Diamond Moon

by B K Gallagher

  She had could replay the video from below. She wanted to watch the lights again to find if there was a pattern or determine a meaning behind them. she had one specimen on board already that she could study and dissect. The fish she had first come across. Reese would be coming with more samples from the sub soon. She realized there would be no wasted time with them still needing her attention.

  Dr. Aman seemed to notice her mood shift. “Reese will be preparing the samples for you this morning. There will be a lot to do. You can get started after a good breakfast.”

  Mara sat upright. She reached nearby for a fork already on the table, and she took a bite out of the pancakes from his plate, and her brow raised as she tasted the sweetness of the syrup. She leaned back in her chair and enjoyed them. She stood up to get some coffee.

  “Mara…,” Dr. Aman said. “I made more…”

  “Maybe later,” she said with a wave of her arm.

  The doctor pursed his lips and watched her walk away.

  “I’ll be in the lab” she told him from down the hallway. She walked to the airlock defiantly, sipping her coffee down as she began to put on her suit.

  When Mara returned to the Zephyr, she could see EUNICE in the chamber just as the doctor had told her. She was hanging vertically from the crane just over the drill hole. Reese was diligently pulling samples from the sub and prepping them in containers and stashing them where the miners wouldn’t see. Mara gave her a quick wave to let her know she would be in the lab nearby.

  The laboratory Mara was working in was a separate facility from the Zephyr, paid for by NASA, and assembled by the mining crew. It was constructed near the drill outpost to do tests on the expected samples of life that were brought to the surface. It was necessary to keep the lab isolated due to the potential for biological cross-contamination. The lab was a self-contained facility capable of allowing a full array of tests and observations to be made on anything that seemed of interest to the scientists; without the danger of any foreign substances, even the smallest microbe, contaminating the rest of the facility.

  As a matter of principle, the lab was isolated, ventilated, and shielded in every way possible from the other two facilities. It was its own facility, independent from the others aside from the power it used.

  The exam room was complete with an array of safety features designed to keep potential cross-contamination events from occurring. There was a bio-hazard isolation glove box with physical plexiglass barriers, rubber work gloves, and an emergency ventilation system to eject anything toxic into the vacuum outside. Mara would remain in her bio-suit even during examination, a redundancy on top of redundancies.

  The extraordinary measures were a necessity here. The possibility of any newly discovered creatures containing unknown pathogens or microbes was not only real, but highly likely.

  It was this part of the mission that Dr. Aman had the most supervision. He had determined the protocols for the examinations, and he had determined that not only would the specimens always remain in their isolation boxes, but the crew performing the analysis would be wearing their bio-suits as well.

  When Mara opened the lab, she saw where Reese had placed the first of the samples. She pulled one of the shrimp-like animals out of the refrigerator and placed it deliberately near the exam box, still in its specimen container. It was looking curiously at her. She kneeled eye-level to it, and she wondered if she even knew how to dissect this unique animal. She sealed the larger examination box shut, and then went around to the working side.

  She would only open the specimen container for access to her subject once it was safely inside the isolation box. She would use the heavy gloves built into the exam box to carefully dissect the creature, leaving no possibility that any material would cross the threshold from that world into hers.

  She stuck her hands through the openings provided and into the thick rubber gloves. Only then would she begin to open the box with the specimen inside. She grabbed it gently with her rubber hands and pinned the creature to the exam tray. With it immobilized on the tray she felt she could begin her work.

  Mara looked through the magnification instrument at the creature’s body structure, feeling and prodding with her utensils to get a sense of the animal — whether it was bony, fleshy, or made of cartilage.

  All superficial indications were that it was a lot like a shrimp on Earth. It had a hard, transparent shell, two eyes, a series of six legs, and the light-producing area at its rear end. Mara paused to consider the beauty of the creature and the forces that had shaped it.

  “There was a reason this creature had this design.” All its features were perfectly predictable by the laws of evolution. Whatever the forces were that shaped this creature, she knew they would give her clues to the environment and its behavior. “The laws that shaped evolution were as dependable and universal as gravity.” A testament to nature or a higher power that such a common design could be so useful. She was overcome with a thought — the other worlds in the universe that might have similar creatures, or similar habitats. All of them based on this one practicality and efficiency of design. “Inevitably, somewhere in the enormity of the universe there would be another world with a creature very similar to this one,” she mused.

  Mara reminded herself that time might be short. She would soon run tests to determine the chemistry of the animal. There were so many questions, and the answers were right under her nose, only requiring to be coaxed into existence through careful study.

  The dissection of the small creature would be first, then the examination of the tissues, and then the electron microscope and genetic testing, if it even had genes. One by one she would run through dozens of tests if she needed.

  She began by grabbing her scalpel and positioning the creature on its side. “A simple longitudinal incision down the length of the creature should open the body cavity,” she thought. “Like any shrimp back home.”

  She made a closer inspection at the specimen to determine the most likely place to begin the incision. She placed the scalpel at the base of the creature’s head and made a quick, tepid thrust into the neck area.

  Her blade made the incision, but a glowing light began to emanate from her sample room at nearly the same time. It caught her attention from the corner of her eye. The light grew outward from the room and then lit the walls around her. It enveloped her. An eerie blue-white light, like what she had seen below, was beginning to encapsulate her lab.

  The light seeped from the cracks in the door and through the hinges. It bounced around the room, saturating it in its mysterious glow. Mara watched the light peak and fade over a minute.

  The light faded as she looked at it, and she brushed it aside, returning to her specimen. She began the incision. She expected resistance but found it easier than she thought. Carefully, she held the creature in place with one hand as she began pulling the blade along the underside of the body, lengthwise. She was moving slowly, deliberately, making careful mental notes about the force required to move the blade, the way the flesh and the shell and tissue reacted, the feel of the incision, and the response. She did her best to note anything that might be of use in future examinations.

  She noticed a clear fluid had oozed from the creature just after the blade had passed. “Likely a form of blood or coagulant.” It seemed harmless, and she watched as it dripped onto the tissue below, sticking to the paper.

  Then she saw the blue-white light again. It pulsed, off and on, over and over, faster than before. It poured out of the doorway and into the room around her. The ceiling of the lab lit up fiery blue. It reflected light down into the room and covered everything in a wash of light. The creatures were responding to something. Something, it felt to Mara, was happening.

  She continued her incision, reaching further than half the length of the creature. She was in deep concentration as the tissue resisted her blade. She pulled harder and harder to forc
e the blade to move. And as she was finishing the incision, she was startled by a shaking sensation. A tremor. A powerful jolt passed through her body and her arms.

  It intensified. The room buckled and heaved. Lights flashed and sparks began to fly from the electronics on the walls. The motion had caught her while executing the delicate incision. Her hands slipped at the instant the tremor struck and she cut through the creature hazardously. She was just now noticing it. Her arms were flailing. She had stuck herself with the blade. It had passed from inside the creature, penetrated her glove, then pierced her skin and gashed her thumb.

  The room continued to shake. Blood poured from the opening in her torn glove and dripped out of the newly formed hole onto the tissue below. The clear fluid oozed from the creature and spilled upon the sanitized tissue next to her blood. The two fluids mixed into a rosy, pink concoction in the middle of the exam table. Mara dropped the creature onto the paper as she braced herself against more shaking.

  She could feel the burn of cut flesh. The room shook while she watched the pink mixture congeal upon the paper. She was fixated on the two fluids, watching closely, despite the turmoil around her.

  Another sudden jolt rocked the room. She braced herself from the heaving floor as she protected her thumb. All she could do now was to secure herself from the shaking, from the more immediate danger of the violent upheaval occurring underneath her.

  The room buckled and gyrated. The entire facility went dark. Emergency lights were triggered, giving her a vague idea of the damage taking place. She could make out a pressure valve on the wall that had torn loose and began spewing gas into her immediate area. Sparks were flying from the walls that were revealing even more damage. Instruments fell from shelves.

  This quake was stronger than the others, much stronger. The laboratory was ripping itself apart, with her inside it. A minute of merciless destruction passed.

  And then it stopped. She held still, silent, breathing heavily, bracing herself as if more shaking was imminent. She made a quick assessment of the immediate situation, checking her surroundings in the dark. Alarms buzzed and warning lights on consoles blinked urgently. She worked hard to orient herself among the damage and chaos.

  She remembered she had gashed her thumb. The thought of this breach coursed through her with dread. Contamination with a foreign microbe was not only possible, but highly likely. “No, it was certain,” she thought. She was panicking, both from the tremor and from the potential cross-contamination. Her breathing was heavy, almost uncontrollable as she processed the events.

  She retracted her hands from the rubber gloves on the examination box. She threw the gloves of her bio-suit onto the floor and made a thorough inspection of her thumb. She stared at it through her visor, still lighting her face and hands in the darkened room. Her thumb was bleeding severely. There was no doubt that she had been exposed to whatever microbes were inside the creature.

  She looked briefly at the animal she had been exposed to. It had dropped to the exam tissue on the dissection tray. In the dark room it lit up like a beacon — like the other warning signals and alarms that were now blaring around the room. It was pulsing in colors; blues, greens, orange, yellows… The creature scrolled through the colors faster than she could track them. It had been stimulated by something, as if it was a computer running through random combinations, simulations, or calculations. Whatever it was, it was doing it with rapid ferocity. Mara wondered if it was the incision she had made, or maybe it was the quake… Whatever it was, it appeared severely agitated.

  She reached for the communication link in her helmet. The pulsations of light were coming in all colors of the rainbow. “Reese, are you there? Come in. Can you get over here?”

  A couple of seconds went by before Reese answered.

  “Mara, is that you? You ok?” she answered.

  “Reese! I need you to come into the lab if you can. I’ve had an accident.”

  “Ditto here, Mara. We got tossed around quite a bit at the Zephyr. EUNICE was swinging and hit the crane. I’m really worried. Hold on… I’ll need to work my way through the mess to get to you,” she said.

  “Take care of yourself if you need to, but I’ve got a serious situation,” Mara told her.

  “Roger that,” Reese answered.

  Minutes passed in the darkness. Horrible thoughts came to Mara’s mind. Thoughts of infection and disease. She was holding gauze over her wound when Reese arrived.

  “What happened?” Reese asked.

  “I was dissecting the specimen when the tremor struck. I guess I jumped. It went through the safety gloves.”

  “Mara, you know…”

  “I know what it means…”

  “You’ve had your immune-booster, right?”

  “Of course.”

  “I’ll give you another just to be safe,” Reese said. She turned to reach for one of the syringes in the medical kit, searching through the semi-darkness. “We’ll need to let Dr. Aman know about this.”

  “What can he do about it now?”

  “He’ll need to monitor you… And don’t think I don’t know I shouldn’t be in here with you,” Reese told her. “I’ll get you bandaged up and then we’ll see what Aman says.”

  Reese flipped a flashlight built into the arm of her suit. She grabbed some gauze and began to roll it around Mara’s thumb, keeping the syringe that contained the immune-booster to the side.

  Alarms continued to buzz. A control panel nearby overloaded and shot a fountain of sparks into the air behind Reese, creating just enough light to work by. Gases continued to spew from a broken pipe.

  Hanson had come by to check on the two scientists. “I’m making a safety sweep. You two okay?” he asked. He stopped when he noticed Mara laying down. He seemed concerned.

  “Call Dr. Aman. We have a situation,” Reese ordered him.

  Hanson hesitated but did as he was told. He hit the comm-link button nearby.

  Mara noted the communications were working, thankfully. When the Hab came online Mara saw that they also did not have power, and the boards and monitors were flashing emergency signals just as extensively.

  “Mara… Reese,” Dr. Aman said as the screen came up. “It is good to see you are ok. We were hit hard here. We are running a check on our life-support right now. Systems seem to be severely compromised. How is it there?”

  “We’ve had a cross-contamination event,” Reese told him. “Mara was in the middle of dissecting one of the creatures when the quake hit. She cut herself pretty good.”

  Dr. Aman stared into the monitor, then lowered his head. “Mara,” he said, solemnly. “Ok. You are all in the lab, correct?”

  he asked.

  “Yes, it’s just Mara and I,” Reese answered.

  “I see Hanson,” Dr. Aman added.

  “I’m doing a safety sweep,” Hanson said. “I’ve got to go. The Zephyr is torn up. I need to help…”

  “None of you is going anywhere,” Dr. Aman said forceably. “We need to set up a quarantine area. Was anyone else exposed?”

  “Only Mara,” Reese said.

  “No, you are all exposed,” Dr Aman answered. “Those microbes could be airborne by now. You could even have them on your suit. Do not leave the hab. Hanson, I need you to shut the door to the lab. Seal it off, and we will assess the situation.”

  “The situation is I’ve got to get back to the Zephyr. The men need me to…”

  “You are not going anywhere,” Dr. Aman said quickly. “You could make everyone sick if you walk into the drill chamber. Stay where you are and keep that door shut while we think about this,” the doctor instructed.

  Hanson paused briefly but then did as he was told.

  Dr. Aman continued. “Mara, you have immune-boosters in the lab. It was designed for this kind of contingency. I suggest you each take one. Stay in that room until we can fu
lly assess the situation. I need to tend to things here. Stabilize the lab the best you can, and we will check in on you in a few minutes.”

  “Dr. Aman, things are bad here,” Reese told him.

  “I understand, Reese. Stay where you are and stabilize what systems you can.”

  Mara started to speak but was barely able to begin her sentence before he left.

  “Shit,” Mara said.

  Dr. Aman returned to the screen when he heard Mara. “You have been cursing a lot lately,” the doctor warned as he came back on screen.

  Mara seemed startled that he had heard her. “Well, it accurately reflects the state of the mission,” she said to him.

  Dr. Aman stayed on the monitor for a second longer. “Mara… Let us hope this is not anything serious. I am placing you all in quarantine until further notice. I will contact Stenner and let him know the situation. We have taken major damage. I need to get back to this mess. I will check in when I can.” Dr. Aman signed off quickly, flipping his hand toward the screen.

  Reese began preparing the immune boosters before he had even left the monitor. She was going to have to do the shots in the dark. Mara held her arm out. The injection fit into a pre-outfitted receiver in her suit. As Reese administered the shot the receiver took the needle and sent the booster directly into Mara’s blood stream.

  Mara and Reese decided to each take a double dose. They took turns giving them to each other.

  “Your turn,” Reese said to Hanson when they were finished, but he pulled away. “I hate those things,” he said.

  “You don’t think this can help you?” Mara asked.

  “I’m healthy enough.”

  “Hanson, these microbes could be like having the plague, or worse” Mara told him, “There are scarier things than needles. How about if your eyes bleed and fall out?”

  Hanson had a disgusted look on his face.

  “Shut up and take the damn booster!” she yelled.