looked at them in a new way.

  “Okay, let’s figure what this means,” Mara said.

  “It means this is the wealthiest mineral deposit ever found in human history,” Reese commented.

  “I mean, I want to know how, why…?” Mara told her, cutting her sentence off.

  “If those are natural formations, they are not created by any means that I am aware of,” Julian told them. “It’s very unusual.”

  “Unusual for Earth,” Mara added. “Maybe they aren’t natural. Maybe those things are building them,” Mara told him.

  Then there was an interruption on the comm-link coming from the Hab One. “Crew, Hab One here, this is Dr. Aman. Come in crew,” he said, his voice was coming directly into their headsets.

  The scientists hesitated to answer, wondering if they had done something wrong. It took them a second to say anything.

  “Dr. Aman, this is Mara.”

  “Ah, Dr. Parrish. Commander Stenner is monitoring from the Copernicus orbiter,” he said.

  “Affirmative,” Mara told him. “Is he getting this?”

  “Yes, and he wants to know who else is seeing it,” he asked.

  The three scientists thought about what was being asked, then they took off their headsets. Hanson had remained behind Mara the entire time. He was still listening.

  Mara paused before answering. She hadn’t considered the situation they had been put in quite yet, but she was starting to suspect she knew what the Commander was worried about. “It’s just the descent team,” she told him, fearing what would happen if she mentioned Hanson. “We’ve had our headsets on here at the console the entire time.”

  Hanson looked down at her, aware that she wasn’t being truthful about his presence there.

  “Good, Mara,” Dr. Aman said. “Stenner requests you treat your exploration on the ocean bottom as classified from now on. Do you copy that?” Dr. Aman asked her.

  “Classified?” Mara repeated. “What is that supposed to mean?”

  “Mara, please turn off the monitor displays on the wall and limit your conversations to text,” he asked her.

  “What?” she complained.

  “Think about what we just found,” Julian said to her.

  “Stenner wants you to refrain from speaking about or sharing what you have uncovered until we consult with Mission Control. Is that understood?” Dr. Aman reiterated.

  Mara considered the request. Her eyes peeked at Hanson standing behind her. She looked around at the mining rig and the equipment in the facility, all designed to tear apart mineral deposits and precious ore.

  She returned to her monitor, thinking. Suddenly Hanson knew a lot more about the mission than the rest of his crew — a lot more than they wanted him to. She worried about how Dr. Aman or Stenner would react to Hanson knowing what they had found. She decided not to tell, and she would address Hanson herself.

  “Are you saying we can’t report this back home?” she asked. “How are people going to learn what we’ve found here?”

  “We will discuss that later, Mara.” Dr. Aman said. “This order comes
straight from Stenner. We will have to check in with Mission on that. I will wager you can expect to hear from them in about an hour. You can take it up with them when you get back.”

  “You bet your ass I will.”

  The three scientists turned off the overhead monitors and continued their work. They texted through their headsets instead of talking. The messages were displayed on their heads-up displays. It made things more difficult, but they were intent on finishing all the work they could while they were there.

  The wall monitors were turned off. Hanson had nothing more to follow. He went back to his crew, and Mara watched as he walked away, worried he would say something. She texted her colleagues.

  MParrish:Can you believe this shit?

  JDugan:Mara, Stenner has a point. We’ll attract every prospector inside the inner orbits if we go public.

  MParrish:The world should know what is here.

  JDugan:We’ll discuss later. For now, we follow orders.

  MParrish:Fine, for now…

  JDugan:Part of our mission is to protect…

  MParrish:We can study AND protect.

  RFielding:They’re not going to make us pull the sub are they?

  MParrish:Not if I can help it, but let’s get as many samples as we

  can now.

  JDugan:We wait for Mission to decide to go public or not.

  MParrish:There are treaties about this… forbidden areas to mine.

  JDugan:A lot of broken treaties. If you want to keep these things safe you keep quiet.

  RFielding:Hanson saw this on our monitors. He heard us talking about diamonds.

  MParrish:I’ll take care of it. Just get us some samples to study.

  RFielding:You think he’ll tell Johan?

  MParrish:Not if he knows what is good for him.

  Sol 9; Mission time - 17:40

  Mara threw her headset onto the console when they were finished. She had been brainstorming a way to tell the world about what they had found without jeopardizing it, formulating her best arguments to make to Mission Control. She hadn’t had very many good ideas.

  Her thoughts were in many places at once. The excitement of finding such an incredible world was completely spoiled at not being able to share it. She desperately wanted the world to see the images and the video. She realized that it was not the discovery itself that had made her love her job — it was sharing her knowledge, her sense of wonder, adventure, and discovery. Not doing so robbed her of the pleasure of her work.

  Still at the console, Julian and Reese took off their headsets and placed them gently alongside Mara’s. Their discussions were limited as they made their way past the miners to the airlock, following orders not to speak about what they had found.

  Mara noticed Johan watching them. He was a suspicious person by nature, and she couldn’t help but wonder if Hanson had already told him what they had found. The apprehension was overwhelming her. She watched for any sign from either of them that they knew anything. She couldn’t take her eyes off them as approached them. Hanson walked toward her to help them exit the airlock.

  “When do you expect to be back?” he asked them. He placed his hand on the button to open the doors, holding it as he waited for an answer.

  Mara stood closest to him, but hesitated to give him any information. She pictured the miners sending probes down the shaft to mine the diamonds while they were gone. It would be too convenient to let them know when they would be back to do more research, she realized. She answered as vaguely as she could.

  “I don’t know,” she said, and she waited for him to open the doors for her, but his hand remained on the button. Mara could tell that he was waiting for her to say more.

  She grew more anxious. Hanson kept his hand on the button, drawing out the scene for what it was.

  Mara grew irritated as she waited for him. “You’re not going to say anything… are you?” she asked pointedly.

  Hanson continued to hold his hand over the button to the airlock while the crew waited to leave, and he smiled at her ambiguously, making it difficult for her to read. He was torturing Mara with his silence.

  “I just need to finish the mission,” he told her with a restrained smile. Then he pressed the button for them.

  The other two scientists walked through the airlock, but Mara found it hard to leave. She didn’t trust Hanson to not say anything. She was trying to understand what he had just said. “He just wants to finish the mission?” she asked herself. She followed her crewmates to the Hab with his words on her mind. She found herself more and more apprehensive. She worried that Hanson would sabotage them, or disable their equipment, or any other number of things he could do to end their mission prematurely, and there was nothing she would be able to do about it.

  Sol 9; Mission time - 17:58

  “Congratulations crew!” Dr. Aman said as they came in. “What a day for discovery! Good to have all of you back. I was lonely here by myself. Stenner has been checking in about every ten minutes,” he added. “We have an urgent conference scheduled.”

  Nobody said anything. One by one they were removed from their bio-suits. The group was unusually silent. They made their way into the conference room where they were expecting Stenner to appear on the monitor. Mara braced herself for a fight.

  “I need to know how you each feel about this decision,” she asked as they prepared for the conference call. “Mission Control is going to tell us to keep this a secret, but that’s a mistake. We need to find a way to show the world what we are finding without jeopardizing it,” she said.

  Julian and Reese remained silent. Neither of them wanted to get into an argument. Not when they knew Mission Control was about to do it for them.

  “Isn’t anybody with me?” she asked. Nobody said anything, and Mara sat heavily into her seat.

  “Mara, Commander Stenner is as concerned about this as you are,” Dr. Aman told her. “It was not our intention to keep the mission a secret. We will move forward in the best way we can.”

  Mara knew Mission Control was the only people that could overrule Commander Stenner. She was anxious to speak with them. “Nobody wants to show the world what we are finding?” she asked again, but they avoided the conversation.

  A chime from the comm-link was heard, and Stenner appeared on the monitor. “Hab One, this is Copernicus, Stenner speaking. Hab One, come in,” he said.

  “Captain Stenner, this is Dr. Aman. We are all here and ready.”

  “Good. I have some news from Mission Control I want to go over with you,” he said. “Please sit down. I’ve had time to discuss this with Mission Control extensively, and what I am going to say is going to come from the very top. I want you to listen very carefully,” he continued.

  He folded his hands in front of him as he began. “Mission Control feels strongly that we shouldn’t be doing anything that will jeopardize the mission or the ecosystem on Europa. That means no discussions, no sharing, no external video, nothing about our operations beyond today’s events. We need a complete black-out from this point. There will be strict regulations on transmissions from the Hab to Copernicus, and from Copernicus to Earth. NASA wants to keep this a top-secret priority until it can be determined to move forward.”

  Mara pressed the palms of her hands down hard against the black surface of the table. When Stenner finished, she slammed the table with her hands. It was loud enough to be seen and heard through the monitor.

  “Mara, this is not what we had wanted for this mission, but the parameters have changed. Our priority is to ensure the welfare of the ecosystem we have discovered. We are viewing this as a protective measure.”

  Mara was bursting to speak but was cut-off by the Commander. He interjected with as stern a voice as only the Stenner could.

  “Listen, all of you. We are close to getting pulled from the mission. NASA wan
ts EUNICE topside right now. The ice is considered too unstable, and there is far too much to lose, particularly you, the crew, to continue risking a presence on the surface. Unless factors change soon, we are on standby for departure at Mission Control’s orders.”

  “What?” Mara yelled.

  “Mara…” Stenner said, trying to stop her.

  “No, hold on. We’ve come all this way. We’ve been here barely a week, we finally get down under the ice, we find this incredible discovery, and suddenly it’s too dangerous? I’ve got news for you, Stenner. The whole idea of this mission is dangerous. We went through a launch, waited two-and-a-half years to get here, we’ve had radiation shooting through us, we had to land here and deal with these miners, who don’t exactly practice proper safety protocols…”

  “Mara…,” Stenner tried again.

  “Hold on!” she demanded, her voice was wavering and emotional. “We just found the most incredible forms of life down there. It’s what we always wanted to see. It’s so unique and amazing we can hardly imagine what else is down there. Now you are saying we can’t stay and study it? You want to keep it a secret? To protect it?”

  “Yes,” Stenner blurted. “You will keep it a secret because you don’t want anything to happen to those animals any more than we do,” he said. “Mission Control knows what I know, and what you already know, Mara. If word about those structures — those diamonds, get out… they will be stripped for everything they are worth, probably by the very mining team that helped you find them.”

  “There are treaties against that kind of…”

  “Mara, you know those treaties are not enforceable out here. Who is going to enforce a treaty against mining the sub-surface oceans of Europa? Are you going to go over there and do it yourself?” Stenner continued. “I want everyone on Earth to know how amazing this world is just like you do, but we have to think about the welfare of this place.” His voice dropped and became more reasoning. “There is a lot of research that can still be done. Find out everything you can. Use whatever tools you can. But we can’t let it get beyond our crew. Keep a tight lid on what you find and don’t let anything slip, starting with your mining friends next door.”