And Saturn Below

Hard Science Fiction, First published in Abyss & Apex

I honestly thought I’d shared this story before. It was proud moment in publication, when the hard science fiction editor from Abyss & Apex said they wanted to publish the story, but I needed to tone down the science first.

It makes a good counterpoint to last week’s story where the science was soft, and I hope you enjoy my little tale.

And Saturn Below

I circled the tubular vessel with its dragonfly array and checked the hull for damage, but she appeared in good shape. Her name rotated into view, looking almost as crisp as when she arrived: Kronos III: Polar Explorer. Underneath, the crystalline plastic tether pointed needle-like at the gaseous planet below. Nothing I saw told me why the ship was dropping orbit. I reported my all clear and prepared to dock.

From halfway around the planet, Roberta cautioned, "She's a second-hand piece of junk, Miguel. If she's not worth saving, write her off and get out."

"Don't let the company hear you talk like that."

I slid in the coupler, and the docking clamps grabbed hold. Before I unhooked myself from the seat, I took another look out past the ship to the planet. From my usual station, the rings always stretched overhead, drawing their lines across heaven's dome. Here, beneath Saturn's southern pole, I could see a large stretch of the rings all at once, laid out flat before me in broad sweeps of purples, grays, and beige.

At last, the airlock opened. I unbuckled the harness, grabbed hold of the walls, and gently propelled myself from one ship to the other. The Expert Program's interface greeted me. I asked for a status report, but it had nothing more to offer than was already known: three hours earlier the electrodynamic tether's internal current had experienced an uncontrolled fluctuation.

In my ear, Roberta said, "What can't be done to that ship in the next hour won't be done at all. We've got five hours before all hell breaks loose. Five hours, Miguel."

"I'll be back before then."

I floated planet-ward, climbing upside down by means of a centrally located ladder. Roberta would’ve spat fire had she known I was enjoying myself despite the time pressure. Our main vessel, The Tolkien, simulated a one-G pull. Weightlessness had become a novelty again. The joy ride ended when I reached the bottom of Kronos and unscrewed the faceplate that covered the anchored end of the tether.

"Can you fix it from there?" Roberta asked.

"I hope so. This isn't a good day for a space walk."

"Miguel…"

"I'm kidding. You know I'm kidding. Now give me a moment."

Nothing seemed obviously wrong, which was a disappointment. I ran the meter checks, one by one, hoping to find something that failed to match the specs, but everything checked out. In frustration, I muttered, "What's the damn problem?"

Though I had been talking to myself, the Expert Program, the E.P., took my question literally. "Variations in the electromagnetic field create vibrations in the tether, resulting in mechanical stress-induced failure. A fluctuating current compensates for this, and as long as that fluctuation is maintained the tether is safe. For unknown reasons, three hours and fifteen minutes ago, that fluctuation temporarily failed."

"I know that, but what caused the failure?"

The E.P. paused before answering. "It is impossible to explain the unknown."

Hmm, I thought, how philosophical.

Roberta chimed in with the obvious. "If it's not onboard, it's got to be in the tether. Send out the drone."

"In a moment," I said. "I need time to think. I did a flyby. The tether's sheathe was unscathed. If I attempt an exploratory repair, I'm likely to do more harm than good. I want to know what I'm looking for." Of the E.P., I asked, "We're still running the tether at full current?"

The E.P. confirmed that we were.

The tether acted as a simple sail, allowing the vessel to move from one orbit to another. If the ship needed a lower orbit, then it lowered the tether's internal current. The plasma in the surrounding magnetosphere would act against the tether, thereby reducing the ship's velocity and dropping it to a lower orbit. On the other hand, when a direct current was pumped through the tether, the force created against the magnetic field would accelerate the craft, allowing it to rise to higher orbits. The speeds and complexities of Saturn's magnetosphere allowed all this to happen off the current generated by the tether's interaction with the field. No additional power from the ship was ever required.

That was, at least, the way it was supposed to work, the way it always did work, until now. As I pondered the problem, Kronos was steadily dropping orbit, despite the current pumping through its tether.

Again Roberta griped in my ear. "If it's a problem with the ship, I don't understand why the E.P. didn't find it."

That got my attention. It was an Expert Program, designed to handle all human knowledge within its limited area: electrodynamic sailing vessels. Roberta was right. If there was a problem with the way the ship was operating, the E.P. would have known, but this tether was an open system. The end of it was unsheathed, open to its environment. This created a phantom loop, using the ionosphere as part of the circuit. 

I let out a long pent-up sigh of frustration. "I knew that would come back to bite us."

"What?" Roberta demanded. "What is it?"

"I told you when the company sent us E.P.'s designed for Earth-orbit vessels that there would be problems. I think we've run into one right here."

"And that is?"

"The cause of the fluctuation isn't the ship, at least not directly. It's something in the magnetosphere, and our E.P. doesn't know enough to see it. Bring up the intraplanetary system readings for the exact time of and just before the anomaly. Tell me what you find."

There was a pause, and then Roberta said, "I'm working on it. You want to tell me what I'm looking for?"

"I'm not sure. It will have something to do with the difference between the E.P.'s Earth-orbit reference and our Saturn-orbit reality."

"Keep talking."

I let myself float freely in the darkness, the light from my headgear offering the only illumination. It fell on metal walls and girders, the ladder, the open faceplate, and other consoles. I ignored them all as best I could without cracking my head into a sharp corner.

Roberta wanted a quick review of the differences between the Earth's magnetosphere and Saturn's. I supposed she thought my ramblings would help her spot a detail she would otherwise have missed. Unsure what a logical starting point would be, I began reciting basic astronomy. "Saturn's magnetosphere isn't as simple as the one on Earth. Plasma trapped in Earth's electromagnetic fields is a fairly straightforward blend taken from the Earth's own atmosphere and the solar winds. Here, the icy moons, the rings, and Titan's atmosphere work together to form a very complex, very active magnetosphere."

As I talked, I could imagine the photons from the sun and the electrons and ions from the plasma all smashing into the rings and the icy moons. The impact ionized water and nitrogen molecules and tore them off, casting them into the sphere's electromagnetic soup. I smiled, wondering if the E.P. could grasp the reach of Saturn's power. On Earth, the influence of the planet's rotation was limited to plasma within 15,000 miles of its surface. Saturn's influence stretched nearly a million miles, encompassing Titan, the rings, and most of the icy moons. It was almost more than an Earth-bound intelligence could fathom. On Earth, the moon played almost no role in the magnetosphere. Here, nearly everything was touched, and the ionized molecules took on the plasma's ambient velocity and repeated the process, smashing again and again into moon and ring, constantly regenerating the plasma. 

"You're getting awfully quiet."

The sound of her voice stirred me. "How much time do I have?"

"Fifty minutes."

"Did you find anything?"

"Maybe," she said. I recognized the strain in her voice and knew that she was well out of her comfort zone. She was a fleet manager, not a scientist. She could have had a perfectly healthy career, safe and sound on Earth where she belonged, but I’d talked her into following my dream.

I could imagine her lovely face hovering over the main screen, its monochromatic light reflecting sporadically against the sharp line of her face. She kept her hair pulled back, but long, black strands would have fallen loose. When I left, she’d been wearing the standard issue sweatpants and a ribbed, sleeveless tee. Since then, she would have donned the bulky sweatshirt as well, to warm herself against The Tolkien's chill. I chose to ignore that fact. In my mind I kept her in that little, form-hugging tee, and I was again reminded that I’d married a beautiful woman.

But relationships needed more.

On Earth, our attraction for one another and the time we spent apart easily compensated for our differences. Out here, with no distractions other than our work, our differences had grown large, all encompassing. We’d drifted apart, isolated in our close proximity.

What she said next chilled me. "At the time of the anomaly, there was a drop in the equatorial magnetic field."

I might have cursed. I don't know. It had never occurred to me that a decrease in the equatorial magnetic field would have affected the ship. In fact, I still couldn’t say it had. What I did know was that the fluctuation and drop were co-incidental. I also knew that a much more massive drop was only hours away.

In my ear, Roberta mumbled a quiet, "That sounds significant."

The biggest problem with electrodynamic tethers was keeping them operational through the endless vibration caused by the high velocity of and extreme variations in the magnetosphere. The variations were countered by a carefully controlled pattern set in the tether's current. If that pattern failed, the tether would soon fail with it. 

"Miguel, talk to me!"

Forty-five days earlier the sun had unleashed a series of X-class solar flares, the largest of which had been aimed directly at Saturn's path. We’d been monitoring the approaching interplanetary shock ever since, its effect on Kronos being our chief concern. If the shock created a magnetic storm, it would be situated over one of the poles, placing Kronos at ground zero. The systems had checked out, and we’d left the vessel in polar-synchronous orbit, eagerly anticipating the wealth of data we’d soon collect.

"Miguel!"

"That magnetic storm we’re expecting, one of its effects is an injection of ions from the magnetotail into the ring current. The strengthened ring current causes a planet-wide drop in the equatorial magnetic field." On Earth, there were recorded drops that lasted as long as twelve hours, and it took twice as long before standard levels returned. 

To the E.P., I said, "Jettison the tether. Engage thrusters. Bring us into a synchronous orbit below The Tolkein." They were only maneuvering thrusters, but they would last long enough to get the ship away from the pole. Without the tether, the ship would be crippled and stand little chance of survival in a Saturn-sized magnetic storm.

Roberta was screaming in my ear, something about the difficulty of getting a replacement tether and other options needing to be considered. Whatever it was, it kept me from hearing the E.P. I asked it to repeat itself. Its words were cold and simple: "Jettison failed."

Roberta breathed a sigh of relief. "Good. Now when this is over, we'll repair the existing tether and stay on budget."

"Maybe you should remember what you said earlier about this being a second-hand piece of junk."

When she asked me why, her tone suggested I was being argumentative. Unfortunately, I was preparing her for a hard truth. "Kronos is a dead ship."

It took her a moment to take that in. Her voice was quiet, almost penitent, as she asked, "Why?"

"The electromagnetic drag on the tether is still pulling the ship out of orbit, despite the current. Maybe the reading is wrong or the strength of the surrounding field has spiked, either way, if we can't jettison the tether, we've lost the ship." Of the E.P., I asked, "Did you fire the thrusters?"

"Thrusters engaged."

"What's our heading?"

"Kronos is plotted to reach synchronous orbit below The Tolkien in twelve hours, forty-two minutes. With the current rate of orbital loss, however, the ship will begin terminal descent in eight hours, thirty-six minutes."

And the interplanetary shock would hit in four hours, forty-five minutes.

I took one last look at the anchored end of the tether, hoping to find a way to jettison it manually, but I knew no such option existed. It was time to write off the ship and get out.

I instructed the E.P. to upload its records to The Tolkien. Then I grabbed hold of the ladder and propelled myself upward to the airlock. As I floated into the shuttle and strapped in, I realized how quiet Roberta had become. She was worrying over the budget. That was her job. The loss was the company's fault, really, allowing themselves to be conned by the lowest bidder into using a maladapted E.P. A Saturn-orbit model might have understood the problem and reacted in time. On the other hand, maybe there was nothing that could’ve been done, and this was simply the price of doing business. Either way, it didn't matter. The company would shift the blame onto our shoulders, Roberta's mainly. The health of the fleet was her responsibility. I was just a scientist. What do scientists know about business?

Roberta's voice came back. "Miguel, hold on. We've got some serious Kilometric Radiation spikes."

The airlock hushed closed. "Now? It's too early."

Saturn Kilometric Radiation, SKR, is the planet's principal radio emission and is related to the way the solar wind interacts with the magnetic field at the poles. The SKR would go nuts when the shock hit, but spikes now didn't make sense, not unless there was something moving ahead of the main shock.

Then I saw the dancing lights of the aurora below me, and I knew I was in trouble. I heard the locking clamps disengage, and I had just begun the careful retreat when Kronos went mad. It rocketed upward and clipped the airlock, which spun the shuttle around until my thrusters collided with the passing vessel. It all happened in less than a second, and then I was tumbling through space. 

The damaged thrusters failed to react to my command. I tried to calm Roberta, telling her I was okay, but in reality I was near panic. When my efforts to correct the situation failed, I steadied myself by trying to understand what had happened. That proved easy enough. The SKR spikes indicated another, more significant drop in the equatorial magnetic field, weakening the forces that had been working against the tether. Without these forces holding Kronos back, the tether and the thrusters, working together at full capacity, had rocketed the vessel skyward.

I felt a little better now. At least I knew what was happening. I thought it strange, that though I might die, it calmed me to know the cause. It was my constant need to know, the very need that drove us to Saturn.

Roberta's voice, now kind and reassuring, said, "I'm coming after you."

I thought of Kronos then, and told its E.P. to cut the thrusters. There was no need to waste the energy. At least for now, the ship was fully operational. 

Roberta had heard me. "Miguel?"

"Yes, Roberta?" I felt guilty for dragging her halfway across the solar system. We should’ve stayed on Earth. We coul’ve had a family. It would’ve made my mother happy. The last time she’d called, what had she said? When she was our age, she already had six children. Six! And we had none. At the time I’d laughed it off as a mother's twisted sense of priorities, but now I thought maybe I had things backwards.

"Can you use Kronos?"

I blinked, not sure what I’d heard or what it meant. Outside, Saturn spun in and out of view three times. It took that long to see the obvious: Kronos could be my savior. 

My enthusiasm, my certainty I could make this work, got me through the next two hours. It kept at bay the possibility that I was sealed in my own coffin, doomed to spin lifelessly in orbit around the planet I had presumed to love. I forgot for a time the power of the magnetosphere around me: the surging, swirling plasma feeding off the solar ultraviolet energy and the ionized molecules constantly torn from everything in its grip. That now included me, and with that realization, my enthusiasm faded. Given enough time, the magnetosphere would ionize my molecules and assimilate me unto itself. I would literally become part of the planet as it had figuratively become part of me.

 Through the E.P., I had Kronos calculate my position and come to my rescue. Uncertain how fast I was going, I was concerned about how long it would take the ship to reach me. My velocity, however, was relatively low, and Kronos made rendezvous inside of twenty minutes. That was encouraging, as the slower my shuttle's speed, the easier the rescue.

I felt good.

In that time I ran a diagnostic on my airlock, and surprisingly, it checked out. When Kronos arrived, I talked the E.P. through the necessary steps to bring the two ships along side each other and then had Kronos duplicate my shuttle's spin, like dance partners. I’d anticipated the time it’d take to complete the maneuver, so the passing minutes did little to discourage me. I could see, inch by inch, minute by minute, the progress we were making, until, at last, Kronos orbited the shuttle, our airlock doors in alignment.

The thrusters held through it all, and continued to hold as I guided her in. The coupler screeched angrily but the ships connected. I used Kronos then to counteract the shuttle's roll. The ship, after two hours in a spin, stabilized. 

I toggled the airlock controls and started unhooking my harness. The silence, though, was unmistakable. I’d been expecting the gentle hush of the opening doors. The silence told me the doors remained closed.

I yanked at the manual override. The doors refused to budge. I closed my eyes and focused on the problem, trying to let the solution come to me, but nothing came. My enthusiasm failed. I looked at the walls of the shuttle and saw the walls of my coffin. I was going to die.

Melodrama runs in my family. I get it from my mother. 

Always a faithful believer, she’d sent a cross and Bible with us as going-away presents. I thought of them then and realized I had no idea where we’d put them. It was a good time to pray, but I knew nothing of prayer and no one to pray to. That symbolized for me, more than anything, the depths of my loneliness. No children. No God. I had, instead, everything I ever thought I wanted: the realization of a dream. I held Saturn in my hand. I knew her, almost possessed her. But I would die, and she would not mourn my passing. How typical.

Roberta's ever-present voice promised that she was only an hour away. One hour. An hour and a half after that, the interplanetary shock would hit. The melodramatic heart of my mother, beating at full strength within me, whispered, "Turn around. You still have time to make it back."

"I'm not going without you!"

She gets it from her mother, too. But her mother is scary, not a weeping Madonna like mine. If Roberta spits fire, her mother breathes it. I knew, when her mother learned what had happened here, I'd be glad I was dead.

I needed to do something to make it easier on Roberta and figured the least I could do was meet her half way. I checked with the E.P. on my current trajectory. In my despair, I had overlooked that fact that we would no longer be on our original course.

Our entire livable space amounted to five orbital vessels. That's five pinpoints in space around a rather large planet. Wherever we were headed, I figured it would be the middle of nowhere, and I was right. I told the E.P. that our renewed destination was The Tolkien, but this time I set us on a fairly direct route, plotting to give only enough distance between us so that Kronos and The Tolkien could pass each other by, should Kronos be dead weight by then. 

Of course, the stated objective was to meet Roberta en route, and I began to hope again that there was something we could do to get me out of my ship and into hers. I plotted and planned, but the only viable solution I could come up with was totally unverifiable. I figured that I could disengage from Kronos, and assuming that the airlock would open once the two ships were no longer attached, I could space walk from one ship to the other. Easy. The diagnostics, as before, checked out for the airlock systems. The malfunction could be in the coupling system. When it engaged, it might have interfered with the airlock. It seemed logical. Unfortunately, the only way to test it was to disengage from Kronos, and the time for that had not quite come. 

Still, having a plan felt good.

By then I’d forgotten about my earlier concern with Kronos. The equatorial magnetic field had dropped briefly, resulting in two problems: the first had been an uncontrolled fluctuation in the tether; the second had been a surge in the magnetic field that followed the drop, and it was that surge that had caused Kronos to systematically lose its orbit. I should have remembered that surge, and considering the second, larger drop that had caused the collision in the first place, I should have known another surge was coming.

It hit about an hour before the interplanetary shock's scheduled arrival, and it felt like a giant had grabbed me by the tail. I nearly panicked, but caught myself in the last moment before I disconnected the shuttle from Kronos. As long as we shared the same downward velocity, breaking free would do me little good.

As before, I told the E.P. to engage the thrusters and give the tether its full current. The cluster of ships slowed, stopped, and actually began a slow crawl heavenward, but Saturn's pull quickly gained strength. I felt our progress die. In a matter of seconds, Kronos would give in to the downward pull.

I disengaged the locking clamps, and instructed the E.P. to maneuver Kronos clear. The worn-out thrusters sputtered and died, but it was enough. Kronos banked away, and, I watched as Kronos III: Polar Explorer lost the fight and sank, its dragonfly array stretched out like the arms of a drowning man.

Its receding form remained in view for the next half hour, and I kept watching, hoping to see it rocket skyward again as the magnetic surge lost its strength. It never happened, and finally the speck in the distance disappeared entirely. Kronos was gone.

Roberta's voice screamed with delight. "Miguel, I've got you in visual! I've got you in visual!"

Snapped out of my thoughts, I pulled on my helmet, checked my harness, and then toggled the airlock. It let out a long, extended hush as it released the interior atmosphere, equalizing the pressure before exposing me to the void beyond. It was the most beautiful sound I’d ever heard.

I floated from one shuttle to the other, and for an instant there was nothing below me but Saturn herself. Far enough removed from the pole, I saw the flattened polar horizon, an effect of the planet's rapid rotation, and then I left Saturn behind and slipped into the shuttle's embrace.

Roberta and I slipped off our helmets and held each other as best we could. I heard my own breath, and that breath nearly became a whisper, a promise we could go home again, to Earth where she belonged. I said nothing, and when the interplanetary shock hit, we watched the lights play like ribbons in space, filling the void where Kronos had been.

-End-

I’m Thaddeus Thomas.