Here it is. Any input welcome.
Epigraph
We live in vain.
It is not so. You live for a purpose.
We have travelled from one end of the heavens to the other and there is nowhere we can live.
Your purpose is not in the heavens. From the beginning they were closed to you. Tubal deceived you, bringing you here.
What shall we do?
In the end it will be revealed to you, when the time of Tubal is done.
Then I will know?
Then you will know.
I – MISSION PLAN
1.
We were four months out when they told us.
It’s funny how you remember exactly where you were and what you were doing when really bad news arrives. I had left the crew in the Wardroom and was sitting in my recliner in the Rec room eating a plate of rehydrated asparagus. Domingo and Deiter had started arguing about religion again and after telling everyone that watching cartoons was likely to be more constructive I bailed out. It wasn't like I was trying to make a point as mission commander or anything. Cloe and Tessa enjoyed the debates but I just wasn't comfortable discussing the topic. After four months in a spaceship the size of a two storey apartment the secret of getting along with one's fellow crewmembers is to not try too hard.
I had put Wall-E up on the screen but wasn't paying much attention to it. About ten minutes into the movie a red dot flashed in the centre of the picture, accompanied by a musical dong dong that sounded through the ship, the signal for a message from Mission. I decided to play it before calling the crew. A lot of messages concerned only one crewmember who was a specialist in the subject matter.
I leaned forward with the remote and started the audiovisual message. Eugene Trinny's face appeared on the screen. That made me sit up. The Director of NASA would not communicate with us unless he had something important to say. I noticed he was not smiling. A kind of cheerful bonhomie is de rigeur in earth-space communications unless something precise and technical is going on between Mission Control and the ship. Something was wrong.
“Hello everyone. I trust everything is fine with you. Seems from our end that Terra Nova is functioning normally.” The Director ran his fingers through his still-dark hair. “What I’m going to say may be difficult for you to take in. We’re still trying to take it in here.” He gestured to someone off-screen. An image appeared, a photograph of a small chunk of rock against a black background.
“1036 Ganymed. It's the biggest of the Amor asteroids. It has an elliptical orbit with an aphelion well past Mars and a perihelion pretty close to Earth. Or it used to. We've been tracking it for the past two years since a planetesimal….next image...”—the chunk of rock was replaced by a starry sky with a red arrow pointing to a white dot near the centre—“since Deepstar IV detected a planetesimal coming into the solar system from the Kuiper Belt. It was probably hit by something else and deflected close to Neptune.
“Nobody paid much attention to it until its orbit was calculated. It was headed straight for Ganymed. At that point the information was given classified status until we had a better idea of the effect the planetesimal would have on the asteroid. Computer simulations predicted a change of orbit, with Earth within the hypothetical radius of the new orbital path. Right, back to the first image.” The chunk of rock reappeared.
“Impact between the planetesimal and Ganymed took place about a month after you left. We tracked Ganymed with all three Deepstar satellites until we had collected enough data to be certain. Ganymed will definitely collide with Earth fifteen months from now. About the time you're due back.”
Everything froze for me except the image on the screen, a tiny, indistinct, innocuous pebble. Then it disappeared, replaced by the Director’s face.
“Let me give you the specs. Ganymed is about 31 kilometers long. It has a mass of 330 quadrillion tons. The experts tell me that's pretty dense for an asteroid—about 3.5 tons per cubic metre, which is due to it having plenty of iron and magnesium silicates in its composition.
“The good news is that we have a plan for neutralising it. We can't break it up but we’ll hit it with multiple nukes to deflect it. We have more than we need for the job so Earth will be fine. However you all have enough scientific and technical expertise to know there's a degree of uncertainty in an undertaking of this nature, so we've devised a fall-back plan for you.” For the first time the hint of a smile appeared in his features.
“You’ll be getting new course settings. It won’t change your current path for the moment. You’ll still be going to Mars. If everything works out it would be a pity to abandon the whole mission just because of a scare. But we're working on sending you a couple of additional supply ships. If necessary you'll stay up there a bit longer than planned. To put it bluntly we’re turning the Terra Nova into a lifeboat.
“We don’t exactly know what the effects would be of a body this size hitting the earth. One has to factor in speed, mass, composition, angle of impact, all that. Our best models project that the Earth would remain habitable but would take a while to recover before you could return to it. The idea is to give you as much time as possible. Again, let me emphasize that this is just a precaution, a fall-back plan. Something that we don’t intend to use. Your primary mission should remain unchanged. We’ll fill you in as our information becomes clearer. Any questions you have we’ll be only too happy to answer.
“It was my recommendation when this came up not to hide anything from you. You can fulfil your secondary mission—in the remote possibility it becomes necessary—if you know exactly what’s going on. For now that’s all I have to say—except one thing. This information is strictly classified. No-one besides yourselves must know of the secondary mission. The last thing we need is any public impression that the situation is not entirely under control. I don’t have to emphasize how much we depend on your discretion. There’s a lot more at stake now. I’ll be available if you need to know anything further from me. Goodbye and good luck.” The screen went blank.
For a long time I sat still, not moving nor even thinking. Then I slowly stood up and walked quietly across to the door that led into the Wardroom where the crew were still at lunch. I stood out of sight beside the doorway and listened to the play between Dieter's scepticism and Domingo's uncertain earnestness.
“Good. So you say you can't prove there is a God. Ja? Then why spoil your life for something that is a maybe?”
“I'm not spoiling my life. I'm here, on the first mission to Mars. If that's a spoiled life then your life is spoiled too.”
“Ja ja ja. I mean, there is so much you can't do, né? You walk down the street, you see a pretty girl, you want to get to know her better, but...the big man up there, he says no.”
Tessa's voice butted in. “He doesn't say no. I say no. He'd better not think of looking at anyone else while I've got a ring on my finger.”
“Wouldn't dream of it, Tess, the ring cost a packet. Ow!”
“I've got him for life, so don't try to corrupt him.”
“Oh ja, another thing you can't do. Till death do you part. What a shame.”
“Don't listen to him.” That was Cloe's voice. “He doesn't mean it. I am married to him for ten years. He is—how you say it—a stick-in-the-mud husband. He will never leave me, not if I beg him.”
A brief silence, then: “Ja, right. I keep what I know is good, but you will give up something for something else that you do not even know exists.”
“I said I can't prove it, that doesn't mean I don't know...”
I entered the Wardroom. Cloe was the first to notice me.
“Who is it for?”
“For all of us.”
She frowned. My expression must have revealed something. “Is it bad news?”
“I think just come and see it.”
Bad news on a space mission usually means really bad news. The crew were silent as they filed into the Rec room: Domingo, our pilot. Then Tessa, biochemist. Cloe, physicist and geologist, and finally Dieter, engineer.
Epigraph
We live in vain.
It is not so. You live for a purpose.
We have travelled from one end of the heavens to the other and there is nowhere we can live.
Your purpose is not in the heavens. From the beginning they were closed to you. Tubal deceived you, bringing you here.
What shall we do?
In the end it will be revealed to you, when the time of Tubal is done.
Then I will know?
Then you will know.
I – MISSION PLAN
1.
We were four months out when they told us.
It’s funny how you remember exactly where you were and what you were doing when really bad news arrives. I had left the crew in the Wardroom and was sitting in my recliner in the Rec room eating a plate of rehydrated asparagus. Domingo and Deiter had started arguing about religion again and after telling everyone that watching cartoons was likely to be more constructive I bailed out. It wasn't like I was trying to make a point as mission commander or anything. Cloe and Tessa enjoyed the debates but I just wasn't comfortable discussing the topic. After four months in a spaceship the size of a two storey apartment the secret of getting along with one's fellow crewmembers is to not try too hard.
I had put Wall-E up on the screen but wasn't paying much attention to it. About ten minutes into the movie a red dot flashed in the centre of the picture, accompanied by a musical dong dong that sounded through the ship, the signal for a message from Mission. I decided to play it before calling the crew. A lot of messages concerned only one crewmember who was a specialist in the subject matter.
I leaned forward with the remote and started the audiovisual message. Eugene Trinny's face appeared on the screen. That made me sit up. The Director of NASA would not communicate with us unless he had something important to say. I noticed he was not smiling. A kind of cheerful bonhomie is de rigeur in earth-space communications unless something precise and technical is going on between Mission Control and the ship. Something was wrong.
“Hello everyone. I trust everything is fine with you. Seems from our end that Terra Nova is functioning normally.” The Director ran his fingers through his still-dark hair. “What I’m going to say may be difficult for you to take in. We’re still trying to take it in here.” He gestured to someone off-screen. An image appeared, a photograph of a small chunk of rock against a black background.
“1036 Ganymed. It's the biggest of the Amor asteroids. It has an elliptical orbit with an aphelion well past Mars and a perihelion pretty close to Earth. Or it used to. We've been tracking it for the past two years since a planetesimal….next image...”—the chunk of rock was replaced by a starry sky with a red arrow pointing to a white dot near the centre—“since Deepstar IV detected a planetesimal coming into the solar system from the Kuiper Belt. It was probably hit by something else and deflected close to Neptune.
“Nobody paid much attention to it until its orbit was calculated. It was headed straight for Ganymed. At that point the information was given classified status until we had a better idea of the effect the planetesimal would have on the asteroid. Computer simulations predicted a change of orbit, with Earth within the hypothetical radius of the new orbital path. Right, back to the first image.” The chunk of rock reappeared.
“Impact between the planetesimal and Ganymed took place about a month after you left. We tracked Ganymed with all three Deepstar satellites until we had collected enough data to be certain. Ganymed will definitely collide with Earth fifteen months from now. About the time you're due back.”
Everything froze for me except the image on the screen, a tiny, indistinct, innocuous pebble. Then it disappeared, replaced by the Director’s face.
“Let me give you the specs. Ganymed is about 31 kilometers long. It has a mass of 330 quadrillion tons. The experts tell me that's pretty dense for an asteroid—about 3.5 tons per cubic metre, which is due to it having plenty of iron and magnesium silicates in its composition.
“The good news is that we have a plan for neutralising it. We can't break it up but we’ll hit it with multiple nukes to deflect it. We have more than we need for the job so Earth will be fine. However you all have enough scientific and technical expertise to know there's a degree of uncertainty in an undertaking of this nature, so we've devised a fall-back plan for you.” For the first time the hint of a smile appeared in his features.
“You’ll be getting new course settings. It won’t change your current path for the moment. You’ll still be going to Mars. If everything works out it would be a pity to abandon the whole mission just because of a scare. But we're working on sending you a couple of additional supply ships. If necessary you'll stay up there a bit longer than planned. To put it bluntly we’re turning the Terra Nova into a lifeboat.
“We don’t exactly know what the effects would be of a body this size hitting the earth. One has to factor in speed, mass, composition, angle of impact, all that. Our best models project that the Earth would remain habitable but would take a while to recover before you could return to it. The idea is to give you as much time as possible. Again, let me emphasize that this is just a precaution, a fall-back plan. Something that we don’t intend to use. Your primary mission should remain unchanged. We’ll fill you in as our information becomes clearer. Any questions you have we’ll be only too happy to answer.
“It was my recommendation when this came up not to hide anything from you. You can fulfil your secondary mission—in the remote possibility it becomes necessary—if you know exactly what’s going on. For now that’s all I have to say—except one thing. This information is strictly classified. No-one besides yourselves must know of the secondary mission. The last thing we need is any public impression that the situation is not entirely under control. I don’t have to emphasize how much we depend on your discretion. There’s a lot more at stake now. I’ll be available if you need to know anything further from me. Goodbye and good luck.” The screen went blank.
For a long time I sat still, not moving nor even thinking. Then I slowly stood up and walked quietly across to the door that led into the Wardroom where the crew were still at lunch. I stood out of sight beside the doorway and listened to the play between Dieter's scepticism and Domingo's uncertain earnestness.
“Good. So you say you can't prove there is a God. Ja? Then why spoil your life for something that is a maybe?”
“I'm not spoiling my life. I'm here, on the first mission to Mars. If that's a spoiled life then your life is spoiled too.”
“Ja ja ja. I mean, there is so much you can't do, né? You walk down the street, you see a pretty girl, you want to get to know her better, but...the big man up there, he says no.”
Tessa's voice butted in. “He doesn't say no. I say no. He'd better not think of looking at anyone else while I've got a ring on my finger.”
“Wouldn't dream of it, Tess, the ring cost a packet. Ow!”
“I've got him for life, so don't try to corrupt him.”
“Oh ja, another thing you can't do. Till death do you part. What a shame.”
“Don't listen to him.” That was Cloe's voice. “He doesn't mean it. I am married to him for ten years. He is—how you say it—a stick-in-the-mud husband. He will never leave me, not if I beg him.”
A brief silence, then: “Ja, right. I keep what I know is good, but you will give up something for something else that you do not even know exists.”
“I said I can't prove it, that doesn't mean I don't know...”
I entered the Wardroom. Cloe was the first to notice me.
“Who is it for?”
“For all of us.”
She frowned. My expression must have revealed something. “Is it bad news?”
“I think just come and see it.”
Bad news on a space mission usually means really bad news. The crew were silent as they filed into the Rec room: Domingo, our pilot. Then Tessa, biochemist. Cloe, physicist and geologist, and finally Dieter, engineer.
