Trapped on Venus (10 page)

 
As the countdown
reached 5... 4... 3... 2... and 1, there was a quiet surge as the landing pod
separated from the orbiter, and the mission began.

 
“All clear here,
Orbiter,” Scott announced to Grayson so that he could thrust to a higher
altitude.

 
“Moving into orbit at
twelve niner one eight,” Grayson reported as his module began to sweep around
the planet. He would be the link for Scott and Marty as they descended to
Venus, keeping radar positioning as well as communications open.

 
Everyone was quiet for
a few moments. This was an extremely tense time. And, though it was certain
that there were hundreds, maybe even thousands, of thoughts flashing through
everyone’s minds, there was a necessity for focus and concentration not verbal
intrusions.

 
Venus Twelve was
gradually lowering its orbit around Venus as it ascended to a repeat landing on
the planet. Only, this time, they would land several hundred meters from where
they were before to avoid the possibility of the ground being unstable. But
they still had to be close enough to the equipment they had left on the planet
before so they could reset it to detect a changed agenda of data. NASA had
chosen a very low-level plateau, wedged intricately in a crater with several
high-rising embankments on several sides.
 
It was thought that this might give the astronauts some protection from
an unstable crust while still allowing them access to the places they needed to
reach. However, this location would also require some pinpoint navigation.

 
As their orbit
lowered, the landing module began to enter the gaseous, cloudy, thick sulphuric
acid cloud layer that hid the surface of the planet from direct observation.
The two porthole-sized windows in the craft streaked with moisture as Scott and
Marty continued their seemingly slow journey closer and closer to the surface
of the plant. They knew the streaking came from dangerously corrosive sulphuric
acid vapors that would have sizzled through the shell of their module if it
weren’t for the acid-resistant molecular structure of the poly-carbon fibers
that bonded the craft together.

 
The temperatures the
craft was exposed to immediately jumped several hundred degrees as they entered
the Venusian atmosphere – to over 930
°
Fahrenheit! – from the so-called “greenhouse effect” caused by the Sun’s rays
penetrating the cloud layer then the heat being trapped beneath the clouds so
that the atmosphere continued to heat up. Visibility was still very limited,
but Marty began to alert Scott to their position from the dials and gauges on
his console.

 
“Twenty-three hundred
meters from the surface, Scott,” Marty reported. “Heading two niner seven to
landing site.”

 
“Grayson?
 
Have you got a fix on us?” Scott asked as he
toggled some switches and turned some dials.

 
“Roger,” Grayson
reported immediately. “Have you pinpointed, and tracking you to landing site.”

 
“Marty, what’s our
speed?” Scott asked.

 
“Four hundred thirteen
mph,” Marty responded.

 
“Slow us to two
ninety,” Scott instructed.

 
“Roger,” Marty
acknowledged as he hit the reverse thruster and they felt the craft begin to
brake. Eight point two seconds later, the thrusters stopped. “Two ninety,
Scott,” Marty reported.

 
Stimson added some
information from Earth Control One. “You’re closing on the Angstrom Meridian,
Scott,” he said, referring to a gorge which seemed to bisect the planet’s
surface. “You’ve got about thirty seven kilometers after that,” Stimson
reported.

 
“Drop it down to
eighty-seven mph, Marty,” Scott commanded. Immediately Marty punched in the new
speed, and the thrusters pushed back against their forward speed. Thirteen
seconds later, Marty advised Scott: “We’re at eighty-seven mph, Scott.”

 
The much slower speed
would give them more time to find the landing site the advisors at Earth
Control One had chosen, but it would also make it more difficult to navigate
the awkward craft without the higher forward speed. Scott tried to look out the
window of the pod for the crater he knew that would shortly appear at the same
time that he checked his instruments.

 
“I think I’ve got it,
Scott,” Marty said excitedly. “It’s at seven four two eight on the leeward side.
See it? It’s that dark spot on the radar.”

 
“Yes, I’ve got it,
too, Marty,” and Scott began to key in the coordinates for a computer assisted
landing.

 
“Craft slowing to
thirty-seven mph,” Marty advised him. “Twenty nine... thirteen...”

 
Scott could see the
crater rim up ahead. It was not a deep crater, maybe only six or eight meters
deep, but it would put them in a good location if they could land on that
slight plateau near the center. Scott was aiming for it as they slowed even
more.

 
Although, just then,
something relatively large appeared on the radar and swept past the window on
Scott’s side of the module. “What the...!” Scott exclaimed. He even turned his
head to the side like one would if a bird had flown at the windshield of his
car.

 
“What was that!?!”
Marty asked in complete astonishment. “Did you get a look at it, Scott?” he
continued. But Scott tried not to be distracted. He quickly looked back at the
console and watched as the computer slowed their speed to a near standstill,
then lowered them to the landing site.

 
“Twelve meters...
eight... four...” Marty paused a moment as the rear thrusters blew the loose
sand below them out to the side. “Touchdown,” he indicated as they bumped to a
stop, but without the thrill they might have otherwise felt if they were not
still wondering what that object was that had swept past them.

 
“Venus Twelve,” John
Stimson immediately called out to them. “What happened up there? What was that
thing you saw? Are you ok?”

 
The astronauts took a
few seconds to compose themselves. They were still not exactly sure of what had
happened themselves. Then they felt their landing module start to tip.

 
Hey!” yelled out
Marty. “Scott! What’s that? We’re starting to... tip!”

 
And it was true! One
of the landing pod feet was sinking into the sand of Venus! The craft was
tipping!

 
“Get ready to launch,
Marty!” Scott said, reacting quickly. The leg of the landing pod was sinking
slowly at the back of the craft. Already they were tipped at about a 5 or 10
degree angle from perpendicular, and they were still tilting!

 
Marty was trying to
analyze the situation as quickly as he could. “Wait, Scott. It may stop.” And
it did seem to be slowing. The astronauts tried to be acutely aware of any
movement of the craft, but it seemed to have stopped. They were tilted backward
at about a 10 or 15 degree angle so that they were left feeling like cartoon
characters who were in a car that was balancing halfway over the edge of a
cliff. They remained motionless, trying to determine if they could move without
aggravating the situation.

 
“What’s going on?...
Scott? Marty?” Stimson asked tentatively. “Have you stopped tilting? Is it
settling?”

 
Still emotionally
jolted by these successively unforeseen events, Scott could barely bring
himself to talk.
What more might happen?
he wondered. “John, I think
we’ve stabilized. At least, we don’t seem to be tipping any more.” Looking at
Marty, he continued: “I don’t know what more to expect. What do you think,
Marty?”

 
Trying to appraise the
situation without allowing fear and hundreds of negative concerns to stab their
way into his judgment, Marty answered: “I don’t know yet. I’m still waiting for
something more to happen.”

 
But, nothing did. For
five, six... eight minutes the astronauts just tried to assess the situation.
At one point, Marty even told Scott he was going to try to rock forward and
back in his seat to see if the ship became unstable . “If we slip any more,
Scott, launch us,” Marty said. Then he began to slowly change his position and
even to rock back and forth, but nothing moved. “I think it’s ok to move
around,” Marty concluded.

 
“Stimson,” Scott said,
trying to advise the Mission Director of their status. “I think it’s holding.
Marty has been moving around, but it doesn’t seem to affect us. I think we’re
stable for now.”

 
“Well, we’ve got to
get you moving if we’re going to stay there,” Stimson said. “Our time is
limited as it is. One of you is going to have to go outside and assess the
situation. You’ve both got your suits on. Marty? Why don’t you go out and see
what it looks like to you from the outside. Scott? You stay at the console,
ready to launch if there’s a sign of any danger.”

 
What a bold plan
,
Marty thought to himself.
But, he’s right. We’ve got to get moving if we’re
going to go through with this.
He wished there was more time to assess what
kind of trouble they might be getting into, but it was just about now or never.
“Roger, Earth Control,” Marty answered. Then he moved to the hatch opening as
he prepared to exit.

 
Marty turned the large
wheel that sealed them from the outside several times around while Scott
lowered the metal ladder that would allow him to reach the surface. The hatch
door cracked open a bit as Marty completed unlocking it, and a searing seam of
heat pushed its way inside the craft.

 
With all the sunscreen
filters on the windows of the craft and the visors on their helmets, it was
easy to forget how wickedly harsh, bright, and forbidding the surface of Venus
was. Over 900
°
Fahrenheit, with an atmospheric
pressure that was ninety times that on Earth, were only part of the brutal
landscape. The breakthrough technology in nano-tydes and pressure balancing
made it possible for the astronauts to walk on the surface without being
instantly crushed, baked, and corroded! But, even the crust of the planet, with
its small but numerous volcanoes, its occasionally shifting and undulating
platelets of topsoil, the incessant winds, and its unbearably slow rotation –
taking 243 Earth days to rotate once on its axis – made the surface of Venus
one of the most alien in the Solar System. Hot, pressurized, and lethal – what
an inhospitable environment!

 
Marty didn’t slow his
movements out the hatch, though, as he stepped boldly into what was essentially
a great unknown. They had been on the surface once before, but this was a
different place and a different time. Each time was always unique. He clung to
the railing of the ladder and meticulously placed each foot on the rungs to
make certain that he kept his balance.

 
“Going down, Scott,”
he advised his partner who sat on heightened alert at his console in case
anything happened. The others at Earth Control One also leaned forward and
listened to every word and sound coming over the intercom.
 

 
Marty paused after he
had taken a step or two down the ladder. He turned his head from side to side,
as best he could in the restrictive spacesuit, to assess the terrain where they
had landed and the situation that confronted them. Things looked calm but
murky. Yellowish-green heat waves colored the atmosphere everywhere he looked,
making him feel more like a deep sea diver going down a ladder into the ocean
than an astronaut about to set foot on the planet Venus for the second time.

 
“I’m going to step on
the surface, Scott,” he advised him as he stepped onto the planet. As his
weight transferred from the ladder to the surface, it seemed solid and held.
“So far, so good,” he said with a little levity.

 
Marty stood with both
feet on the planet, looked around slowly, then shuffled slightly to his left
where the landing pod leg had sunk into the crust of the planet. He could see
that the lander leg was submerged in the topsoil about ten or twelve inches,
but the craft didn’t seem to be tipping severely. “It doesn’t look that bad,
Scott,” he informed him as he approached the pod leg. “The surface seems
solid,” he observed. “No cracking or sinking.”

 
“Does it look like you
can takeoff from that angle, Marty?” asked Stimson from Earth Control One.

 
“Affirmative,” he
replied. “It might even have felt like more of an incline inside the ship than
it is. Yes, I think we can take off, maybe without even as much spinning as we
did last time.”

 
“That sounds good to
me, too,” Grayson said in relief from the craft circling the planet overhead.
“That last hookup was more like a circus catch than a space dock.” The men knew
the gravity of the situation and were merely trying to reassure each other that
they were ready for whatever happened.

 
“Should I come out,
Marty?” Scott asked. “It’s going to take both of us to get everything done. If
it looks good to you, let’s have a go at it.
 
Stimson? What do you think?”

 
“Yes, do it. It looks
like things are about as good as we can make them,” said the Mission Director
with a breath of resignation in his voice.

 
Scott wasted little
time getting out of his command chair. He pushed back the seat, removed the
safety harness that held him in place, then took a couple of well-placed steps
to the hatch of the ship. He swung the door open and took a moment to adjust to
the heat and light and the vaporous gases around them. Then, he turned himself
so that he could descend the ladder.

 
As he stepped onto the
first rung of the ladder, something small and translucent smacked into the side
of the landing pod. There was no sound because the atmosphere and the helmets
of the astronauts prevented them from hearing it. But, both Scott and Marty saw
what had happened. Something – some kind of creature... something like a
jellyfish with tentacles and a clear, light, almost see-through body – had
flown into the side of their craft. It had fallen to the ground from the
impact, and lay there huddled in a ball.

 
“Marty!” Scott
exclaimed in astonishment. “Marty! What was that?”

 
“I... I... don’t know,
Scott,” he stammered.

 
“What are you talking
about, Scott and Marty? What is it?” Stimson asked. He had no idea what had
just happened, but he could tell from the pause and the consternation that
something significant had happened.

 
“It’s... another
creature of some kind, John,” Scott told Stimson.

 
“What?!?! You’ve got
to be kidding me!” he nearly yelled into his headset. “What is it? What
happened? What can you tell us?”

 
“I can’t really tell
what it is, Stimson. Can you, Marty? Did you see where it came from?” Scott
asked. He started to descend the ladder, carefully choosing each step to make
sure he didn’t stumble, but he also felt a sense of urgency.

 
“No... I don’t know
what it is,” Marty said with uncertainty in his voice. “It must have been
flying,” he surmised, “but there isn’t much visibility to see something like
that until the very last second.”

 
“Can you see it now?”
Stimson asked. “Is it dead?”

 
Both questions stumped
Marty. “I can see it,” he said with a slight hesitation, “but I can’t tell what
it is, or even what it looks like. It’s all kind of rolled into a lump of some
kind,” he explained. “And, whether it’s alive or not... well... I can’t tell.
It’s not moving.”

 
Scott had reached the
last rung of the ladder, then stepped onto the surface of the planet. He moved
closer to the creature where Marty was standing.

 
“Be careful,” Marty
warned. “I still don’t know how stable this surface is. And I don’t know what
to make of this... this ‘thing’”, he called it.

 
“You’ve got to find out
more about it,” Stimson insisted. “Do you have any photo equipment?”
 
“Negative, John,” Scott replied. “We
lost all of it when we encountered those things on our first landing – the
camera, the photo cards, the lenses, everything.”

 
“Do you have something
you can poke it with?” Grayson asked. Of course it was a very primitive idea,
but what else could they do?

 
“Should I nudge it
with my foot?” Marty asked.

 
“Negative!” Stimson
answered quickly. “We have no idea at all what this might be. It might even be
some kind of predator, or it might contaminate you, or even put a hole in your
suit. No, don’t make contact with it until we can determine what it is.”

 
“Describe it as best
you can,” Jacob Levin, a chemist on the team asked. John Stimson was surprised to
hear his voice intrude on the conversation, but it was as good a question as he
could think of at the time.

 
“Well, it was probably
about... what would you say, Scott?... about three, three and a half feet in
diameter when it was flying, or whatever it was doing?” Marty started.

 
“I didn’t get a look
at it at all, Marty,” Scott answered. “I was turned around when it must have
hit the ship. I didn’t see it and I didn’t hear anything. But, looking at it
here, on the ground, I’d say that three feet or so would be a good estimate.”

 
“You say it was
‘flying’,” the professor asked.

 
Marty spoke up.
“Flying... gliding... I don’t really know. It was in the air. But, it appeared
so suddenly, I couldn’t really tell.”

 
“Is it the same thing
you saw as you were landing the ship?” John Stimson asked.

 
“I don’t know,” Marty
answered. “I barely got a look at whatever it was that went past the ship. It
could be the same, it could be something different.”

 
Professor Levin asked
a more obvious question. “Do you see any more in the air or hovering around
your location?”

 
Marty and Scott looked
up to see if there were any more visible. “It’s hard to tell, things are so
cloudy,” Scott answered first. “I don’t see anything, either,” Marty answered. Then
both of them reacted in surprise.

 
“There it goes,
Scott!” Marty said as he watched the creature suddenly unroll from its curled
up position and fly away. “I don’t believe it!” Scott said aloud. “It’s gone!”