Busy Skies: The Council Dissolution Page 22
“Chemically speaking, silicon is much heavier and bigger than carbon, which, simply put, means that the outermost electrons which are far away, tend to break away much easier than in carbon. Therefore, forming long chains of molecules is a bit harder. Also, unlike carbon to carbon bonds, silicon to silicon bonds are much weaker, especially in liquids. So in our atmosphere which is water-rich, and better yet, oxygen-rich, silicon bonds are very unstable. So, when silicon is exposed to oxygen in our atmosphere, it bonds with it, which results in silica. But unlike methane which is the equivalent molecule for carbon, silica is solid. This solid is better known as quartz, or simply, sand.”
“This is why you see so much sand and rocks around on earth, and none of them ever try to have a conversation with you. Therefore Earth's atmosphere is extreme for silicon, so, what conditions would silicon like? - It turns out that for silicon, to make stronger bonds, atmospheric conditions for us, carbon-based life, would be extreme, hellish in fact. In laboratories, it has been observed that a solvent, i.e. a medium for silicon-based life would be sulfuric acid, and this would need to be under high temperatures. Many other different types of life can be possible in conditions that are toxic for us, and unimaginable. Life thrives under ammonia instead of water, methane, ethane, etc. In chemistry, it is plausible that you can meet another type of life that thrives in high temperature, acid rains, thick atmospheres, and while we might consider those very reactive environments, to them this would appear just right.”
After Dr. Quill’s lecture was finished, there were a dozen of seconds of silence that was finally broken by commander Hewitt. “Dr. Quill, this is very interesting, and a bit disturbing, I think that we need to rethink our efforts at this point. But, thank you for your elaborate explanation. However, can you clarify, does this mean that the Rock is not alive, nor was it here intentionally placed? - How could have we been so wrong?”
Dr. Quill replied “Actually, we finally know what the Rock is, and what kind of conditions it would enjoy. Based on the latest experiments, the rock fits in the second category I mentioned previously. It has a bit more complex composition than I thought, however, essentially it's silicon-based. This means that on Earth, it cannot thrive. It hasn't turned into sand because of its specific location. The ice was somewhat protecting it from atmospheric oxygen, while the volcano that it hit, provided some heat to bottom layers which allowed it to be in a sort of equilibrium. However, whenever we invested additional energy, it was actually oxidizing. At first, we considered that Its cognitive ability is similar to ants, however, it always reacted in places where energy was applied. So, this is not a conscious reaction. It has no metabolism and it only reacts similarly, meaning that it only transforms energy. It's not alive, nor it is complex life, however, exposing it to conditions it likes, can make it grow. In fact, if we exposed it to a lot of pressure and heat, it would grow significantly.”
Dr. Quill then turned towards commander Hewitt and said, “and commander, to address the question of how is this possible. It's simple”. Dr. Quill then faced the councilor and said “we have been fed false information from sabotaged equipment. All the data we have collected from the night of the accident in the Antarctic research facility was recorded from the new sensor array my team have developed.”
Commander Hewitt looked surprised with this remark, and Dr. Quill made a dead serious expression, while looking at the councilor, and said, “It’s simple, we have been fed false information from sabotaged equipment.”
“Or, your sensor array was miscalibrated. Without sounding too melodramatic, what’s the second point you wanted to make about the doctor?” - asked the chancellor nervously.
“I can assure you that our equipment recorded flawless data”, answered Dr. Quill, and continued. “The second point I wanted to make is obvious. It cannot be from a planet that resides in the Goldie-lock zone. It might be that the calculations are wrong, or origin speculation, I don't know, nor care, but it is for sure not from Luyten B.”
“So, doctor”, said commander Hewitt, “I'm taking from this that the Rock cannot withstand oxygen, am I right?”
“Yes”, replied Dr. Quill somewhat surprised, that this was the only concern of commander Hewitt at the moment. But regardless, he continued, “exposing it to oxygen will actually turn it into some sort of sand. Not the regular one, found on Earth, it has some interesting properties, but yes, commander. Oxygen. I'm guessing that this is good news and that our visitors aren't trying to terraform our planet, for the lack of a better term.”
“It seems now, there is no clear incentive for us to consider them hostile”, said the councilor. “Thank you Dr. Quill”
The image of the councilor went away, and commander Hewitt nodded a greeting and his image also disappeared. For a moment, Dr. Quill was standing alone in the room, and he felt simultaneously proud that he got to the bottom of this, but also, somewhat sad upon realizing how deep this whole case was and how far it went. He sighed and headed to the exit, but then, he felt a sudden burst of pressure and he found himself rolling in the ground, exposed to the cold surface of the moon. Dr. Quill opened his mouth to yell for help but he could not produce any sound, he felt as if he was going to exhale his lungs, while simultaneously feeling heavy burning all over his body. His eyes burned so much he could not keep them open, and on his skin he felt the cold burning. He was erratically and uncontrollably shaking, however, at some point he just stopped. He
lost consciousness, and soon after, he was lying on the Moon’s surface, dead.
* * *
Carlo and Lee were thoroughly mining the data that Dr. Quill left them, and upon realizing what this all meant, they went towards the old office of councilor Frost, where he had the meeting.
However, once they came there, an unexpected commotion prevented them from coming closer. One of the security officers asked them to leave this place since there has been an accident. Apparently, some pressure sensors were a bit off in their measurements, and the room decompressed.
“What?!” - asked Lee, “how do you mean pressure sensors were off, that's impossible!”
Carlo moved a bit closer to the window which allowed a partial view of the meeting room, and right next to the huge window was Dr. Quill. Without a moon suit, lifelessly lying on the ground.
“No! No!” - he said calmly and turned to face Lee, who was explaining to the officer why a pressure valve failure is not possible. Lee stopped and looked outside and saw Dr. Quill.
They both ran directly to the decompression chamber and got dressed and went outside. Once they got to Dr. Quill, his face was wrinkled, stiff, and frozen. So was the rest of his body. “He was suddenly exposed to a zero pressure, cold environment with no air to breathe. He was dead instantly”, said one Carlo, with a very sad expression.
As both of them stood there, staring at Dr. Quill’s lifeless body, medical personnel started walking towards them. When they came close to Dr. Quill, they performed some checks, and one of them said, “at this point, there is nothing we can do”. They opened a black bag and placed his body inside, and at that moment, Carlo noticed that Dr. Quill was tightly gripping something in his hand. He offered help to the medical personnel, and as they were lifting his dead body, Carlo managed to take a small black device from Dr. Quill’s hand. He placed it into Lee’s back pocket.
Several minutes later, all of them went inside, and in the decompression chamber, Carlo took the small black device from Lee’s back pocket.
“What is this?” - asked Lee. Carlo leaned in and whispered, “I took this from Dr. Quill, he was holding it tightly in his hands”.
Lee took the device and said, “It’s a recording device, seems like Dr. Quill was recording the meeting”. As one of the security officers was passing by, Lee quickly placed the device in his pants and rushed past him. Carlo followed.
They passed through several hallways, tunnels connecting the domes of the Lunar observatory and they finally caught some privacy in Lee’s cubicle.
“I’m not sure about this Carlo”, whispered Lee. “It was exposed to extreme temperature and I'm not sure whether this memory device can withstand that.”
Carlo looked a bit disappointed, but said, “nevertheless, we should try. Considering everything that has been happening, to the Winsons, and the involvement of the topmost people, it's reasonable to assume we are in deep shit now. First, just by having this, and secondly, knowing that the data shows.”
Lee took the device and placed it on his desk. A semi-transparent computer screen came out of the desk, and a reading progress bar encircled the memory device. The computer displayed the message’ Damaged drive. Unable to retrieve data.
“Perfect”, said Carlo, “that's just perfect. He stood up and walked across the room, looking at Lee's sad face. I guess we are alone now.”
Lee looked at him with a sad expression and said, “yes. He was a bit of a grumpy old man; however, he was brilliant and it was a pleasure working with him.”
A sudden loud thump from the outside interrupted their conversation. The ground beneath their feet shook a bit, and they ran to the window, along with other scientists in the room, to see a huge cargo ship right next to the cargo area.
“Yes!” - whispered Carlo. “That's our ticket out!”
Chapter 25
Right according to the plan, Hank delivered the cargo to a lunar base near the Lunar observatory 9. Now, the next thing for him is to fake out a malfunction which would give him the right to land at the Lunar observatory 9, where they would have to offer him help. He didn't have any way to contact Dr. Quill, Lee, or Carlo, however, he thought that once he lands, he will figure out something.
He was approaching the Lunar observatory 9, and right from the air one could notice that this is no ordinary observatory. It was much bigger than the other ones, it had much larger telescopes and it looked much posher than the others. Most of the buildings were covered by concrete made from the moon rock, so one could see a lot of doors, gates, and something that appears to be tunnels. However, there were also a lot of glass domes, and glass windows which were very distinctive for a lunar outpost. It was located very close to a huge crater. Around the facility, there were many stone walls that didn't have a protection function, but rather aesthetics. It looked kind of nice, like a nice park in the desert. Hank assumed there were a plethora of tunnels under the ground, but once he landed, Dr. Quill, Lee, and Carlo would look for him. He identified a huge artificial plane that was surrounded by several tunnel exits, and he assumed that this must be a cargo dock.
Very precisely, he made several maneuvers that on a scan would look very weirdly and almost as if one of his thrusters isn't working properly. Finally, he approached very close to the surface and dragged the ship on it to create some dust for the effect, before gaining altitude and landing right next to the dock, with some impact.
He opened a channel to the Lunar base and said, “Mayday, mayday, lunar resupply ship XFC-111 requesting help. Mayday, mayday.”
“This is Lunar observatory 9, please stand by. We are sending a rescue crew to pick you up and inspect your ship.”
Hank stood up and ran to the back of the ship to disconnect some wires. He used those to make burning marks on his clothes and then he messed up his hair. He ran back to the front when he saw that a bunch of suited-up security personnel was inspecting the ship. He waved at them, and then one of them singled them to suit up and come out.
After struggling a bit with the suit, Hank went outside, and explained the problem, saying that one of the thrusters is offline.
One of the security officers said, “alright, please proceed inside, while we assemble a mechanical team to check out the problems. We will try to get airborne as soon as possible.”
* * *
Carlo and Lee witnessed this through the window and recognized Hank. “Perfect”, said Lee, “we need to get to him, and we need to give him this data storage unit. With the right equipment, I believe some parts of it can be restored.”
“Alright”, said Carlo, “but more importantly, we need to give him the data analysis. It should be a bit more important considering it’s content.”
“How do you think we can do that?” - asked Lee. “Don't get me wrong, I would like to get away from here as soon as possible, however, I don't know how.”
“Let's just try to find Hank, we will probably have some good ideas”, said Carlo.
They went into the main hallway to inspect the map of the facility when they realized that Hank is in the sealed off part of the facility. It was impossible to get to the part of the base where Hank was. It was a low security zone and it was physically disconnected from the rest of the base due to security reasons.
“Damn it, now, what are we going to do?” - asked Lee
“I don't know”, replied Carlo.
After a moment of thinking and looking around, Carlo said, “alright, I've got an idea. But you're not going to like it.”.
“What?” - asked Lee, and Carlo continued. “The room that has just been breached, where Dr. Quill was. It's within the secure part of the observatory. It might be sealed off but I doubt that anyone is watching it or cares about it. It should be an easy place to get out. Then, maybe we can proceed to the ship somehow, or contact Hank.”
“Where do we get the suits, and who will suit us up?” - asked Lee. “Don't you think that we would be suspicious coming to the pressure chamber and then saying, alright, we are keeping the suits to walk inside?”
“Yes, we would, but first, we need to take the suits and drive them in one of those service carts so no one notices, and second, we need to incapacitate the guards”, replied Carlo.
“Oh, I don't like that idea. ” - said Lee.
“I told you so”, replied Carlo, “do you have a better one? It's our only option. Alright, come with me, I need to get to the lab.”
“Ah, OK”, said Lee rolling his eyes.
Once they got there, he told Carlo to take some wire and capacitors, while he heats up the soldering iron.
“Why are you doing this manually, why cannot a robot do it?” - asked Carlo.
“I think that if I punch in the console that I need two tasers, someone will probably notice. I'm actually not sure if that's allowed”, replied Lee.
“So the plan is to tase the guards?” - asked Carlo. “Precisely!” - said Lee proudly.
After soldering the tasers in the record amount of time, Lee announced that it's ready.
“Alright, let's go”, said Carlo. They stormed outside the lab, toward the pressure chamber where two guards were casually talking.
“Wait, wait, wait.” - one of them said. “Where do you think you're going?”
“Outside.” - said Carlo.
“No one is to go outside”, replied the guard. “There is a cargo ship without proper clearance and it is a security and safety risk. Besides, you’ve already been outside today, just a couple of hours ago, am I right?”
“But we need to palace these outside”, said Lee, and gave the officers his homemade tasers to inspect. Both of the guards were a bit confused, and then, Lee took a step back and pushed a button in his pocket.
Nothing happened, and one of the guards asked, “what's this?”
“It's a dozificator”, said Lee, while in his pocket he was trying again and again to tase them.
“Alright, I'm going to need to call someone to check this”, said the guard.
Finally, Lee took the remote out of his pocket and gave it a proper shaking with several not so gentle taps. Finally pushed the button again. Both of the guards fell on the floor as if someone turned an off switch on them.
With a smirk, Lee proudly looked at Carlo who indifferently said, “OK, remind me never to piss you off”.
Lee then realized this action was a bit off to his standard behavior, and he was a bit embarrassed. “Never mind that”, he said, “let’s drag them in the decompression room.” They did so, and then took two suits, placed them in
to a small service wagon.
“Why cannot we just get outside here?” - asked Carlo.
“Because this is an official entry, and it's monitored”, said Lee. “ It would sound an alarm. The one in the meeting room isn't. Stop asking questions and hurry. Once we get dressed we will need to decompress another zone, but if we do it quickly enough, no one should notice.”
“By the way, what is a dozificator?” - asked Carlo.
“I don't know”, said Lee, “I made it up, what was I supposed to say? Hurry!”
* * *
Meanwhile, Hank was on board the observatory, and he came to the same realization. There is no way to get to the personnel except through the outside or through a series of checkpoints, and there is no way he can smuggle any data or people through that channel.
He looked outside the window, to check out the station and saw that there is one office that seemed to be recently damaged. There has been a breach, there was dust all over it and a huge part of what looked to be a glass window was missing. On the other side, there were a couple of mechanics looking around his ship.