Saturn Rukh, page 25
~ * ~
“Disgusting!” remarked Petro as he and Petra made their way back over the feathers to their nesting niches on Petra’s keel. “The four-legged vermin were almost pleasing to the sight with their bright yellow-green skin, their large shiny eye, and the bright light they emitted from the top of their heads. But it was all false. A visual lie! Hidden under that beautiful exterior is nothing but a bluish-pink blob with hair-feather patches in strange places and two tiny squinty eyes. They look like deformed gizzard worms with legs.”
“They must realize they are ugly,” said Petra, trying to defend her newfound friends. “That is why they cover their ugly bodies with beautiful things. Look at you. Doesn’t your claw look better now that it has that shiny pink thing on it?”
“It does look nice,” Petro had to admit, rotating his panty-covered foreclaw in front of his eye.
“What a marvelous new idea,” mused Petra as she settled into her niche. “Putting things on your body to make yourself more beautiful.”
~ * ~
When the news about the successful language lessons with the obviously intelligent rukhs reached Earth, there was mixed reaction. The scientists, news channels, and the general public were thrilled that another intelligent species had been found for the human race to talk with. Within just hours, you could buy rukh tee-shirts, rukh baseball caps, and rukh-shaped gliders and balloons. Within days, the Peaceful Planet Protectors were petitioning the United Nations to put the Rukh People of Saturn under a UN protectorship, with Triple-P as its sponsor, since none of the commercial nations could be trusted. Within weeks, there were video games and animated television shows featuring battles between fleets of human-powered airplanes and dirigibles against flocks of gigantic, man-devouring rukhs.
Art Dooley, however, was very unhappy, as he watched his major investment in the mission evaporate away. “That sinks it,” Art said, when he first heard the news from the chief scientist of the mission team. “There’s no way we’re going to be allowed to set up meta production facilities on Saturn. Although the most suspicious greenie has to admit that full-blown meta production for the next million years won’t even begin to deplete the large stock of helium gas on Saturn, even I have to admit that it would be a very bad idea to operate unshielded nuclear reactors in the living space of friendly intelligent beings. Besides, we were planning on dropping the used reactors when we were done. That would only make it worse. After the reactors have gone down where it is hot enough, the reactors would melt, releasing volatile radioactive waste products, which would then be brought up by the next thermal column carrying the food supply for your intelligent friends. As soon as the crew makes it back home, they’ll be paid off and the Saturn meta project will be closed down.”
“I admit it is bad news for Space Unlimited,” said the chief scientist, “but it’s good news for the science community. Now that we have identified a good reason to visit Saturn, the science budget for manned deep space exploration to the planets will have to expand. Soon, we will be searching all the outer planets and moons for signs of life. Perhaps even the planetoids in the Kuiper Belt.”
“That’s where you’re wrong,” said Art grimly. “Finding an intelligent species on Saturn may sound like good news to you scientists, but in reality it’s bad news for both of us. Yes, for a few years you scientists will get increased funding to send orbiters and balloon probes to Saturn to continue conversation with the rukhs—with the two-and-a-half-hour time delay between sentences that implies. But as for setting up a crewed orbital station around Saturn, forget it. Just to set it up will cost tens of billions—we know, we’ve priced it. And to keep it running will cost more billions every year. What you scientists don’t realize is that governments have to make a profit on their investments—not immediate profits, but profits sometime in the foreseeable future. Those governments that ignore the forces of the marketplace don’t survive over the long run. Look at the former Soviet Union and its flirtation with communism and state-sponsored military expansion and space exploration—it took over seventy years for the market to exert its forces, but it did. Tell me, Doctor. What is the human race going to get back from its investment of billions of dollars per year to talk to the rukhs? Do the rukhs have any advanced technology that we can use?”
“No,” replied the chief scientist. “They seem to have no technology at all. They are intelligent enough, but they haven’t had access to any materials with which to make tools.”
“You forgot to make the case that we might learn some new biology from them,” Art reminded him. “How different is their biology?”
“Since they live at the same temperature we do, they use the same carbon chemistry that we do. In fact, the information Sandra obtained using the nanoimager on some of the samples seems to indicate that they use the same DNA helix and genetic code that we do. It is now suspected that life on Saturn was seeded from spores in rocks blasted off from Earth billions of years ago.” He paused as he tried to think of something that would make further interaction with the rukhs worthwhile. “But... their culture and language are unique—”
“And you expect the U.S. government, or any government, to spend billions of dollars a year on ‘cultural exchanges’?” retorted Art. “I’m afraid not. Without the motivation of a commercial return from the production of meta, there will be no permanent base orbiting Saturn, and no realistic way to maintain communication with the rukhs. It looks to me like these initial conversations between the rukhs and the humans are going to lead nowhere, as soon as the beancounters controlling the government purses realize the rukhs are nothing but noble savages.”
~ * ~
“We’ve just passed the forty-ton marker in the meta tanks,” Pete announced two months later as he came in from checking out the meta factory. “Four more months and we’ll be on our way home to collect our billion.”
That night at dinner they were all talking about what they would first buy with their riches. The only one who wasn’t there was Seichi, who had taken the last nighttime shift and was starting a long Saturnday by sleeping in. Rod and Pete were arguing over which was the better sports car, a Toyota-Benz Tsunami or a Rolls-Skoda Rocket.
“You guys can keep your sports cars,” remarked Chastity. “I’m going to get me an armload of diamond bracelets and rings, and go back to Idaho and dazzle my daddy right out of his pulpit. He said I’d never amount to anything.”
“I thought you said he wasn’t speaking to you,” said Rod.
“Mom finally got up enough spunk to tell him otherwise,” Chastity replied. “Knowing Dad, the fact that I’ll soon be a billionaire probably made it easy for him to ‘forgive’ me.”
“I’m going to buy a big mansion on the Mississippi,” said Sandra dreamily. “And wait there until my colonel comes for me …” She looked coyly at Rod, who was trying to figure out what he should say in response when the voice of Jeeves boomed throughout the ship.
“EMERGENCY! REACTOR EXCEEDING THERMAL LIMIT! INITIATING SHUTDOWN!”
Rod was up the ladder in an instant, with Chastity right behind him. With the commander console gone, Rod went to the scottyboard. The console was already activated and a red warning icon blinked rapidly on the screen.
“Damn!” Rod exclaimed as his test pilot eyes scanned the rest of the screen, looking for other problems. “Just when things were going so good ...” The lights flickered as the power from the reactor failed. The console screen dimmed, then recovered. There was now a change in the icons in the power sector of the console. The icon for the prime power was now red, while the icon for the meta-powered internal backup power now had a green on in it.
“Jeeves! Wake Seichi!” he commanded. “We’ve got to get that reactor going or we’re as good as dead!”
There was a clang as a habitat hatch was shoved open and Seichi scrambled out onto the control deck in his underwear, eyes blinking as he tried to wake up. Within seconds his fingers were flying over the screen on the scottyboard as he analyzed the situation. When he turned to look at Rod, his face was grim.
“The reactor is not in good condition. I am sorry to report that the impacts from the larger prey of the rukh have finally damaged it. Another of the secondary cooling loops has lost pressure. It must have a leak somewhere. I can bring the reactor back up using the last remaining cooling loop, but I’ll have to cut the power level to compensate in order to keep the reactor temperature within its thermal limit.”
Rod was relieved that it wasn’t more serious. “Do it,” he said. “As long as we can keep making meta, we still have a chance.”
Seichi carefully took Jeeves through the procedure of completely closing down the reactor, taking it from its emergency shutdown state to its dormant startup state, with the emergency shutdown rods removed and back in their primed position. Once that was done, he used Tabby’s camera eyes to explore the damage to the failed cooling loop and to check out the condition of the remaining loop. The coolant had leaked from a crack at the base of a cooling fin. The fin had been bent sharply back by a strike from a large animal hitting it at high speed. What was worse was that further inspection showed that the remaining cooling loop pipe had dozens of similarly damaged fins, many with cracks. None of them was leaking—yet.
Two hours later, Seichi had the reactor back on-line with Rod, Pete, and Chastity anxiously looking over his shoulder. The lights flickered again as Seichi switched from the internal backup system that burned meta to the reactor prime power system that generated excess electricity to make meta.
“We’re back up at one-third design power,” Seichi said finally.
“I’d best go down into the meta factory and shut down some more meta lines,” said Pete, heading for the ladder leading below. “The individual production lines are slightly more efficient if they are operating at peak power instead of reduced power. That’ll give me a chance to clean the optics on the resting ones. Every percentage point in efficiency is another liter of meta.”
“Concerning percentage points …” remarked Seichi. Pete stopped on the ladder and looked up at him. “You should shut down all but thirty percent of the meta lines—not thirty-three percent. Since the power to operate the crew capsule comes first, the amount left over for making meta dropped to less than a third.”
“Oh,” said Pete, a slight frown creasing his forehead. “Right, thirty percent it is.” His head dropped below the grating floor as he headed for the airlock—stopping off at the toilet first. It would be a long day.
“I’ll cycle you out,” said Chastity, following Pete down the ladder.
“Well, at least we’re still producing meta,” said Rod to Seichi, trying to put a positive note on things. “It’ll just take us a little longer to get home. Fortunately, we have plenty of food.”
“I didn’t want to tell the others, since it is useless to worry about things you cannot control,” said Seichi in a quiet voice so that those down below would not hear. “But as commander, there is something you must know, even though it increases the burden you must carry.”
“What is it?” said Rod, not really wanting to know.
“The failure was probably caused by hydrogen embrittlement widening and deepening the stress crack until it leaked. The stainless steel tubing normally isn’t affected by hydrogen, but stress cracks, especially in welded portions of the tube, allow the hydrogen to get inside the metal and cause it to fail. The cooling fins were designed to operate under a floating balloon, not a high-speed flying wing. The remaining cooling loop has many similar cracks. It won’t be long before it fails also, especially if it experiences additional strikes from prey animals.”
“I see,” said Rod. “Any time estimate?”
“With only one data point, it is difficult to estimate,” replied Seichi. “But this loss took place in two months. The next one will likely be in weeks rather than months.”
“And we need four more months of meta production to fill the tanks. It’s going to be close.”
“Nearly six months,” Seichi reminded him. “The factory is now operating at only thirty percent capacity.”
“Right,” said Rod, lips firm. “But, as you said, it is useless to worry, about things you cannot control.” He paused, then turned back to look at Seichi with a quizzical expression. “Is there any way you can control it? Can we somehow plug those cracks?”
“If we could drain the cooling lines and take them apart, then it is possible to weld the weak points in the heat pipes, reassemble the line, and recharge it with coolant,” said Seichi. “But that complex task cannot be done with Tabby. Its crude manipulators were not designed for such delicate work, and its small size means it cannot handle large pieces of equipment in the gravity field of Saturn. It requires a much stronger and more sophisticated robot—or a human being.”
“Which is out of the question,” said Rod. “A human wouldn’t last an hour in that radiation environment, rad-drugs or not.” He sighed. “You’re right. We’ll not tell the others. We two will do the worrying for them.”
Rod did, however, report Seichi’s finding back to the Space Unlimited Mission Control Center. They started working on contingency plans. Unfortunately, there weren’t many options available since the problem was occurring so far away from Earth.
~ * ~
The language lessons with Uppereye continued during each nighttime altitude climb. Sandra and the rest of the crew now had outside bass “speakers” built into their backpacks so each could talk directly with Peregrine’s eyes, while Uppereye was learning to speak a crude form of pidgin English using sounds generated by its neck sac orifices. Seichi had learned enough of the rukh chordal language to communicate with not only Uppereye, but Lowereye and the other rukhs who occasionally came by to visit the humans during the socializing periods that occurred at morning and evening when both eyes were awake. Seichi’s range of tonal ability was limited to the seven octaves of the keyboard, whereas a rukh’s multibladder voice covered twenty octaves, from whole-body breathing modes that generated notes that took many tens of seconds to complete one cycle to a “falsetto” generated by the neck sacs that was too high for the human ear to hear. Still, Seichi could generate the names of everyone in the flock, adding to the name chord the chordal patterns that meant “Hello,” “Good-bye,” “Please come and talk to me,” “How are you feeling?”, and “Did you have a good hunt?”, as appropriate to the situation.
As the giant winged body of the latest visitor, Eagle, lifted upward, its body booming out deep tones and Seichi responding with his own keyboarded chords, Sandra waved good-bye and turned to Seichi.
“It is really amazing how well you can converse with the rukhs in their own language, Seichi,” she said.
“It is a little like the art of writing hiragana, but you do it with chordal patterns instead of strokes of the brush,” Seichi explained. “You start with the chord that represents the basic root concept and add other chords in other octaves that represent additional concepts, adjusting all the concept chords so they blend rather than conflict, then modify that combined chord with either changed notes or additional notes that signify the context and tense of the meaning you are after. The rukhs carry it much further, however. A typical single Japanese hiragana character can be either a word or a long phrase, while the rukhs speak the equivalent of sentences or paragraphs with each chord. I am sure my feeble attempts at speaking their language sound to the rukhs like ‘Me Seichi say hello to you Uppereye’ spoken in baby babble.”
“Still, they must understand you,” replied Sandra as she watched Eagle bank away. “The others in the flock do so like to come and talk with you.”
“I would suspect they find me amusing,” replied Seichi. “I notice that each time I try to generate a new phrase by combining chords that I have never combined before, the visitors and Uppereye repeat the chord back and forth to each other, their heads bobbing up and down in amusement, before Uppereye takes the time to pronounce the chord correctly for me a couple of times until I get all the nuances correct. I can’t complain. With their willing help, I am rapidly becoming proficient in the language.”
“I notice that you now know the name of practically every bird in the flock,” said Sandra.
“What I find interesting is that every name chord has a common deep bass subchord,” said Seichi. “I believe it is a root chord meaning either ‘rukh’ or the ‘family name’ of the flock. I will have to try it out when the elder of the flock, ‘Condor,’ finally gets around to visiting me. I’ll chord ‘hello’ and the root chord with the family name, with the little high-pitched twittering bit that means the chord is a question, and see what response I get.”
Sandra noticed that Uppereye’s eye was blinking sleepily, the nictitating sheet sliding downward over the surface of the lens, wiping away bits of flying food creatures that had been blown into the clearing by the wind gusts and splattered against the high-pressure balloon optics. She had learned from experience that Uppereye was almost addicted to using the portable console to bring up new pictures of life on Earth and the other planets and would stay at the console all day if Sandra permitted it. Sandra turned off the console power at the airlock junction panel.
