Michael A. Ricciardi    						about 8,200 words
4329 Densmore Ave. N   
Seattle WA 98103
(206) 634-3041
marz62@yahoo.com
member: NASW

       A Song of Saturn’s Moon
     by M. A. Ricciardi

‘On Earth, or in the Heavens, one thing never changes, mused Raja Darwin, we will always be doing repairs.’

Raja Ali Darwin stood at the bottom of a narrow, roughly elliptic-shaped crevice, with small mounds venting steady clouds of gaseous compounds all around him. The crevice bottom was, in fact, some 500 meters below the surface of Titan, the largest of Saturn’s many moons. He had been scraping and taking samples for the past earth-hour or so. Raja sealed the sample container tightly, deftly inserting it into the vacuum sample pack strapped to the waste of his Life Support Suit, and took a deep breath. The deliberateness of his actions belied an inner excitement. He took a long sip from the mouth tube of his LRS, silently thanking the engineer who had invented the cooling technology for these Liquid Recycling Systems, reattached the main tether to his suit, and so began the long trip back up the crevice. 
This return trip was enabled by a methane-powered hoist system anchored at the top of the plateau. And with every few meters of ascent, he sensed the outward pressure on his LSS adjust accordingly, and his heart rate started to race a bit. Raja smiled, knowing what was coming next: 
“...Scavenger, this is base...I’m getting an elevated heart rate signal...is everything alright...”? 
   	Raja welcomed hearing Mira Jiang’s voice over the comset; its tone was reassuring and usually soothing to him, although he detected a bit more concern than usual this time. 
   	“I’m fine, base,” replied Raja Darwin, “Just a little excited about getting back...and analyzing these samples...this could be something.”
   	“Ooh...Don’t tease me like that!” came the reply, the signal crackling slightly. 
   	Mira Oko Jiang was the systems engineer and materials physicist for the Huygens-Titan Pioneer Mission. In the months since landing on Titan with this team, he had grown quite fond of Mira, despite their occasionally heated debates on space ethics verses earth ethics. But when they weren’t debating, and when they happened to be working together, they would often take turns singing their favorite traditional and popular songs. Each had a good singing voice and a prodigious musical memory, and this activity, they found, was the perfect escape from the data sets, nano-graphs, AR overlays, and even the digi-flix and mp9s meant for their diversion. Raja mused that, as technology dependent and immersed as they were, this simple human behavior — so primal in its origin — provided an ineffable comfort to them on this long mission away from more familiar terrain. Even Mars, reflected Darwin, felt more like home than here. 
   	Thinking of which, using the excuse of saving power, Raja Darwin decided to switch off the Augmented Reality display to his visor, preferring instead to rest his eyes and meditate, trying to calm his breathing and heart rate. He knew this was not exactly in the safest loca`le in the solar system. But then, hunting for proto-biotic environments, and extremophiles, was never safe. One always had to venture deep, where extremes of either heat or cold ruled. Although it was the only moon known to have an atmosphere—the result of a major “greenhouse effect” — Titan possessed a 90 Kelvin average surface temperature, owing ultimately to its great distance from the Sun.  
  	Fortunately, this particular equatorial region of Titan — known as Xanadu -- had numerous “hot spots” where the frictionally-forced effluent of subterranean cryo-volcanoes spewed out the warming, organic gases that clouded the thick, multi-level atmosphere, giving it a yellow-orange hue. These “gas springs” were quite warm and generated a sort of protective zone around each. Of course, the farther away you ventured from one, the more pronounced the downward temperature gradient. Although this particular hot spot in Xanadu was relatively safe for human activity, all one had to do was venture a few too many feet beyond the spring’s heat radius, and the extreme cold of the atmosphere would begin sucking all the heat from you and freeze you stone dead in about fifteen minutes, even with the LSS. 
   	As a result of all the venting gas, the atmosphere was “thick” here, with a surface pressure about 50% stronger than on Earth.  The warm gases quickly cooled as they escaped, but within a small radius the temperature was marginally within human comfort levels, and where it was just barely so (as with the air pressure), the LS suit did the rest. It was this gas that was used to power the hoist system.     
   	Raja’s comset crackled alive: 
   	“Scavenger this is base again...” Mira’s reassuring voice came through the comset again, “One more thing...Both rovers are having problems...I’m working on fixing one now...should be OK in short time...I should be at the site in thirty minutes or so...Copy?”
   	“Copy that, base...I have complete faith in you...Over.” Raja smiled, more assured, even though two rovers in disrepair normally would be cause for concern. But Raja recognized well all the things that can go wrong here -- even on the “simplest” of expeditions. 
   	Case in point:   
   	It was only 4 earth hours ago that the entire Huygens-Titan crew — Darwin, Jiang, and Bruno — had set out in their two rovers during this last day of “Light” (a period lasting about 7.8 earth days, when you could see, faintly, the tiny Sun through Titan’s haze, just before it was eclipsed by Titan’s massive parent planet), packed full with all their equipment and supplies for (what was hoped to be) a ten earth-hour expedition. They had earlier mapped one particular hotspot location just over 10 kilometers from T-base. Numerous gas springs and plenty of small, liquid water-and-ammonia “lakes” dotted the region, with several fairly deep chasms, possibly sink holes, scattered amongst them. These holes—ranging from a few feet to several meters across--were what Darwin was most eager to explore, and there was only one way to do this: straight down. They had fully discussed the risks over dinner and a glass of Titanol the night before (the ethyl alcohol-based brew was synthesized from the moon’s trapped ethane emissions). 
   	With Raja and Doc in one rover, and Mira in the other, they maneuvered the vehicles to just alongside one moderate sized hole several meters away from one very active vent. The methane-powered hoist was to be enclosed in a sealed and anchored enviropod, constructed from a new meta-material that could alternately serve as a nearly perfect insulator, and also, a heat conductor, depending upon the electron flow in the nano-wire “threads” that composed it. Fully suited and charged, they exited the rovers and, quickly as they could, began setting up the e-pod. The new LS suits offered far more mobility and adaptability than previous designs, and, with the gravitational force here being eighty percent more than Earth’s Moon, and a bit less than on Mars (it tended to counteract the atmospheric pressure), the job proceeded reasonably smoothly, with only the occasional, comical stumbling over a random chunk of icy gravel. 
   	As was her habit, Mira softly hummed a traditional Sichuan song as she worked, with her comset still engaged, and so, both Raja and Doc could hear her. They never mentioned this small bit of non-professionalism, for, in actuality, neither of the men minded at all. The words were airy and incomprehensible, but the melody was simple, pleasant, and somewhat melancholic. Raja had asked her about it before, but Mira, who only rarely lacked an exact answer for any question, would just shrug and say she couldn’t remember, only that she had learned it from her grandmother as a child, before her family moved abroad.
   	Once the e-pod had auto-assembled, anchored properly, the conducting line (from spring to e-pod) set, and fully hooked-up to the low-amp power source, they could relax somewhat, as the shelter’s nanotech, meta-material would begin conducting heat from the nearby spring almost immediately. When the temperature inside reached a comfortable 10º C, the polarity of the interwoven, carbon-magnesium nano-tubes would be reversed, and the structure would then become an insulator. 
   	Using a simple, weighted plumb line, Raja tested the sinkhole’s depth (almost 500 meters down). Raja next used a chemo-sensor to analyze the air coming from below. It was definitely methane laden, with significant amounts of water vapor and ammonia, but interestingly, there were also larger than trace amounts of sulfur hydrate and hydrogen cyanide, according to his sensor. Raja smiled at the readout, and a tinge of excitement went up his spine. But Darwin was too sober of mind to allow his hopes to get so far ahead of probability. The odds of finding actual microbial life here were slim, but this was no reason not to explore, and, there were other, far-reaching benefits to such studies.
   	The crew next began setting up the methane-powered motor and hoist system that would lower Raja down into the sink hole. This took a bit more effort than the e-pod, as the tether had to be coiled around the hoist shaft first, the shaft had to be extended and placed directly over the chasm, and, with a person on either side of the hole, the shaft was then attached on both sides to the hoist apparatus and its anchor. 
   	The up-percolating methane gas that filled the otherwise nitrogenous air outside would be drawn into the uptake valve in the e-pod, and siphoned off to the hoist engine. A battery unit connecting to the sealed, inner combustion chamber of the machine would provide the small spark to ignite the gas, providing the power. It was actually a relatively simple mechanical apparatus, which Mira greatly appreciated. 
   	As the main shaft slid into the rotary chamber and locked into place, Raja felt his heart rate go up just a bit in anticipation. Everything was going fairly smoothly, he thought. Raja then secured a small, light-weight, metal grappling ladder to the outside edge of the hole. The ladder extended down just short ways, but allowed Darwin to avoid having to sit on the edge of the hole and then swing out on the tether. He attached the end of the tether to the front of his suit, smiled at Doc and Mira, and prepared to climb down.
   	Doc Bruno made quick eye contact with Mira, and then put his gloved hand on Raja’s shoulder. “Are you still OK with proceeding?” It was the standard question, Raja knew. And Doc, being an amateur geologist and armchair bio-genesis theoretician, was almost as eager as Raja to proceed with the sample collecting and site imaging. Raja smiled, patting him back. “But, of course, my dear doctor...Aren’t I always?”
    	The plan was for Doc to stay in the e-pod and assist as needed, while Raja explored the sink hole. Mira had to be back at T-base to repair one of the joints on her rover, and also to finish fine-tuning her newest Augmented Reality program (whose feed could be transmitted from base, and displayed on their visors), but would maintain communications with, and remote monitoring of, both Raja and Doc. 
   	Mira’s Augmented Reality testing was on-going, and she was always telling them to maintain their AR feeds (that is, to not switch-off the visual) so she – and the Artificial Intelligence program that collected data and generated the AR display -- could actively troubleshoot the system and make real-time mods, if needed. It had become their techie joke, but they knew only too well that it had long-term importance; these AI-AR feeds were a parallel component of the Knowledge Acquisition System that each member of the crew (and many others back on Earth) had contributed to. At present, though, the technology was used mainly for mapping and orienteering purposes. A bit over-capacity on the tech support, if you ask me, thought Darwin, who often preferred “old school” methods and “hands on” experience. He would soon have his chance to do so.
   	Standing in their midst, Mira reached up, switched on the radio beacon affixed to the top of the pod. This was a backup safety precaution. She patted Raja on the back.
“Good luck, Raj. I’ll be standing by if you need me. The AI will be remote monitoring your movement and vitals, plus you’ll have the other rover, and Doc is here, so...everything should be fine.”  
   	Raja Darwin smiled confidently. “It will be. No worries.” 
   	Mira waved and smiled at the two men, turned, and headed back to the rover to make the trek back to base camp. Doc and Raja nodded to each other, and Raja attached the hoist tether to his suit, climbed down onto the grappling ladder, gingerly let go, and commenced his trek downward.
					       #
   	It took over 25 minutes for Raja to descend to the bottom of the chasm. Once there, he began utilizing his chemo-sensor to identify the composition of the rocks and venting gases that engulfed him. There was also a thin, moist layer of condensation on the crevice walls. Raja began collecting samples in earnest, forgetting completely for a few moments that he was 500 meters below the surface of a moon around a planet that was hundreds of millions of miles from his home planet.
   	It was just about this time when they received a slightly noisy automated message from the headquarters of the Interplanetary Missions Center:
   	“This is IMC. Requesting Doctor Stanislaw Bruno to report to Europa base ASAP. Outbreak of sleeping sickness of unknown origin detected. All visitors now quarantined, including crew doctor. Diagnostic and therapeutic expertise required immediately. Confirm receipt of IMC Communication. End message.”
   	Wonderful, thought Darwin. 
   	“I’m going to confirm this, Raj” said Doc, a bit hesitantly, “I’m afraid...duty calls. What do you want to do?” 
   	Raja thought for a few moments. “Yes, of course, Doc, you have to go. I understand. No point in waiting for me, though. Just take the second rover back to T-base. I’ll be fine here until Mira can come get me.”
   	Mira’s voice crackled over the comset: 
“Confirm that Scavenger team... I’ll have to stay here to assist Doc with the recovery craft launch...Then I’ll head back out to the camp site as soon as I can... This is not SOP... Are you OK with this Raj?”
   	“Roger, base. Do we have any choice? I’ll be fine. Just get back here as soon as possible. Good luck Doc.”
   	“Thanks, Raj. I really wish I could stay. We’ll have lots to look over when I return...Be safe...Base, kindly prepare the recovery craft for launch... my ETA is approximately twenty minutes out.”
  	“Copy that, Doc.”
   	And so it was that the expedition was altered in mid-course. This was not exactly the safest arrangement. Normally, no one was left alone on an expedition, anywhere. However, they had communications, AI-assisted remote monitoring, and the AR feed, all of which gave some confidence to Darwin. Besides, he was too excited about analyzing the samples he was collecting to let these other concerns occupy too much of his thinking. 
					     #
   	The hoist coil-recoil rate was purposely designed to be slow — lifting Darwin at about one meter every 2 seconds — so as to avoid any frictional sparking. And for safety and smooth functioning, a coating of methogel was applied to all external, moving components. Now, with plans changed, once back at the top, he would have to wait for the rover to arrive to take him back to T-base. “Ah, yes...,” sighed Darwin, resignedly, “Life on Titan...”
   	Yet, despite his slow ascent, the generally harsh conditions, and their concomitant dangers, Raja was honored and thrilled to be on such a mission. And to think, he mused, just a little less than one hundred years after the first human moon landing! At opportune moments, Raja Darwin marveled at the progress made in space exploration in the first half-century of the third millennium. He recalled his early youth and learning of the severe ecological-climatological crisis, and a third global war that was narrowly averted in 2021...and how the nations and region states of that era had at last decided to permanently break with the past, to put aside the constant warring over scarcer and scarcer resources, and to join forces in the greatest collective effort in human history: the unceasing exploration of space, beginning with our solar system. This proved a fortuitous endeavor, despite the enormous, initial financial cost. For, the joint public-private colonizing, farming, and mining of the Earth’s Moon and neighboring asteroids proved to be the saving grace for the Earth’s ecology, and a boon to its emerging, energy/materials economy. People had big plans for moving on to Mars too, but, at that time, there were still a great many logistical and technical challenges to be worked through.
   	Then came the successful testing of the Magnetic Plasma Beam Transporter — the “Mag-beam” -- based on an older concept by astrophysicist Robert Winglee of the Univ. of Washington, in Seattle. The Mag-beam enabled astoundingly rapid transport between vast inter-planetary distances via a powerful and directed, magnetized, plasma energy beam. It took six years to set up and test the Mag-beam base in orbit around Earth’s moon, and another six years to set up the orbital receiver station around Mars, but once they were in place, and linked up, travel to Mars (from Moon orbit) became a matter of several days, not years. Improvements were added, and from there, new orbital MBT stations were establish above Jupiter’s Europa, and most recently, in synchronous orbit around this giant moon of Saturn. 
   	Energy wise, the MBT stations were powered by advanced solar thermal energy collectors which transformed the “solar wind” into more usable forms of electromagnetic power. And due to the extreme, accelerative nature of the magnetic beams, such stations had to be “free” (off-planet) and orbital ones, to give the whole system a bit of “wiggle room”. Thus also, there was no Mag-beam transport direct to Titan’ surface. Transport to any planetary surface had to be done via a separate launch shuttle. 
   	These “work horses” of the New Space Age utilized a nuclear-powered engine (a modified NERVA engine) first designed, but never utilized, in the late 20th Century.     
   	The transport stations were entirely AI autonomous, and could be remotely controlled. There were limited sleeping quarters, but the only people that occupied them were special visitors, artists, students, planetary scientists, etc.-- those in transit — the stations themselves had no crews.
				    	     #
   	“...Scavenger, base again...[signal noise]...Just a warning...[signal noise]...some type of storm approaching your... [signal noise]...may be delayed...[signal noise]...be advised...[signal noise]...copy?”
  	 “Copy that base...” replied Raja Darwin, maintaining his calm. “No worries...it’ll be over by the time I reach the top...Over.” 
   	Or so he hoped. He chose to suppress any doubts he had, for any longer or stronger than normal storm would pose serious risks to his survival. And so, Raja focused his thoughts on more scientifically provocative things.
   	Raja Ali Darwin recalled the moment his drone-based molecular sensors detected an intriguing, organic signature, after more than an hour of painstaking searching of the bottom of this hole. Organic chemicals per se were not a great surprise to find here, for the atmosphere was mostly nitrogen with plenty of methane and ethane emissions and cloud formations. But this was different. From a small, heat-venting mound made of some type of iron-nickel composite, he had already confirmed traces of ammonia and water (verifying decades earlier data from the old Cassini mission), but there were also indications of hydrogen sulfates and hydro-cyanic acid. The drone’s camera had shown a viscous, yellowish-green coating covering the surface rock surrounding the vent, but then the on-board sensor failed to produce a proper sensor reading. This would have to be done up close and personal. And so, here he was, 500 meters below the surface of this distant and mysterious Moon of Saturn -- where he might possibly find some sign of Life.
  	He instantly recalled sitting in his exobiology class back at the University of Montana, watching a documentary on the deep-sea thermal vents discovered off the Pacific coast of North American back on Earth in the 1990’s. He remembered hearing how shocked the scientists were to discover an entire eco-system existing so deep, so removed from all sunlight and oxygen, and subject to immense pressures. It was an eco-system based upon the metabolizing of sulfurous compounds with hydrogen ions by extremophilic bacteria. It had opened up whole new frontiers in the study of biogenesis and “geo-bio-engineering”. 
   	This discovery in turn enabled them to build computer models of remote environments and their probable suitability for life. Microbial life, that is. So far, still no little green men. Raja chuckled to himself, bringing himself back from his semi-meditative state. He was greatly pleased with himself too. For he had designed the bio-genesis model that had, ultimately, brought him to this location -- it being a refined variation of his doctoral project, and the preferred model for other exploratory efforts on other worlds (like Europa). But with that thought, he quickly humbled himself, realizing that he had stood on the shoulders of giants -- those earthbound, oceanic scientists of the late 20th Century that would never see what he was seeing now. “Ah!” exclaimed Darwin, reflecting on where he was, then thinking: And now I stand on an even bigger giant!
   	The comset crackled loudly again, and Raja could make out only a few words that Mira was saying....
“…Scaven...ase...seems...and storm...”  
   	Raja surmised from this spotty message that the nature of the storm had been determined — most likely a sand storm, as these were quite common, if unpredictable, on Titan. For a moment his anticipation of getting back to the station lab with his samples was interrupted by another concern: these high-velocity sand storms could be deadly --even in protective enviropods. Most e-pods only lasted through one such storm, needing recycling and re-fabricating afterwards. Fortunately, such storms didn’t last too long. But that was small solace, for Raja knew this would mean at least two days lost to repairing panels and re-coating base camp with methogel—which had to be chemically prepared in large quantities first. On Earth, or in the Heavens, one thing never changes, mused Raja Darwin, we will always be doing repairs.
   	Ah well, Raja thought, at least I have these samples...knowing that he had plenty of scientific work to occupy his time once these immediate needs were addressed. It would be a bit more difficult too, this time, as their third crew member -- Stanislaw Petrov Bruno, the mission’s chief medical scientist -- had been suddenly called away due to an outbreak of some form of “sleeping sickness” at the Europa base. 
   	Doc Bruno had utilized the station’s N7 recovery craft to return to the orbital MBT station, and then from there, had been transported to the orbital Europa station. All this concerned Raja and Mira no small bit, as any disruption in team integrity was always a source of anxiety and stress. Still, what could they do? Doc Bruno was, technically, the leading virologist in the (off-Earth) solar system...and the closest to Jupiter. 
   	Until then, they were, for all intents and purposes, stranded. 
   	Doc and Mira had wanted Raja to end the expedition at that point, but the fact was that Raja was already nearly at the bottom of the crevice. Waiting for Raja to come back up would waste precious time for Doc, who had just a slight time window for the Mag-beam transport to Europa before Saturn’s many moons interfered. No, events now dictated that he stay behind for a short while, and besides, he had the e-pod, food, and water.    
   	And so, Mira had to first assist Bruno with the recovery craft launching, and then rapid-fabricate a replacement part for the second rover, before she could return to the site for Raja. Despite the surprise thrown at them, they were initially confident that this was all still doable. What threw a bomb into their plans was the one thing that messed up the best laid plans since the beginning of the space race: the damned weather!
   					    #
   	Raja began running survival scenarios in his mind, partly as a reflex conditioned through training, but also, because it was something he did as a hobby as well. It was a common “game” amongst remote planetary mission crews: first, who could present the most difficult and seemingly worst-case survival scenario, and second, who could come up with a creative, workable solution.
   	The piezoelectric transducers in his suit would allow him to maintain minimum battery power for quite a while -- as long as he exerted himself periodically (but which used up oxygen). And he had enough to breathe for another two hours—factoring in his re-breather unit, but only if he conserved his oxygen. There was always some trade off in space exploration.  
   	He had recycled water still in reserve, and, if needed, Raja could manufacture a nourishing, carbohydrate paste fairly easily -- using the MANA device attached to his suit -- so long as the intake port and transform module was still functioning. MANA stood for Molecular Augmentation for Nutrient Absorption; an extremely useful chemo-synthesis machine especially designed for this mission. Mira had actually worked on the design upgrade team for the thing -- one of many reasons she was chosen for this mission. 
   	A crackling, nearly incomprehensible signal came through the comset, jarring Raja’s reverie: 
“Scav ... ger… sensors ... read .... high ... locity ...  advis ... feed ... cop ...”
The sand storm was becoming more powerful, it seemed, for radio communication was becoming next to impossible. 
   	Raja looked up to see if he could spot the canopy of the enviropod. He could make out the small safety lights along the hoist cross beam the spanned this crevice. Above this was a dim grayish color, the canopy of the e-pod; the integrity of the enclosure seemed fine. Hearing the faint but growing howl of wind above him, Raja noted that the e-pods were designed to withstand a “force four” hurricane.
   	Less than thirty seconds later, Raja’s auditory sensors could make out some distorted, but loud, tearing sound from above. Oh, crap! A bead of sweat emerged on his forehead, despite the temperature-controlled suit. The next moment, the tether jerked forcibly, and nearly seemed to stall. A moment of panic swelled up inside Raja as he surmised what must have happened. The sand storm must have been worse than he had anticipated, and damaged the e-pod. Looking back up the chasm, Raja could make out an orangey-red tint, as a cloud of sand particles now enveloped him. Oh, crap! The e-pod’s gone! Raja then had a second realization and moment of panic: the hoist, now exposed to the full force of the storm, would be in imminent danger of failing, or worse, collapsing.
   	A few moments later, the hoist stalled completely, leaving Raja dangling at the end of the tether, maybe fifteen meters from the plateau. The force of the sand-blasting wind just above was now causing an upward suction action on the air in the crevice, which, though warmer, was buffeting him against the crevice wall. Raja had to keep his legs extended nearly horizontally -- a tough trick even with the vastly lighter weight of these suits. Raja now accepted fully that his situation was becoming more critical. And as he thought this, a sudden updraft spun him around to his right, and before he could get his orientation back, threw him forcibly against a pointed outcropping of rock, hitting him just below his stomach area. Uuuhhh! The pain was nearly instantaneous and pronounced. After the initial expression of pain, Raja quickly forced his mind to dissociate the pain signals and began considering his survival options.
   	Once his stored power supply was gone, so long as he remained connected to and swinging on the end of the tether, he could still generate piezo-power from the transducers in his boots by constant pushing off of the crevice wall. His store of pressurized oxygen, along with the rebreather, was sufficient for maybe another hour or two, based upon his quick calculation. But there was no telling how long it would be before he reached the top, or for that matter, how long until Mira arrived in the rover, which had its own store of oxygen. Raja reflexively made an effort to slow his breathe rate down.
   	As he swung back, Darwin was able to plant his feet just atop a smallish ledge jutting from the dark rocky wall, slowing his momentum. He grabbed a slight hand-hold, and paused for a moment. He looked up through the haze of sand and gases. The grappling ladder, affixed separately to the rocky surface next to the hoist, extended down the crevice face just two meters or so. He could just make out a dullish glint off its metal structure, teasing him, it seemed, just another 12 meters above him. His audio sensors were now picking up an intermittent, tensional “groaning” of metal under stress. Crap!, thought Raja, That doesn’t sound very good... He visually traced the tether line from the shaft to his suit belt, and quickly realized the obvious warning. There was only one thing for Raja to do. Securing his footing as best he could and close to the wall, and grasping onto a hand-sized piece of rock sticking out from the crevice wall, he quickly unlocked and detached the tether-link from his belt with his free hand, switched on his visor light, and began looking for more hand and footholds. 
   	A sudden weakness took over his muscles; he was tired and battered from all the banging against the rock face. What’s more, the pain in his side began throbbing. Raja knew this would have to be a free climb back to the top, and quickly. He took some courage knowing that the nano-wires in his suit would support every move he made, allowing him more stamina that normal. Raja breathed deeply, thinking: I can do this. And just maybe, with some luck, the storm would abate, and Mira would be there in the rover.
   	Tentatively, mustering what strength he had left, Raja began his climb to the top, holding in his mind an image of himself, back at base, calmly analyzing his collected samples. And as he did so, he imagined hearing Mira’s soothing, mellifluous voice, singing in the background.
   	One hand hold, one foot hold at a time, Raja Darwin made his way up the final meters to the top. With his visor light aimed directly ahead to illuminate the cliff face, Darwin tried to keep his movements steady, and rhythmic. 
   	His trance-like state was suddenly interrupted, as something bumped the top of his helmet...the grappling ladder! Raja looked up, spotted the end rung, and made a grab for it almost without thinking. He grabbed it firmly with one hand, then, with all his strength, he pulled up on it, grabbing the ladder’s side with his other hand, pressing his suited torso tightly against the ladder, and quickly reached up for the next rung. The pain in his side flared. His legs let go from their slight footholds, and with great effort, pulled himself up further until one foot could get a hold on the first rung. Ayyeee! Got it! Raja’s breathing was getting more rapid. He tried to take slower, deeper breaths but his heart was pounding, making this effort difficult. 
   	Raja held on to the ladder and rested for few moments. His auditory sensors now detected a sudden abating of the storm, which was good, but with the e-pod swept away in the storm, Raja realized, he wasn’t quite yet safe, however temporary that safety might be. He had to control the pain and muster enough strength to crawl the few meters away from the hoist and towards the hot spring. But in the aftermath of the storm, the atmosphere was so thick with dirt and dust, he couldn’t see. Darwin was feeling feverish and disoriented. “Crap! Which way?” demanded Darwin, exhausted. After a moment of desperation, he remembered: the AR display! He recalled Mira demonstrating the infra-red integration earlier in the week; the embedded IR sensors were “poly-painted” onto the visor material’s original tri-polymer matrix…and this function didn’t require any feed from T-base computers. Raja rolled onto his other side, pulled back the control flap on the front of his suit, grazed his fingers over the haptic panel, and sighed with relief as his visor lit up with data. Mira had integrated infra-red nano-sensors with the AR feed to his visor display. The hot springs’ heat signatures would now show him the way.
   	A sudden wrenching metal sound startled him. Raja looked back in time to see that the hoist shaft, having been wrestled loose from the motor port, was now hanging precariously, still partly attached to the anchor on the opposite side, dangling well out over the edge of the hole. Apparently, the sandstorm, having carried off the e-pod, had then sand-blasted away all the methogel coating that protected the hoist, causing it to fail. Damn, thought Darwin, exhaling with relief, but not a little shaken. Turning back, he focused on the now infra-red-enhanced view of the terrain. He turned his head to either side, scanning the dust cloud surrounding him. His eyes came to rest on the tell-tale, plume-shaped heat signature of a decently venting gas spring (with smaller, weaker ones appearing in the background) several meters ahead of him. With great effort, Raja resumed his crawl over the gravely, icy terrain. Though maybe only fifteen or so feet away, he realized he must be at the very edge of the thermal radius of the spring. The temperature gradient drop-off at the edge, and just beyond it, was dramatic, and deadly. The crawl to this closest hot spring, given the shape he was in, would take nearly three minutes, Darwin calculated. 
And those few minutes now seemed almost forever. It was just enough time for the extreme cold to begin counteracting the suit’s meta-material capability to insulate from extreme temperature variation. The new LS suit was amazingly adaptive – it’s what made such explorations possible -- but it was no “god suit”, as exo-explorers sometimes dubbed it. Raja suddenly realized that he was sweating, profusely, and becoming nauseous. How strange. He was snaking across the ground, risking damage to his suit, through what could only be described as an orange, dirt fog, and thinking: This was not how I envisioned this day going...The very next moment, there came from behind him, a final wrenching sound, and the warped shaft came loose from its anchor and tumbled, clanging eerily, down the chasm.
Raja was a bit shaken by this, but was interrupted as his comset crackled with life: “Raja...this is Mira...come in....I’m on my way--fast as I can make this pile of 
processors move...Come in Raj!”
   	With some effort, Raja took a deep breath, pressed the transmitter button, and replied: “Copy...Mira...great to hear...from you...feel like crap.”
   	“Raj!Thank heavens!...Look, just hold on, OK?...I had to do repairs...and the storm and this dust is messing up all our tracking and communications...must be the iron in the dirt like you said....Never mind....the rover is tracking the beacon as we speak...there’s so much dust in the air...I’ll have to navigate with IR...slow going, but, I should be there in a few more minutes....just stay calm and close to the springs, OK?...Just hold on!”
   	“Copy...infra...red...good...” Several times Raja had to stop himself from passing out. He wanted to put his head down in the worst way. But the pain in his side would surge back intensely, forcing Darwin to groan uncontrollably. What’s happening to me? From some part of his brain not currently seized with pain, Darwin managed to fully process what Mira had said. Radio beacon? No! The beacon was attached to the e-pod, and the e-pod was swept away... Darwin managed to press the transmit button on his comset:
   	“Mira...stop…tracking the beacon...e-pod…not here anymore...”
There was a pause, then the comset, crackled with signal noise again. 
“...Raj...Repeat... Did you say the e-pod is not there?...Confirm...”
   	“Confirm...not...here.”
   	“...Copy, Raj...ok, don’t worry...I thought something seemed wrong...I’m way too far from base...can’t use the memory map from this morning either...the storm redrew the entire terrain...I’m just hitting sand dunes...Damned dust cloud!” 
   	There was a much longer pause now. Raja sensed that Mira was thinking. He was trying to think too, but the pain was getting to him.    
   	“Raj...I can see the gas plumes now up ahead...damn! There’s so many of them...how do I...?” Mira’s voice faded off and there was a longer than normal pause. Then, a burst of transmission noise, and Mira’s voice again:
   	“Raj...I’ve disabled the auto tracking...I’m switching over to your bio-metrics...Damn it! I’m not getting anything!”
   	Raja hazily remembered the constant bumping into the crevice wall, and figured he’d damaged his bio-metric processor unit in his belt. 
  	“Mira...I got bumped a lot down there...and I....”
   	“Wait...forget it...I’m doing this old-school...I’m tracking the strength of the com signal...if you can, keep talking...just say anything...keep talking...OK, Raj?”
   	“...Copy....” But Raja fell silent, fatigued. Raja had managed to crawl close enough to the spring to give him time to rest, a need which he felt throughout his body. The nausea was coming in waves now. His eyelids felt so heavy, he wanted desperately to curl up in a ball...
   	“Raj...do you read me?”
   	Somehow, from somewhere deep in his neural nets, spontaneously, an ancient, epic verse came to his lips: 

“How does it pass / to be the last man standing / after the battle is won? / And 
where is your lady / now that you’re done? / Where are your loved ones / now that you’ve won? / Who will stand with you / in the glory of the sun?”
   	“Good, Raj...getting a decent signal now...keep singing…just hold on!”
					    #		
   	Mira Jiang maintained her heading in the direction of the com signal (Raja’s half-delirious singing). Using the IR display on the rover’s view shield, Mira carefully maneuvered the rover around the heat signatures and the dark blue patches on the ground (these were typically sink holes and small ponds of liquid water and ammonia). The IR sensing was one new integrated feature of the new Augmented Reality program she had been working on all week. Seeing now in infrared, the problem was that there were scores of venting sources -- which was the right one?
   	The rover was designed to record every change of speed and direction it took, thus producing a map of the journey which could be retraced under normal circumstances. But letting the rover do a map run now meant repeatedly plowing into sand dunes and drifts that were not there earlier, wasting precious time. 
   	And she was all too aware of the other time constraints: Raja’s suit would protect him (so long as he was close to the spring) for a while, and his oxygen supply would hold out for another hour or more, but would Raja? Before his biometric transmissions cut out during the storm, Mira had noted some troubling signs -- most significant of which was a rising body temperature. He was definitely sick and getting sicker.    
   	Her heart pounding, she scanned the heat signatures appearing on her view shield, listening intently to the signal strength of Raja’s fading song...veering off to her left, now, just beside one plume of venting gas, Mira could make out the faint heat signature of a six-foot form curled up on the ground. 
Mira’s heart rate jumped. “Raja!”
   	It took a few minutes to position Raja and lift him into the rover. Mira sealed the doors, pulled the oxygen tube from the rover supply panel, and plugged it into the auxiliary intake port of Raja’s oxy-pack. Raja was drifting in an out of consciousness, while sporadically, a scrambled burst of his fading song escaped his lips, as he fought falling asleep: Where is my...strange one / standing...on the sun?
					     #
   	Maneuvering the rover at top speed, which was just about 30 kilometers an hour, it took Mira nearly a half hour to navigate around the crevices and lakes and gas springs —staying well within the equatorial (and warmer) region of Xanadu — and arrive back at T-base. 
   	Mira half dragged, half carried, Raja into the air chamber, pounded a button on the wall, and the gate closed and sealed with a thud behind them. “Evacuate.” She heard herself say, to which the AI controlled chamber responded appropriately, sucking out the Titan atmosphere, and replacing it with breathable air. “Open Main Entry.” She dragged him inside, leaning him on his side against the wall, released the pressure lock on his helmet, and removed it. Next, she detached the oxy-pack from the back of his suit, letting it drop to the floor. Raja’s breathing was shallow and quick and his heart rate was erratic. Mira proceeded to drag/carry Raja into a barely lit side room, which was actually the exercise room, dispensary, and medical bay, all in one. “Lights!” The room lit up. The med part of the room consisted of various pieces of imaging and surgical equipment, a mini lab (now missing several instruments with Doc called away), and an examining/operating table. Mira hefted Raja onto the table, and began hurriedly removing his boots and suit. 
   	In a self-mocking tone, she said aloud: “Why is there never a doctor around when you need one?” What the hell, thought Mira, no better time to test-run the KAS than here and now...
   	Positioning his body properly on the table and fastening the sensor straps, Mira lowered the glassine view shield at a 45˚ angle between herself and Raja’s sweat-covered body. Mira steadied herself, and took a deep breath...Here goes...
   	“Access Knowledge Acquisition System. Subject: Medical Diagnostics and Therapeutics. Reconfigure AR feed to surgical display.”
   	The viewing plane lit up with multi-colored data symbols.
   	“Accessing KAS...Medical Diagnostics...Reconfiguring AR feed...Waiting for symptoms...”
    	“Symptoms: Body temp103º and rising, heart rate fluctuating between 70 and 100 bps, blood pressure rising...patient semi-conscious...”
   	At that moment, Raja momentarily regained consciousness, and grabbed his right side, letting out a pain-filled moan...and then mumbling something only semi coherent to Mira. 
   	“...might be infected...aaayyy...sample contamination...awhhh....”
   	Mira continued: 
   	“Patient also has severe pain and some swelling on his lower right torso area...” 
   	Mira touched the display screen in the corresponding location, which was being recorded and processed by the central KAS computer. The Knowledge Acquisition System (KAS) was actually a slightly modified version of a prototype KA system designed by a team of artists and engineers in Spain back in the first decade of this century. She had tweaked it here and there to improve speed, but still, it could never work fast enough for Mira’s liking.
   	“Patient diagnosis...patient is experiencing an inflamed or partially ruptured appendix...Possible peritonitis...High risk of acute sepsis...and death.”
   	Mira’s heart rate accelerated. “Oh, no you don’t”, yelled Mira, “Not on my watch, damn it!”  
   	“I do not understand. Please rephrase.”  
   	Mira, annoyed, took a deep breath, and refocused. 
  	“Recommend Procedure” 
   	“Recommended Procedure: surgical incision at locus of swelling and removal of appendix.”
   	“I had a feeling you were going to say that...Request Surgical Protocol!”
  	“Surgical Protocol: Prepare incision area by sterilizing skin surface.”
    	“Done. Next.”
	And so the operation — and the first real-life test run of the KAS — proceeded, step by step. At times Mira had to repress some queasiness; for she was not at all fond of the “wet sciences”, as she called them, preferring more structurally elegant and solid design forms. But she overcame this with a mental game wherein every bloody, squishy thing she saw or touched was just so much plumbing, really — and she had no choice: her friend and crew mate’s life depended on her.
   	At one point, as the scalpel entered Raja’s right side, he regained partial consciousness, and attempted to sit up, but was too weak to do so. 
   	“Where...what’s happening...?” Raja looked up at Mira, dazedly, and then down at his torso. “Oh...holy crap...this really hurts...can you...do this?”
   	“Don’t worry Raj...you’ll make it...you’ve got an inflamed appendix...nothing exotic...just a swelled-up bag of tissue that evolution forgot to eliminate. I’ve got it all under control. Just lie back, please, close your eyes, and try to control your breathing…OK?”
   	As she maneuvered the suction hose to the gaping and bleeding incision site, Mira had an idea to ease Raja through what she surmised was a painful procedure (for there hadn’t been time to inject a local anesthetic).
   	“Access Music Library. Select and Play Song 23” 
   	After a brief pause, the first notes played. It was the traditional song that Mira had often half-sang-half-hummed aloud at random work moments. The dreamy, micro-tonal melody unfolded and Raja Darwin slowly relaxed his grip on the table, closed his eyes and laid his head back down. 
   	“I know this...strange song...”
   	“Yes, Raja, I know how much you like it...now lay still...concentrate on the song...I’ll try to get through this as fast as I can...” 
   	From that moment on, Raja said not another word, nor uttered a single moan of pain; only a slight smile could be seen on his lips, and a tear or two from his eyes.
					#
   	After a long and deep sleep, Raja Ali Darwin slowly opened his eyes, and adjusted to the dimly lit medical bay. He felt a somewhat dull soreness in his side, pulled back the blanket that covered him, and slid his right hand down until it came to rest upon a row of stitches maybe four or five inches in length. “Oh....wow....” was all he could manage. With some effort, Raja turned himself on his side, sat up, dangling and wiggling his legs over the side of the operating table like a young kid. He was a bit foggy headed, but otherwise feeling much better. He could hear the sound of rain hitting the metal panels of T-base. Fragments of recent events started to seep back into his consciousness. His head swooned a bit. He suddenly became aware of his intense hunger, and unthinkingly, jump off the table, then reflexively clutching his side. “Ok, Raj ol’ boy...” he said aloud to himself, “...take it slow...”
   	Raja headed straight to the dining bay refrigeration unit, grabbed a standard bag of dried fruits and nuts, and devoured the entire contents in about thirty seconds. He felt as though he hadn’t eaten for days. A wonderfully rich and familiar smell assailed his nostrils. “Coffee!” exclaimed Raja, and turned about to see Mira standing there, smiling, holding out a steaming cup of the dark brew (synthetic, but a damned good simulacrum). Raja took it thankfully, taking several sips, his eyes closed as if in prayer. Mira smiled, saying: “Raja, come look.” She led him across the dining bay to the main observation window, which offered the fullest view of the Titan landscape. The two stood in front of it, staring out, as the rain abated, and one could just see the distant sun began to slip behind a luminous, multi-ringed Saturn, casting subtle, fast-fading shadows from every natural feature that stood out. The passing storm’s winds had momentarily cleared enough haze that one could see, fuzzily, the moons and stars. The scene was both eerie and indescribably beautiful. Titan was fast approaching “Night”, a week-long phase in which its orbital took it behind Saturn, blocking the Sun completely. This was relative, of course, as the light difference between “Night” and “Day” was slight, and the atmosphere was usually thick and hazy. Only at random moments of cloud-thinning, or after a hard methane rain, could one see any stars, or the constant re-configuration of over sixty natural satellites that passed through one’s view. But when conditions permitted, the view was literally breath-taking. Raja and the others could never quite become accustomed to the astounding and mesmerizing vision of a multi-ringed Saturn appearing over the horizon — a reminder to them of just how far they were from home, and how far the Human endeavor had moved into space. It was 2059, and here they were on Titan (!) with others back on Earth planning the next MBT station for...where next?
   	“Thanks, Mira...for saving my life...”
   	“Thanks for helping me save your life...It was your singing that helped me track you in that massive dust cloud.”
   	“My singing?” Raja’s memory of this was virtually forgotten.
   	“Yes...” affirmed Mira, “...what I could make of it...some old, pre-industrial age, warrior song...but your recall and pronunciation was getting worse and worse. If it hadn’t been a critical situation, I might have laughed; you’re kind of funny...when you’re delirious.”
   	“Ahh...” smiled Raja, somewhat embarrassed, then, remembering something: “Holy crap — the samples!”
   	“Not to worry, Raj, they’re undamaged and safe in the specimen room.”
   	“Thank goodness! I had some bizarre dreams while I was...out of it...the samples had microbes in them, and somehow they had escaped and....Ha!...How silly of me....” Raja chided himself.  
   	“Doc should be at Europa base in a few more days, and with any luck, he’ll be back by next Light’s end. You two should have lots of sample analyses to go over together.”
   	“Yes, with any luck. I’m looking forward to his return...and the work...I’m just not quite ready yet...”
   	“Yes, you still need to relax and rest a bit. How about watching a digiflik?”
   	Raja stood silent for a few moments, staring out at the ghostly, yellow-orange shadowscape that was Titan slipping into Night.
 	“Nah. How about we celebrate...with a song? We can record it for Doc.”
  	Mira smiled, mischievously. 
“Ok…How about we improvise a sea chanty…What do you do with a burst appendix?”
	They both chuckled, nodding approval. 
Raja grimaced, carefully feeling his still sore right side. 
“You lead…try not to make me laugh.”

                 End