Chapter Seventeen

 

Cramer noted the faltering repulsion drive, readouts blaring red warnings as the lander fell downward, roughly parallel to the sloping crater wall. He didn’t wait for Lila to react. He overrode her link and kicked in the chemical thrusters, taking manual control and watching the terrain display on the pictorial altimeter. The base of the crater sloped to a flat area. He set the craft down just beyond the last of the sloping surface of the crater.

“Excellent flying, Mr. Cramer,” she said.

“Thank you. Please, Lila, you always called me Joe.”

“What were you saying several weeks ago about your bad reaction time?” Mona asked.

“I just hope I didn’t expend all our chemical fuel.”

They took their time checking out all the systems on the lander. Replacement of faulty electronic components in one of the repulsion drive cascade amplifiers solved the repulsion drive glitch. Mona tuned the special detector for any metal or plastic structures, so it scanned in all directions. The monitor showed only white noise.

The three of them looked through the forward portal at the strangest alien surface they’d ever observed. A nearby lake registered methane. The dark red shore consisted of a hydrocarbon polymer. The liquefied methane rippled without a shower of spray as it lapped at an ammonia iceberg. Powdered ammonia snow glistened at the edge of the polymer shore. Farther away the ammonia snow blew into drifts. Chunks of water ice perched here and there across the surface along with occasional rocky outcropping. The overhead clouds, heavy and turbulent, moved from one horizon to another with speed, yet no significant wind blew on the surface.

Lila stayed in the ship near the radio. Cramer and Mona donned their space suits and took the open cockpit rover out the lower bay door and drove toward the lake. Lila monitored a video camera attached to each of their helmets. They took with them the metal and plastic detector which fed the monitor in the lander.

Mona drove the rover into the lake, slowed, then made sure they would have traction to back out. The hydrocarbon liquid closing above them allowed excellent visibility. They saw nothing suspicious across the floor of the lake in any direction. Mona backed the rover out and, at Cramer’s suggestion, took the vehicle around the crater to investigate any surface irregularities in that direction.

The rover rolled along a slight slope a small distance up the crater wall. Cramer kept the detector wand pointed ahead. Rough ground lay before them, leading to distant peaks. The jagged formations seemed arranged in a rough circle with no obvious way into the interior of the group of peaks. He pointed the detector wand in that direction and on a whim, cranked the sensitivity to maximum.

“Joe, I’m getting some faint readings on the metal and plasti-steel monitor,” Lila said over their rover and suit intercom.

“We’re moving closer. Keep us informed of any change toward those peaks.”

Mona continued steering straight for the peaks, still some distance away. The rover’s wind indicator soared as ammonia snow caused a white out. Mona halted the rover, and they waited. Ten minutes went by. The blowing snow got worse, then lessened, leaving a fresh layer of the glistening snow. She inched the rover forward once more toward the peaks. The closer they came, the stronger the signal Lila reported, but she said she could not see any structural details. They stopped short of the rocky and icy crags that blocked their way.

With care, Cramer and Mona climbed out of the rover and, before leaving it, activated its homing beacon. They trod into knee deep snow, very powdery, crystalline, and dry. It took very little effort to wade through it, especially in the lighter gravity. They reached twin mounds and moved between them. A clear lake completely surrounded by the steep pointed land crags faced them, not a single ammonia iceberg in sight.

“The signal is very strong, especially as you point towards the lake and a bit down,” Lila said.

“Look, Mona. Isn’t that something sticking up out of the lake, a round structure?” He gestured a gloved hand across the lake.

“Yes, I see it.”

“Lila, what reading do you get when I turn to narrow beam and point to the solid structure in the middle of the lake?” Cramer asked.

“Just a minute. Yes, it shows a plasti-steel composition,” she said.

“This is amazing,” he said. “I think we’ve located the alien city first trip out.”

“The footing to the lake’s edge looks treacherous. We’d better take some photos, go back to the ship, and plan a way to get into the lake. We can review the video footage as well,” Mona said.

“Okay.”

After taking photographs from several angles, they returned to the ship and examined the details of the area from the photos and video footage to see if either revealed a way to get to the lake without falling.

“It looks like there’s an opening on the far side,” he said.

Mona gestured at the photo’s grainy image where Cramer indicated. “It’ll be tricky to get the submergible down. Fortunately, gravity and the sub’s small size are in our favor.”

“If you run into alien writings, you can send me the video, and I’ll translate for you. If the transmissions can’t get through then I’ll have to accompany one of you in the sub,” Lila said.

“Looks like a transmission coming in from Floyd.” He adjusted the external antenna to increase signal. “We can hear you now, Floyd. Go ahead.” Cramer bent toward the transceiver.

“There’s a major storm headed your way. It’s slow moving and will take about twenty-four hours to reach you. It’s bringing ammonia snow from the north.”

“Thanks, Floyd. Keep us posted.”

“Looks like we don’t have the luxury of sleep before dropping into the lake,” Mona said.

“Yeah, I wonder what this area will be like after the storm.”

“From my monitoring of distant snow covered areas it appears the winds eventually clear the snow out or create huge drifts,” Lila said.

“Let’s not waste time,” Mona said.

They took extra oxygen tanks, equipped the submergible with them and checked out the rover and submergible’s operating systems. The video equipment, radio and antennas, propulsion engine for the rover and submergible, winch and line to lower the sub into the lake and various other implements tested okay. Lila insisted Cramer and Mona take at least a two-hour nap prior to departure. When he awoke he felt worse as he always did after a short nap. She, however, appeared refreshed.

The snow swirled in gossamer-like clouds as the rover’s wheels barged through the nine-inch layer of ammonia. The pliable tires took the bump out of the icy chunks scattered here and there. Cramer looked at the cloud cover and it never seemed to change. There would be no weather predicted by observation on Titan like on Earth. He remembered as a boy when he won the state’s science award for his accurate weather predictions through reading the clouds. His accuracy outdid the weathermen with all their fancy Doppler radar, satellite images, and such.

He always said, if you see alto-cumulus clouds in the sky, you can stake your last dollar on rain in twelve to twenty-four hours at least eighty percent of the time. The other twenty percent of the time it would look like rain. He hadn’t the time to study any subtle changes in Titan’s cloud patterns, but he intended to keep watch during the next twenty-four hours for any tell-tales in the sky.

Skirting the circular surface prominence to get to the other side took longer than they expected. Two hours elapsed by the time they lowered the sub down to the lake’s edge. Cramer angled the rover’s camera to watch the cloud cover to their north in the direction of the storm. Mona questioned in light of Floyd’s constant vigil of the approaching storm. Cramer couldn’t justify that other than wanting to check for storm warning signs, feeling it as reliable as orbital observation, which only looked at the top of the clouds.

The sub made waves in the liquid organic lake as it began its journey under. The waves didn’t carry like water waves on Earth but rather disappeared a very short distance from the sub. Despite natural light being at a premium, they could see. They headed for the dome, a fabricated structure here on this dynamic planet with its natural elements of organics, ice, rock, and gases.

They stopped to get more video footage before beginning to make their way around the circular base. The plasti-steel’s thick material and ripples created by the sub in the lake made it difficult to see through the walls of the structure. Mona, handling the sub, increased speed, hoping to spot some way to enter the great dome. Cramer looked at the rover’s video image. The cloud cover remained unchanged.

One hour went by and they noticed a protrusion from the dome’s base. She halted. A control panel on the exterior might indicate an airlock. He put his video camera up close, and Lila radioed the translation of the buttons’ identifications to him, verifying it as an airlock. He and Mona secured the sub and entered the outer section. Once inside, they shut the door and activated another control, which pumped the lake’s liquid out and replaced it with presumably the atmosphere of the dome.

“Look at the pressure and composition indicator,” he said.

“Twenty-five percent oxygen, Earth normal pressure. That confirms this was built by the Sirius aliens,” Mona said.

After the airlock gave the green light, they opened the door and noted the dome’s interior atmosphere composition and pressure as identical to the airlock. They removed their helmets. What lay before them showed the ravages of time.

The city only spanned perhaps a mile on the lake’s bed. A spidery network of cracks abounded on the marble-like streets, and the buildings, none over two stories in height, suffered the same fate as the streets. Lighting still worked, supplied by a power source they didn’t immediately see. Cramer moved through the broken streets with Mona in silence, saddened by the aging, broken dwellings, supply houses, meeting place, disabled vehicles, and what appeared to be a church. Thankfully, they found no bodies.

He looked at the dome overhead. Now, in the middle of the city, he could barely make out the clouds through the narrow section above the lake’s surface. As the bubble side of the city sloped down, the view through the lake grew darker. The illumination in the city saturated their night time vision. Mona tugged at his shoulder and pointed. The structure appeared to be the power plant for the city.

“What kind of power source could have lasted all these years?” she asked.

“I think we’ll find our answer over there.” Cramer strode toward a series of heavy gauge wire pairs that led downward. He tested the wires with a voltmeter and found voltage.

“Each pair of these wires has about fifty millivolts across them. They’re all connected in series, making a large voltage. They’re thermocouple wires sunken into the core of Titan where it’s hot. Two dissimilar wires welded together will generate a voltage at the junction if the other ends are at a colder temperature. Judging from the voltage, I suspect this is a chromel-alumel pair,” he said.

“So, as long as Titan has a hot core, there will be power?”

“Exactly.

“The history indicates those left behind were going to repair the city, but no one came back for them. Where do you suppose they went?” Mona asked.

“I don’t know. When their archivist left on the last ship I wonder if anybody else took over recording their last days here.”

They left the power building and walked toward a small box-like structure sitting isolated from the others and near the edge of the dome. A door—the right size to accommodate the aliens’ small stature—stood partially ajar. She pulled it fully open and shined her spotlight in. Cramer peered over her shoulder and saw steps heading downward.

“Shall we check it out?” he asked.

“I’ll go first,” she said, stepping and crouching through the low opening, then proceeding down the stairs.

Cramer, with his number twelve shoes, found it difficult to take the narrow steps. Mona’s foot, being smaller, let her to get ahead of him. Overhead lamps burned under low light, allowing her to extinguish her spotlight.

The stairs ended at a level floor and small room. They moved to another door, one constructed with heavy seals but apparently not an airlock. He took the lead and opened the door. It gave a noticeable pop as the rubber seals released. They bent again, and he gasped at what lay beyond.

The huge room obviously extended beyond the main bubble over the city. A ship sat in the middle of the room, only partially built. A silver bullet, it pointed toward a transparent dome above, still under the lake. Construction ended about halfway up the seventy-five meter high spacecraft. A boarding ramp gaped at them from under the ship like a tongue from a three-legged hard-shelled insect.

“Let’s check inside.” He walked up the plank.

Mona followed, once again turning on her bright light. They climbed up a narrow spiral staircase, stopped at each landing to look at supply storage, passenger quarters, and at the top the pilot’s room. Cramer surmised a little about the mechanisms, remembering some of the symbols from the Sirius expedition. He couldn’t get Lila’s input down there because of a blocked radio signal.

On the way back down, he and Mona stopped at the passenger quarters and decided to open the doors to their tiny rooms. They found six sleep chambers, a smaller version of their star ship Quest. The mummified bodies of aliens lay within the sealed chambers.

“There must have been a mechanism failure,” he said.

“I wonder why they were placed here before the ship was finished.”

“I don’t know, but this means there were more than these six in the city.”

“Let’s look for evidence of the others down here,” she said.

“Okay, but I want to look at their ship’s engines.”

He crawled around the bottom section looking at the fuel storage tanks and engines. It reminded him a little of the ancient rocket, V-2, from Earth’s antiquity. Used as a war machine and for scientific studies of the upper atmosphere, the V-2’s internal construction contained a nightmare of tanks, tubing, valves, and electronics.

“I doubt this ship could attain much more than one-tenth light speed, probably much slower than the supply ships that came from Sirius,” Cramer said. “Had they left in this ship, they probably would have drifted forever in space.”

“Come look at this,” Mona called to him from outside the ship.

When he came down the ramp, she stood on the opposite side of the room from the door to the stairs. He walked to her position, bounding in the low gravity. Another door like the one leading to the stairs from the rocket room stood closed and sealed tight.

“I have a feeling we’d better not try to open this one.” He examined the seals and noted their tightness. He imagined he could smell organic fumes faintly along the metal to rubber seal. He glanced along the wall from the door and saw a clear plasti-steel window, rather large.

“Look at this.” He motioned to Mona.

Moving along the wall to the window and putting their hands to the sides of their eyes to shield the light from the room, he and Mona pressed their faces against the cold substance. They remained there for a minute. He could see something from within. The compartment seemed flooded with lake organic. Diffuse light came from above, giving the room an eerie effect. She turned her beam on full power, held it against the transparent material, and again strained to see. Their vigil revealed an identical room to the other, except no ship sat in the middle. Scorch marks on the floor made a pattern like three rocket nozzles would when fire emitted on a rocket take off.

“Well, that explains where the rest of them went,” she said.

“Yes, apparently they had a working ship that blasted from that platform.”

“They didn’t have room for those six poor souls in the other ship.” She nodded toward the ship behind them.

“I suppose they hoped that someday we could have helped them.”

“We have enough video and information. We’d better go back up. There’s a lot we’ve not checked out up there yet.”

“Agreed.”

They made the journey back up the steps to the city above. Once topside Cramer notified Lila of what they found then started a systematic search of buildings other than the dwellings. He looked at the rover’s video and noted a subtle change in the cloud pattern only after six hours. Floyd’s info indicated the storm wouldn’t arrive for another eighteen hours.

They entered one building that appeared to be a library. It consisted of a combination of computer info cubes and hardback books. Puzzled at two widely separated eras of development in the same room, Cramer took down an attractive book, bound in perhaps leather, with gilded lettering in gold. He zeroed in on the title for Lila to decipher. The history book covered a very early period of the alien’s existence. He leafed through it, fascinated by the professional-looking type set and well-preserved paper. It reminded him of his prized volume in his home library authored in 1906 by Percival Lowell, entitled Mars and Its Canals.

Would it be wrong to take this book and other items from this library? He remembered an unwritten rule about disturbing the remains of discovered bodies. That included going through their pockets as their bodies lie in sunken ships or, in this case, sleep chambers. He rationalized these books and info cubes didn’t rest in the hands or pockets of a dead person. Despite them being written by a person long since dead, it would be no different from purchasing a book written by a deceased person. A lot of people paid for this expedition, but the one thing that made it rational to take these writings would be communicating these records to Keldahl back at Sirius. Keldahl may not be aware of these writings.

Cramer stared again at the cloud patterns from the rover’s signal. He didn’t like what he saw. A gut feeling told him the storm may be coming sooner than Floyd indicated. “Mona, I think we’d better take what we can carry and get back to the ship.”

“Why? The storm won’t hit for another eighteen hours.”

“It’s going to be sooner. I’m sure.”

“Now, how can you know that?”

By the very inflection of her voice, Cramer read her skepticism. “It’s just a feeling I get when I look at clouds. I seem to have a knack for reading weather from clouds.”

“But the clouds from the rover video don’t look any different,” Mona said.

“Mona, please, there is a subtle difference.”

“Okay. I’ve learned not to go against you.”

They started gathering what they could carry. She snatched up several info cubes and stuffed them in her specimen pack. Cramer took as many books as he could carry, including the old history book. He covered them in a protective wrapping he found in the library, hoping they would survive the elements outside the dome. He looked at the rover video again. Did white flecks swirl in the atmosphere?

He called Lila. “Is it snowing, Lila?”

“Yes, very little. There’s no wind.”

They went through the airlock, put on their helmets, then exited the dome into the lake. In slow motion, they drifted to the sub, placed the library materials in the secure bin of the sub, climbed in, then backed away from the dome’s entrance. Mona applied maximum power and headed for the edge of the lake where they’d entered. They surfaced into a heavy snow storm.

“Forget loading the sub onto the rover. The storm’s getting worse. Get our records and put them in the rover,” he said.

They climbed out of the sub with their arms full and crawled carefully up the incline to the rover. Already the snow covered many obstructions they slipped around. They stumbled to the rover. The snow neared the tops of the wheels. A wind started.

She hoisted herself into the driver’s side; he secured the items they’d taken from the library, feeling through the snow with his boots to climb in. Mona activated the electric motor of the rover and began the trip around the lake, circumnavigating the tall peaks. The snow, blowing now, obscured their vision. The rover’s tires made ruts through the fluffy ammonia flakes which quickly filled in behind the tires.

“We’d better make sure our reception of the beacon from the lander is maximum,” she said.

“I’m having trouble zeroing the antenna in. Lila, can you hear me?” he asked.

“Barely.”

“Boost power on the beacon.”

She didn’t answer, but he observed a stronger signal. The wind increased except the heavy snow accumulation didn’t blow away. Visibility dropped, and he tried helping Mona see the peaks that surrounded the lake. The rover ploughed through the heavy snow, now deep enough the fluffy ammonia flowed into their laps through the open cockpit.

“I’d better slow down. I can’t see the rough ground around the lake,” she said.

“We’ve only been traveling for thirty minutes. Under good conditions it would take two hours to get back to the ship. Better keep your speed.”

“Did you hear that? The signal is fluctuating,” she said.

“Yes. I think that’s what happened on the way over here. The peaks around the lake are between us and the lander, causing the signal block. We’re over half way around the lake now.”

“Joe, I have to slow down.”

“Okay.”

The rover didn’t part the ammonia snow as much, so there was less flowing into the cabin. The rough ride made Cramer wish for seat belts. He grasped the roll bar as best he could, but when the rover hit a large boulder or ice chunk hidden under the ammonia, he lost his hand hold and fell from the rover, disappearing under the snow. He tried to stay calm and attempted to regain his footing as the light gravity caused his fall to carry him some distance. He came to rest on his knees, then stood up. With visibility only eight to ten feet, he strained to see, but only blowing snow surrounded him. He lost his orientation, not knowing for sure the direction of the rover.

“Mona, can you hear me?” He only heard static.

He tried several times then realized his two-way radio light wasn’t burning. Fortunately, his receiver for the lander beacon still worked. The attenuator light, like on Europa, displayed numbers from zero to nine with nine meaning he would be right next to the lander. Now it showed a two.

He wandered. Mona probably didn’t even know when he fell out. Rover tracks disappeared immediately. Another problem plagued Cramer. Apparently, the circulating fan in his suit that kept him warm only operated part of the time. The temperature in his suit dropped.

He strode on blindly, the fluffy snow up to his armpits. He bounded through, lifting above the snow and watching the homing beacon signal strength. A weak sound through the receiver indicated the signal. If he went in the right direction the signal tone rose in pitch until nearly inaudible then the attenuation number would go one digit higher. The tone pitch would then be lower and rise again until the next step increased the attenuation. He noted the pitch didn’t change, and the readout still showed two. That told him he must be walking parallel to the signal. He changed directions. The pitch rose, albeit slow.

As he exerted more effort in his search, his air gauge descended more. The attenuator blinked to a three, and the pitch increased to mid-range. The heavy snow blinded him. It changed in consistency. The large flakes created a top layer of fresh snow that made treading difficult. His suit temperature dropped to thirty-two degrees Fahrenheit, and he tried to stifle his shivering. He quickened his pace, bounding higher and farther with each stride. His attenuator showed a four. As he recalled, the readings increased more rapidly in an exponential fashion. He could take comfort in that.

Cramer couldn’t believe his sweating, but the term cold sweat came to mind. The water vapors frosted up his face plate because of the poor circulation in the suit. Now he truly walked blindly. He couldn’t make out the attenuator number any longer but knew from the changing pitch a five now showed. With his air gauge reading and attenuator indication only a guess, he plunged on through the shoulder-high snow. He began to tire, his legs threatening to buckle, his breath laboring, heart pounding.

Stumbling, he dropped to his knees. He wanted to just lie down and die. The cold gripped him like a frost monster blowing its chilling breath on him. If he remembered correctly, the attenuator should be seven and the pitch rising fast. Almost there, no time to give up. Survive for the benefit of Cindy, Mona, and Floyd—all others who placed confidence in him.

The warm, gentle breeze in July on the beach of Burr Oak Lake in Ohio must be wonderful. The company of Cindy on one side of him and Mona on the other side—what a pleasant idea. That warm vision contrasted Cramer’s suit temperature, which seemed to be plunging now. He could hardly move.

This time when he staggered and dropped to his knees, his muscles refused to work. He envisioned the suit failing altogether, plunging to the outside temperature of minus two hundred ninety degrees Fahrenheit. Besides that, the red warning light flashed on his face plate, indicating less than two minutes of air left.

Was he in a death sleep dream now? Someone grabbed one arm and perhaps a second person snatched the other arm. He lost all awareness with no oxygen, no reasonable temperature, feeling death’s frigid fingers gripping, attempting to separate his spirit from his body. His body refused to release its grasp. Although that clinging of body and spirit together became more tenuous, nevertheless it continued.

Warmth, air, rest…comfort flooded his body. He never appreciated the meaning of those sensations as much as he did now. He opened his eyes. The blurry vision coalesced into two faces above him. The dark haired, lovely image of Lila and the flowing blonde hair that framed the beautiful face of Mona became crystal clear. Warm blankets piled on him, and the bright interior of the lander welcomed him back. He witnessed something he had never seen before—tears streaming from Mona’s eyes.

“Joe, I never knew you’d fallen off until several minutes passed. I searched, I called. I’m so sorry.” She wiped away the tears.

“We detected your presence outside from the heat sensor, but your suit temperature was low so you had to be right on top of us before we could find you,” Lila said.

Cramer tried to speak but couldn’t then he half-rose, and Mona allowed him that effort. His skin tingled as feeling returned. He remembered how his hands, when exposed to the Indiana winters, would throb with pinpoints of pain as they began to warm up after he played in the cold while wearing wet gloves as a boy. Lila noted the pained expression on his face.

“Your suit’s temperature regulator went into catastrophic failure just before we got you into the lander,” she said.

“Take it easy, Joe. We’re going to leave before the storm gets any worse,” Mona said.