(59) Day 29 2125 (19 hours and 35 minutes to impact) Dirk Struggles to Counter the Disaster
“Radius, I’m going to walk and think – I’ll be back in a while,” Dirk said, heading out the door. He didn’t wait for a response.
Dirk headed down to the Crane Farm. “I’ll get more water, leave the weights and head out to Tharsis Minutus,” he said to himself. “I’ll warn them, and they can evacuate to a safer location.”
He ran various scenarios through his mind – “I race into the cave, and she is waiting there, at the shore of the lake…”
But as he walked down the path to the Crane Farm he realized the idea’s futility. “Even if I find them, I have no way to communicate – what, I’ll use hand signals to indicate an imminent comet impact? In addition, what if that was the only place on Mars they were able to live? Maybe that was why there had never been any evidence of life found, because they had died out except for this small group in some perfectly balanced geothermically activated cave system, that existed no where else on the planet.”
He paused at the berm, and looked to his left, where the emergency shelter lay hidden. It was bad enough when it was he and Radius alone cowering in the hole waiting for impact – now he’d sentenced an entire species to a similar fate. They didn’t even know it was coming, could do nothing about it.
Dirk abandoned the path and took the hard way up the side of the berm. Working up a sweat, he was able to forget momentarily the crisis at hand, moving on all fours up the dusty slope.
When he reached the top he took a long drink from his integrated hydration system, and looked out over the Crane Farm. The Drill for the Elevator anchor was barely visible, off to his right. Directly below was the Control Tower, and to his left the garage complex and storage sheds with the old Cranes. The garage door of Garage C where he’d been working on fueling one of the old Cranes was open a few inches at the bottom.
“Dang it! The microswitch ‘door closed’ indicator must have become obstructed again,” he said. The switch was at the bottom of the door, and it tended to get dirty. The same thing had happened at A garage. Tom had alerted him to the problem, so he’d added the check to the Preventative Maintenance Program. However, he’d not kept up with the program like he should have, and this was the result. The switch, when dirty, would stop the door before it fully closed. As a result, a dust storm would fill the garage, ruining everything inside, the open electronics at least, completely.
Dirk, looking at the steeper side of the berm facing the Crane Farm thought, “I could take the path down to close it, but…” He examined the slope.
“I don’t care if I fall – I deserve it,” he thought, as he started down at a jog – he could crawl or run, he figured - might as well run.
Quickly he reached the bare edge of control – “This is more a controlled fall than a run,” he said to himself, his feet sliding in the gravel with each step. “It’s like a Games competition, jumping from post to post crossing a water hazard. Only here I won’t get wet, only broken as I tumble down the slope into a heap of compound fractures, undiscovered until tomorrow when Radius reported for the next scheduled delivery – if they didn’t delay the delivery to keep the airspace clear for the bigger delivery – the comet.”
Dirk made a controlled crash into the back of the closest garage – he’d made it without incident. He felt a slight disappointment – he was hoping to punish himself in some non-fatal way. Opening the side door to the C garage, he pushed the “open” button on the main door. He usually opened it manually, but didn’t feel like showing the power conservation sensibility right now, considering how much power was soon to be destructively expended on Tharsis Minutus.
The door opened. He turned the breaker for the garage power to the “off” position, and looked around for a screwdriver so he could remove and clean the microswitch.
“This was the last place I was working, so the tool bag must be in here,” he said to himself, quickly getting angry. “Where is it!” he yelled out loud.
Suddenly he remembered his Mom always saying to “Think back to the last time you had it” advice he always found singularly unhelpful. In spite of himself however, he found himself doing it. “I left the garage and went to the control tower before heading home…” he thought as he manually closed the large garage door.
Walking out of Garage C, he looked toward Tharsis Minutus, the top of which was barely visible over the southern horizon: Olympus Mons loomed over all to the west, with the Three Sisters closer, their peaks looking minuscule compared to Olympus, but soaring heavenwards relative to the Crane Farm.
There were the tools – on the workbench on the ground level of the Control Tower. He grabbed the tool bag and headed back to Garage C.
Clearing the microswitch was a job of only a few minutes – it took longer to detach and reattach the switch than to actually clean out the grit. Tired, Dirk sat down in the driver’s seat of the Crane. It was one he’d refueled and hoped to use for ground travel.
“I could take this out to Tharsis Minutus, loaded with camping gear, and set up a little base at the cave mouth to facilitate further exploration. That way I could stay out there overnight comfortably – but that is hopeless now.”
Dirk had managed to avoid thinking about the impending disaster, but now the emotions associated with the comet, which he thought would have been so great - swimming on Mars! - were unimaginably horrific. He hit the steering wheel of the Crane in frustration.
“That never does any good” he recalled his dad saying after a long forgotten temper tantrum. “No it doesn’t – didn’t even make me feel better,” he said to the Crane.
Dirk noticed that the refueling rig, or more precisely, the fuel transfer rig he’d put together out of spare hoses and other junk was still attached to the now empty Crane from which he’d taken the remaining fuel in order to top off the Land Crane.
“Radius would be mad to see that I didn’t put that away properly,” he said to himself, and began detaching the rig from the Crane.
“It only took one Crane to top off the other, so really, two Cranes equals one. I wonder how long I’ll be able to spin the wheels on a full tank?”
He laughed – “Maybe Tom and I can race these babies.”
Dirk went back outside, walked over to the control tower, and alternatively looking in the direction of Tharsis Minutus and overhead (at the path the inbound comet would take) felt an idea taking form.
Five minutes later, he ran into the Control Room and called Radius on the WiMAX – “Radius, Radius, get my dad, Tom, and Mandy and come to the Crane Farm! I’ve an idea on how to save the Martians!”
“This is Radius, roger over,” said Radius immediately.
“This is Dirk – roger, hurry, out,” Dirk responded and ran back to the garage.
(60) Day 29 2300 (18 hours) The Idea
They arrived at the Crane Farm as Dirk was pushing a Crane to Garage C. Two Cranes were parked outside.
“The one on the right is full. We can push it to the landing zone, and attach the Cranes together there,” Dirk yelled as he continued pushing the Crane into the garage.
“I’ll start refueling this one,” he said. “And ….”
“Hold on, Dirk, hold on,” his dad said. “You’re already executing a plan that you haven’t shared with us - we have no idea what is going on.”
“Yeah buddy,” said Tom. “Take a deep breath and catch us up.”
Dirk wiped the sweat off his face and said, “Ok, I can use a drink anyway. I’ll show you in the Control Tower.”
Once in the Tower Dirk walked over to the wall mounted tablet and began to draw.
“Local area exploration – that was my first objective. I figured, once these Cranes have delivered their load, they are trash. Especially since we are so close to Elevator installation, there is no future demand for these vehicles. I’ve been sticking them in the garages, because it seems such a waste to let the sand eat them into scrap, even t
hough that is what the Company standard operating procedures direct.”
“But they are out of fuel when they land,” Tom pointed out, “And we don’t have the fuel generation capability here to refuel them.”
“That is half right,” said Dirk. “Few of them are actually out of fuel upon landing. As you know, they are basically a directional braking system. For them to perform their function, they have to have enough fuel to decelerate the loads even in high wind conditions when they’ve been blown off course, or have to take a long descent because of an especially heavy load. As a result, they load them up with ‘extra’ fuel. This means that almost all Cranes contain leftover fuel in the tanks.”
“And you developed a way to transfer fuel from Crane to Crane,” explained Radius.
“Yes,” said Dirk. “Initially I thought I could refuel the Cranes and use them to explore further and faster or even set up little base camps, such as for example at Tharsis Minutus.”
A sad look passed over his face, but he quickly shook it off.
“But this is much more important. We will use the Cranes to adjust the comet’s trajectory!”
He looked at each of them, waiting for a positive response. His dad was looking out the window at the landing zone, Mandy, holding T2, had her eyes closed. Tom was peering intently at Dirk’s drawings.
His dad finally spoke up. “I like the idea Dirk, but I’m not sure of its effectiveness – the comet is a huge, dense ball of ice – that is why they harvested this particular one – it is not a loose snowball like most comets. One Crane is not going to be able to shift the vector sufficiently to generate trajectory change.”
“I know,” responded Dirk, “That is why we’ll use several Cranes in a row, one after the other, to nudge the comet into a better path. We don’t have to get it to go anywhere in particular, just not into Tharsis Minutus.”
“And not into the City,” said Mandy, opening her eyes.
“Yeah,” Dirk agreed. He hadn’t thought about that.
“There is another problem,” his dad said. “You’ll only be to able to affect the comet when it is almost at its destination – you can’t control the Cranes when they are far away – the system is only designed to work for terminal guidance.”
Dirk began to look worried. These were all issues he had failed to consider.
He turned to the drawing, yawned, and began looking for some solution.
Mandy had laid down on the bench again, and closed her eyes, still holding T2 who was starting to wiggle. Tom noticed and took him from her.
“Come on, little monkey,” he said to T2. “Let’s figure this out. Dirk is on to something, it just requires extra thrust.”
Dirk walked over to the shelf for the water he had forgotten until now he needed. He sat down and drank the entire container, staring at the floor. The happiness he’d felt an hour ago had once again been replaced by despair. The fact that he was running on basically no sleep for almost an entire day helped neither his mood nor ability to think.
No one said anything for a few minutes. Dirk’s adrenal based strength he’d used to move the Cranes and begin the refueling process faded into exhausted despair.
(61) Day 30 0100 (17 hours) Tom Solves the Problem
“I love this plan, and I’m excited to be a part of it!” said T2 to Dirk, or rather, Tom holding T2 in front of his face and using a babyish voice.
“What?” said Dirk, without enthusiasm.
“We have to use multiple Cranes,” said Tom.
“Yes, Tom, but I still don’t think we have a sufficiently large time window to get the number of Cranes, at least four, up to the comet and affect its trajectory before the comet impacts Tharsis Minutus,” said Mr. K.
“Not one at a time, true, so we’ll have to do it all at once,” said Tom, beginning to sketch out his idea on the board.
Dirk stood up and moved over to see better. “Dirk, can you please hold T2?” Tom asked. “I can draw better without holding him.”
“Sure,” said Dirk, taking T2 from Tom.
Tom drew a circle with eight dots forming a smaller circle inside it. He then drew a square using four of the dots, and then two lines from the corners making an x. He then shifted over to blank space and drew a 3D expanded view of the shape, showing it as a rectangular solid.
“We don’t use one Crane at a time, we use two – and attach them at the wheels with this!” Tom said.
“When the wheels are locked in place, as they are for the normal delivery mode, they won’t move at all, providing a stable anchor point for connection,” Dirk said.
“Exactly,” said Tom.
“But that only gives us two,” said Mr. K.
Dirk stepped back, said “Hold on a minute,” and ran out of the control tower.
“What do you think,” Tom asked T2.
T2 smiled.
“Can you quickly manufacture the assemblies?” Mr. K asked Tom.
“No problem. I’ll use the ship’s 3D printer,” Tom answered.
“What material will you use? The housing stock is far to weak.”
“Ship emergency repair – we have barrels of the stuff, hull penetration quality. It will work,” Tom answered confidently.
Dirk ran back in. “We can hook the Cranes together using the trailer hitch – they are tow capable. Once hooked together we can reinforce the lateral connection with another longer assembly on the outer wheels similar to the one Tom has designed for the interior wheels.”
“Show me,” said Tom. The three of them went back outside to examine the Cranes.
“Yes, Dirk,” that will work, Tom agreed.
“But what about the shear forces on the four Cranes? Will the attachment assemblies you print be strong enough to keep it together?
“I can print pressure hull patches with integrated cosmic ray shielding – it’s strong enough,” said Tom.
“Ok,” Mr. K said, “But Dirk, how are you going to control the four Cranes as a unit? You only have one channel for Crane communications.”
“That’s covered,” Dirk said with a smile. “I’m going to Master and Slave the group. One Crane will be the Master (the one with the best control mother board) and I’ll wire the Cranes to that control board so that each Crane acts as a single engine. As a result, I’ll be able to control all four via the single channel.”
After a minute of looking at the Crane, his dad had another question.
“Steering. How will you steer it?” his dad asked. “You much catch the comet before you can nudge it, and that is going to require some steering.”
Dirk had an answer for that too. “I’ve worked out the energy maneuverability for one Crane as part of my job – the Cranes are basically braking systems – so to get the deliveries down safely, and on target, you have to trade altitude for horizontal movement by selectively firing each of the engines. By changing the descent vector inclination, it is possible to steer the Crane down. It will be more complicated with four Cranes acting as one, with the play in the connection between them, but our problem is actually simpler than a delivery – we want to get the comet off its current target – we don’t have to place it precisely onto another one. So a nudge will do.”
Mr. K and Tom considered what Dirk had said for a moment. His dad looked up from the ground where he’d been idly making circles in the dust with a pen. “I think it will work – you’ve really thought this through. Tom, how long will it take you to print the parts?”
Tom thought for a moment. “2 hours for each assembly,” he said, “Give or take 30 minutes. We have to include the transportation time to get them back here from the ship. So at least 9 hours.”
T2, who had been very good so far, started to fuss. Dirk put him on the top of the Crane so he could practice standing as Dirk continued to hold him.
Radius had joined the group and Mr. K now turned to him. “Radius, do you know how to refuel the Cranes?”
“Yes, I’ve helped Dirk with it be
fore,” Radius answered.
“Outstanding,” said Mr. K. “Tom, do you think T2 is ready to go to sleep?”
“He sure is – it is way past his bedtime.”
“How about this then for a plan – Dirk takes T2 back to your house, and the two them get some rack time. Dirk can sleep on the couch in T2’s room, so he is there if T2 wakes up. You and Mandy head to the ship and start printing. You have a place to sleep there, right?”
“Yes,” Tom replied. “Mandy and I can trade off taking naps while the printer is working. He smiled at T2 – “We are used to not getting much sleep, right son?”
T2 laughed and nodded in agreement with his dad.
“But Dad, I don’t want to sleep – we have too much to do,” Dirk said.
“I’m not suggesting you get some rest because you have nothing to do – I’m suggesting you get some rest because you have work to do. Rewiring and flying this MegaCrane can’t be done effectively with you brain dead from fatigue. Sleep will dramatically increase your proficiency with the soldering iron and Crane controls.”
“I like it – let’s run it by the wife,” Tom said.
“Mandy is asleep,” Radius said.
“Ok,” Tom said. “Let’s get started without her. Radius, tell her the plan please when she wakes up. I’ll get T2 and Dirk settled at home and then head to the ship to start printing. Let me take some measurements, Dirk, and we’ll get started.”
“Hey Tom, if its ok with you, I’ll head home, shower and grab some clean clothes and meet you at your house,” Dirk said.
“Sounds good,” said Tom.
“How long does the refueling, or more precisely, fuel transfer process take, Dirk?” Mr. K asked.
“Once the pumping starts, about 30 minutes. I had to jury rig the pump assembly, so it is not very efficient – but I never worried about the speed of the transfer before.”
“That is manageable. Radius and I will get the Crane’s fueled and then head over to help with the printing. Agreed?”
“Roger,” said Tom.
“Sounds good, Dad,” said Dirk.
“Are we missing anything, Radius?” Mr. K asked.
“Not that I can see now,” said Radius.
“All right then, break!”
(62) Day 30 0900 (7 hours) An Unwelcome Call from City Hall
“Dirk, Dirk, wake up,” said Radius softly. “You have to go to City Hall – medical.”
It took a minute for Dirk to register where he was – on Tom and Mandy’s couch in T2’s room.
“What?” he said. “Why didn’t they call me?”
“They did,” Radius said, “But you left your communicator in your pants pocket in the other room so it wouldn’t disturb T2. They called me to find you.”
Dirk sat up on the couch, and rubbed his face. “Let me hit the head and brush my teeth.”
He stood up groggily. He’d only had 6 hours of sleep – a sizable amount, but not enough to recover fully from the last two days.
“Is T2 still asleep?” Dirk asked.
Radius walked silently over to T2’s crib – he turned toward Dirk and nodded, “Yes.”
Radius watched T2 roll over, open his eyes halfway, and continue sleeping.
Dirk returned after a few minutes. “We can’t leave him here. What time do we have to be at City Hall?”
“The Sergeant said ‘immediately’. He was very angry. I don’t know why. How could you be expected to report there at any moment? I propose we get your father.”
“Yeah, where is he?”
“He is still down at the Crane Farm, doing some additional work on the engines, cleaning them I believe to ensure maximum thrust at the key moment.”
Dirk, still half asleep and distracted by the Governmental summons, had forgotten for a moment that they were engaged in responding to a crisis more significant than the Sergeant could generate.
“Umm. I don’t want to interrupt him – I should have thought of that. Let’s go, and we can head over the ship directly from City Hall. T2 will be glad to see his parents anyway. I’ll grab him some snacks, then we’ll carry him over. Hopefully he’ll stay asleep.”
“Where are your weighted clothes?” Radius asked.
“Oh man,” said Dirk. “I left them at home last night, since I was coming over here to sleep anyway. We’ll have to stop at home first.”
“How about you run home now, get dressed. I’ll put the snacks together for T2, and so when you get back we can go straight to City Hall. This house is closer to City Hall anyway. No sense in dragging T2 to your house and then right past this one to get to City Hall and the ship.”
“Great idea – thanks Radius. Ok, see you in 5 minutes – or so.”
“Very well,” said Radius, heading for the kitchen after looking at T2 again to verify that he remained asleep.
They walked into City Hall to find the Sergeant waiting angrily. About to launch into a tirade he restrained himself when he saw T2 asleep in Dirk’s arms. Radius pushed the empty stroller in front of him. T2 had started to fuss when they’d tried to put him in the stroller, so Dirk carried him, which kept T2 happily asleep.
“Good morning,” Dirk whispered. “Why did you call me here? I have to get to work.”
“There are no deliveries scheduled for today,” the Sergeant said.
“But I have other things to do at the Crane Farm.”
“You can do them after this. Come into my office.”
Dirk looked at Radius, who shrugged. They followed the Sergeant.
“Sit down, Dirk,” the Sergeant said. “Put the baby in the stroller.”
“He might wake up,” Dirk said. “I’ll hold him.”
“Suit yourself,” the Sergeant said, “But I require access to your arms.”
“Why?” said Dirk, trying to keep his voice low to avoid disturbing T2.
“We must take blood for testing,” the Sergeant said.
“But why? My dad has to be here before any medical procedures take place.”
The Sergeant was not pleased to hear this. “That is unsatisfactory. I’m getting the Director.” He walked behind his desk and pushed the button to talk to the Director.
“What?” she snapped.
“Director, I’m here with the Kamehameha boy. He is uncooperative.”
“I’m sorry to hear that,” she said, in an unctuous voice. “I’ll be right down to explain things to him. Thank you for bringing me in on this important meeting.”
Radius took the opportunity provided by the Sergeant sitting at his desk to whisper to Dirk. “Dirk, your dad is working on the engines. Do you really need him here?”
“Yes,” Dirk whispered back. “They have no right to take blood from me, no matter what they say. Dad was very clear that I should not provide any blood again, and that if they called me here to contact him immediately. If I wasn’t so tired I would have called him right after you woke me up.”
Radius held back his response as the Director walked in.
“Good morning!” she said cheerfully. “And who is this?” she asked, stooping down slightly to peer awkwardly at T2.
“It’s Tom and Mandy’s son – I’m babysitting him, and must to get him back home as soon as possible. Why am I here?” Dirk asked.
“Well, well,” the Director said. Both Dirk and Radius noticed her quick glare at the Sergeant as she considered what she was going to say.
“Dirk, additional blood samples are necessary. It will only take a few minutes. Sergeant, please begin. I’m sure Dirk will cooperate now,” she said with a smile.
“Yes ma’am,” said the Sergeant, as he grabbed two of the vacuum flasks. As he picked them up from his desk drawer, they hit one another, and the bell sound that Dirk had noticed during the retrieval rang through the room.
Dirk forced himself to not look at Radius, afraid the glance would reveal that they knew how the bottles had gotten there.
“No,” Dirk said, standing up. “I’m waitin
g for my dad. I’ll go outside and call him now.”
The smile disappeared from the Director’s mouth and she narrowed her eyes.
She looked at the Sergeant, more to think of her next step than from any desire to communicate with him.
She turned back to Dirk, Radius and the still sleeping T2. “Ok, Sergeant, please take the little guy, what is his name again? Three-two? Strange name for a child. We will take a sample from him.”
Dirk stood up, and started to back out the door as the Sergeant approached.
“Hand him over,” the Sergeant said, reaching out his arms for T2. As he did, Radius grasped the Sergeant’s right forearm – the pain caused the Sergeant to immediately lean toward his right side. He grabbed desperately at Radius’ hand.
“Ow, let me go immediately!” he said.
“Release him now or I will have you destroyed!” said the Director.
“The baby will not be touched,” Radius said, continuing to hold the Sergeant’s arm.
“Oh fine,” said the Director, shaking her head dismissively. “But we must get a sample from Dirk then.”
Radius released the Sergeant, who rubbed his arm, glaring at Radius. He walked back to his desk and picked up a flask.
“Give the Robot the baby and stick out your right arm. Sit down first, then give me your arm,” he said.
“Is it worth taking Dad away from the engines to fight this now? I’ll make more blood,” Dirk thought. He looked at Radius, but Radius didn’t say anything. “We don’t have time to waste with this,” Dirk thought
“Ok, I’ll do it,” he said, and carefully transferred T2 to Radius’ arms. T2 mumbled a little, but didn’t wake up.
Dirk sat down, and the Sergeant realized Dirk had to take off the top part of his suit to give the blood.
The Director noticed it at the same time. “I’ll leave you your privacy – Sergeant, contact me immediately if there are any other issues.”
Dirk stood up again, took off his heavy tunic and removed the top of his sweatsuit.
The Sergeant reviewed the flask instructions. He put the flask on the arm of Dirk’s chair and went to his desk to get gloves. He put them on awkwardly and read the instruction sheet again.
“Ok, make a fist,” he said.
Dirk complied.
“Release it, and then pump it a little,” said the Sergeant, looking closely at the veins at Dirk’s elbow.
Removing the safety cover from the top of the vacuum flask revealed a long needle. He grasped Dirk’s arm awkwardly and stuck the needle in Dirk’s arm.
“Ouch!” Dirk said. “That hurts, a lot! Have you been trained on this?”
“I watched a video,” said the Sergeant. “Be quiet and don’t move – it will hurt more if you do.”
Dirk quickly felt light headed, and as if his arm was being sucked into the flask. The vacuum pulled his blood out – it was calibrated such that it sucked at the same rate as his blood flowed, so that it didn’t cause the artery to collapse, but it felt to Dirk as though it was sucking out all his guts, not only blood.
The Sergeant took the full flask and put it on his desk. Dirk put his head in hands, the room spinning around him. The Sergeant grabbed another vacuum flask and holding it down beside his left leg to hide it from Radius, who was looking intently (worriedly one would say if his face could make such an expression) at Dirk.
“Are you feeling ok?” the Sergeant asked solicitously, while simultaneously grabbing Dirk’s left arm and inserting the needle.
“Hey!” Dirk said weakly. “You already have the sample.”
“That was the first one – you agreed to this, or should I use this one on the baby?”
It was an empty threat, (he knew he couldn’t get to T2 through Radius) but it was enough to get Dirk to acquiesce, which is all the Sergeant needed.
“But wait!” said Radius.
“Ok, ok, it’s ok Radius,” Dirk said, laying his head back in the chair. He was pale and sweaty.
Unwilling to put T2 down, Radius stood there.
It only took a couple of minutes – the Sergeant took the full flask back to his desk and was suddenly quite pleasant.
“Thank you very much for your cooperation, Dirk. Have a nice day,” he said.
Dirk winced as he lifted himself to a standing position. He put his sweatsuit and weighted tunic back on and stood. Resting his weight on the stroller, he walked slowly out of the office and down the hall. Radius followed with T2 in his arms.
Once outside Dirk leaned against the wall. “Radius, I can’t walk much further. You think T2 would mind if I used his stroller,” he said not looking up, with a weak laugh.
“Hold on,” Radius said. “T2 is awake.”
“Good morning, T2” Radius said. “I’m going to put you in your stroller now, and we’ll go to the ship to see your Mom and Dad.”
T2 looked at him, still half asleep, but didn’t fuss when put into the stroller. Radius walked over to Dirk and pulled Dirk’s left arm over his own shoulder to help him walk.
“I’m ok, I’m ok,” said Dirk weakly, trying to stand. He took a step and collapsed.
Radius swept him up in his arms.
“Dirk, can you drag the stroller?”
“Uh, ok,” Dirk responded, sounding as if he was no more awake than T2.
Radius maneuvered so that Dirk could grab one of the stroller handles with his right hand, and Radius began walking, carrying Dirk who was pulling the stroller by one handle. The stroller swayed side to side as they walked. T2 faced backwards, but didn’t seem to mind. At least, he wasn’t making any noise about it.
“Radius,” Dirk said quietly.
“Yes, Dirk.”
“Looks like you broke the first Law of Robotics back there. But I’m glad you did,” Dirk said.
“Bent, not broke” Radius replied. Dirk couldn’t see his face, but it sounded like Radius was smiling.
(63) Day 30 1015 (5 hours 45 minutes) Dirk, Radius and T2 arrive at the Ship
“Dirk, I’m going to put you down here,” Radius said, lowering him to ground at the base of the ship’s brow.
“T2, time to go up into the ship and see Mom and Dad,” Radius said as he deftly removed T2 from the stroller and walked up the steps into the ship.
He paused after getting up a few steps. “Dirk, I’ll be back to get you as soon as I turn T2 over to his parents. You ok?”
“Yeah,” Dirk said weakly, his face sickly pale, hair damp with sweat.
Radius walked quickly, but carefully, up the stairs into the ship. He paused for a moment, called up the ship’s plan from memory, and turned right and then right again to head back toward the ship’s stern and the cargo bay. The main hull repair equipment was located in the bay so it could be easily taken out of the ship and put into place if necessary. He wasn’t sure, but it seemed likely the 3D printer Tom had discussed would be there.
The main passageway had larger than normal hatches, to allow for equipment movement into the ship, and he had no trouble transiting the doors holding T2. He quickly reached the cargo bay, and the sound of the printer sliding back and forth confirmed the validity of his destination choice.
Mandy was sleeping on a cot next to the printer, but woke up as Radius entered the space.
“Hi, Radius. Hello, baby,” she said, getting up quickly. “Where is Dirk?” she asked, reaching out her arms to take the happy to see his Mom T2.
“He’s outside. I’ll go get him,” said Radius.
“Ok, we have the first two assemblies printed,” she said, smiling at T2 but pointing to the printer.
“That is good,” said Radius as he turned and walked out of the cargo bay, anxious to retrieve Dirk.
Radius picked up Dirk with no more effort than he had expended on T2 – his disaster response heritage was evident in the ease with which he carried Dirk up the stairs to sick bay.
“The door is locked, Dirk. I’m going to put you down and get Tom who mus
t have the keys. I’ll be back in a few minutes. We’ll have you rehydrated and comfortable soon,” Radius said, placing Dirk on the deck.
Although Radius had put Dirk in a sitting position against the bulkhead, Dirk immediately lay down on his side, unable to keep himself upright.
“Ok, Radius, I’m fine, really,” he said softly.
Radius returned to the cargo bay, where Mandy was sitting on the cot playing with a now wide awake T2.
“Sick bay is locked,” Radius said. “Do you have the code?”
“Why do are you asking about sick bay?” Mandy asked, looking up from T2. “Is Dirk ok?”
“No, he needs rehydration. The Sergeant took an excessive amount of blood from him.”
“What!” Mandy exclaimed. “Why? You can tell me on the way. Tom is asleep in his stateroom. I’ll get him. We’ll meet you at sickbay.” She slipped on her shoes and strode quickly ahead of him, T2 on her hip toward the bow. Radius returned to sickbay.
After a minute he heard the door unlock and slide open. He put Dirk on the first patient table. Accessing his trauma medicine files, he quickly grabbed an IV bag of synthetic blood, and gave Dirk a couple of packs of nutrient gel to eat and a water bottle to sip.
“Hey Dirk, I’m going to take off the top part of your suit, to access your arms, ok.”
“Sure, fine,” Dirk said.
Radius undid the top of Dirk’s suit. Hanging the synthetic blood bag he gently inserted the IV into Dirk’s arm.
Exhausted, Dirk didn’t even flinch when the needle penetrated his vein, below where the Sergeant had extracted the blood.
“Here Dirk, have some water,” Radius said, holding the water container up to his lips.
Dirk took a sip and then lay back.
“Have more,” Radius said.
Dirk finished a longer drink as Tom, Mandy and T2 rushed into the room.
“What happened!” Mandy asked, taking the water container from Radius and handing him T2.
“They took blood with vacuum containers that arrived a couple of days ago in a Diplo pouch.” It seemed like a month ago to Dirk as he said it.
“Why would they take blood?” Tom said. “No one has given blood for almost 70 years, since the optimization of synthetic plasmas and other blood products.”
“I don’t know,” Dirk said softly.
“Radius, do you have any idea? Did they explain themselves? Why did you allow it?” Mandy shot at him.
“We wanted to wait for Mr. K, but were sensitive about the time – we didn’t want to take him away from the refueling,” Radius explained.
Dirk drank again. His color was already looking better, and the blood bag was half empty.
Tom took a blanket from the closet and put it over Dirk, being careful not to jostle his arm.
“Thanks,” Dirk said.
“That’s not right,” Tom said. “We must notify the Company Directors,” Tom said.
“Yeah,” Dirk agreed. “And if I didn’t agree they were going to take the blood from T2.”
Mandy, frightened now, looked at Tom.
Dirk saw her expression, and gave a weak laugh, which sound more like a cough. “Don’t worry, Radius ‘bent’ the First Law as soon as the Sergeant reached for T2. I thought he was going to crush the Sergeants arm, or rip it off. The Sergeant almost collapsed from the pain and gave up on his T2 plan.”
Mandy put the water container down and took T2 from Radius. T2 in her left arm, she gave Radius a hug with her right. “Thanks, Radius.”
“My pleasure,” said Radius.
“I’ve been wondering about that though,” said Dirk. “By rights they should have reported it and had you destroyed immediately, not threaten to obliterate you.”
Radius didn’t say anything.
“That is very strange,” Mandy said. “I mean I’m glad they didn’t of course, but that doesn’t make any sense.”
“It does if they knew they were doing something illegal and didn’t want any off planet attention. The limited prosecuton of Dirk for trespassing, not theft is odd. They are up to something and are willing to overlook minor and indeed major infractions in order to protect themselves,” Tom said.
Mandy looked at Dirk, who had stopped sweating and regained most of his normal color, but still looked less than healthy.
“Dirk, you should get some sleep,” she said.
Dirk tried to sit up. “But we have to get the MegaCrane assembled. The control system hasn’t been rewired yet.”
“Tell you what,” said Tom. “We still have two more hours of printing to do. You sleep until the printing is done, and then we’ll take the parts down to the Crane Farm and begin assembling.”
“Ok,” said Dirk. He was too exhausted to dispute the appropriateness of Tom’s plan.
Mandy tucked him in as Radius removed the IV from his arm and put the healing gel on his punctures – they would be completely healed by the time Dirk awoke.
“Dirk, choke down this meal gel and drink at least half of this water,” Radius said. “Then you can sleep.”
Dirk sucked the gel tube dry and drank the water. “Thanks, guys,” he said, closing his eyes. “Can you please lower me down flat on this thing?”
Radius hit the button and the bed flattened. Tom raised the right side rails while Radius raised the left.
“See you in a couple of hours, Dirk,” Tom said, dimming the lights.
“Ok,” Dirk replied, his eyes shut.
The four of them left Dirk and walked down the passageway for a few steps before Tom stopped.
“Radius, while we finish up the printing would you be willing to go back to the Crane Farm and get one of the Cranes that Dirk modified for land use and bring it back here? These parts are pretty heavy.”
“Certainly,” said Radius. “I’ll leave now. Is there anything I can take down there with me?”
Tom thought for a few seconds. “If you take one of the wheel attachment assemblies down, you can OPTEST it in order to ensure we didn’t mismeasure or screw up in some other way. We can plan for the anticipated problems, but the unknown unknowns that we don’t prepare for could be fatal. We have to test as much as possible to tease those gremlins out early.”
They continued to the cargo bay. Radius went directly to the printer, and picked up the two tire shaped hemispheres joined in the middle by fat Xs that made up the first Crane union assembly. The hemispheres ‘hugged’ the tires, and thus distributed the torque to the rubber of the wheels first. Longer screws through the X’s that attached to the wheel lug nuts provided additional strength.
“They are about 500 Earth pounds each,” said Mandy.
“No problem,” said Radius, picking one up. “Do you have any chain or rope I could use for handles – it is a long walk.”
“Sure,” said Mandy. “You can use these cargo tie downs.”
“Thank you,” said Radius, attaching the tie downs to two of the attachment assemblies. With one in each hand he started off. He stopped at the door and turned.
“Are any of the connectors printed yet?” he asked.
“Yes,” said Tom. “I have them printing out on the small printer in the machine shop. I’ll get you eight so you can optest them.” He ran into a space just off the cargo bay and returned with a bag of the new bolts. He put the bag over Radius’ head and across his shoulder.
“Comfortable?” he asked.
“Indeed,” said Radius, and resumed his walk to the Crane Farm.
(64) Day 30 1212 (3 Hours 45 minutes) Dirk Restored
It took Dirk a minute to realize where he was, but he knew he desperately required a restroom. Unable to figure out in the dim soft light how to lower the rails hemming him in, he slid out at the bottom of the bed and hit the head, relieved.
“Those nutrition gels have the right stuff – wish I’d been eating them while I was competing in the Games,” he thought as he realized the debilitating weakness he’d felt after the bleeding was gone,
and his muscles responded to movement commands. “Normal energy levels coursing through my body – good. Some more food and a long drink of water and I’ll hit 100%,” Dirk said to himself.
Heading aft out of sickbay a wave of dizziness that forced him to lean against the bulkhead reminded that he was not at 100% yet. He walked more slowly after that, keeping a hand against the side of the passageway as he made his way to the cargo bay.
Tom and Mandy, lifting the second external connector off the printer, didn’t notice him immediately as he walked in.
“Hey, Dirk,” said Tom, as he and Mandy placed the assembly on the deck, “How are you feeling?”
“Great!” said Dirk. “A little whoozy occasionally, but almost 100%. Do you have anything else to eat here?”
“His appetite is back, that’s a good sign,” said Mandy with a smile. “Yes, there is a small food unit here, so we can zap up whatever you like. The ship still has plenty of food.”
“I didn’t know the ship had any food left on it,” Dirk said.
“Yes, I don’t publicize it, but the ship is equipped with sufficient emergency stores to last the entire population 18 months. That is plenty of time for a rescue ship to get here if we had a catastrophic failure of our habitation systems.”
“Good to know,” said Dirk. “I’m going to eat more than my fair share now.”
“You’ll earn it,” said Tom.
As Dirk finished his Kailua pork and poi, Radius walked in.
“Optest complete, optest sat,” said Radius. “Or as much of an optest as I could do. The assembly fit, and based on the torque measurements I was able to do will suffice for at least the time we require.”
“Excellent,” said Tom.
“Hi, Radius,” said Dirk. “Thanks for getting me up here. I think T2 could have crawled here faster than I could without your help.”
“My pleasure,” said Radius. “You are feeling normal?”
“Yes, I feel fantastic, especially after all this food. But we are burning daylight. What is the status down at the Crane Farm?”
“The first two connection assemblies are installed,” Radius said.
“What about the refueling?” Dirk asked.
“We have refueled 6 Cranes, the ones that looked best to your dad and I, in case one of the Cranes proves unsuitable. We still have 8 partially filled Cranes from which we can extract additional fuel if necessary. Your dad is sleeping now. We should bring him some food.”
“Oh yeah, he must be starving!” Dirk said. “Did you tell him about our encounter with the Sergeant?”
“No,” Radius said. “I saw no reason to distract him. I believe the comet is our primary focus now.”
“Good point,” said Dirk.
“Yes,” said Tom, “I think that was very wise Radius. We’ll have time enough to deal with our friendly Government representatives - who are of course only to here to ‘help’ - after we knock that comet away from Tharsis Minutus.”
“Whoo hoo!” yelled Dirk, as he drove out of town with the first two interior assemblies strapped down to the Crane in a precarious pile held together with tie downs and duct tape. Tom and Radius clung to the sides.
“Dirk, this was a great investment of effort, to figure out how to get these things running in a land mode,” Tom said.
“It wasn’t hard,” said Dirk. “I had to do some minor reprogramming, but they were designed for dual use – just not dual use here. These are the same models used for asteroid mining. The ore pulling cargo attachments are designed so that they cover almost the entire Crane, keeping it pressed down onto the surface to prevent roll-overs when transiting slopes. They drive on the surface before launching back up to the processing vessels. Modifying the programming using existing code modules to make them drive here was all that was required.”
The 20 minute walk reduced to a five minute drive. Quickly, they unloaded the interior connection assemblies and headed back to retrieve those for the exterior.
(65) Day 30 1300 (3 hours 15 minutes) Mod Delivery
“All yours!” yelled Dirk from the open cargo bay door, as he felt the line with which he had lowered the large exterior connector go slack.
“Yeah, it is on the Crane,” Tom yelled back. “Radius is on his way up to help you load the next one.”
“Roger,” said Dirk as he pulled the line back up.
“One down, one to go,” said Dirk as Radius walked into the cargo bay.
They attached the line to the remaining unit and Radius held it over the edge of the door as Dirk braced himself in a squat and began lowering. As soon as it cleared the hull of the ship and was swinging clear Radius grabbed the line to help Dirk lower it down.
“Hold!” Tom yelled. They stopped lowering, waiting for Tom’s “Go!”
“Go, three feet or so,” Tom said and they softly placed the long assembly onto the Crane.
“Let’s roll,” Tom yelled up, climbing into the driver’s seat. Dirk stuck his head out of the bay. “Hey, I get to drive!”
“You snooze, you lose!” Tom said laughing.
As they topped the berm on the City side of the Crane Farm, the Crane halted.
“Why are you stopping?” Dirk asked, from his precarious perch on the passenger side of the Crane.
“I don’t know,” said Tom, looking at the dashboard.
Dirk dismounted and walked over to stare at the dashboard with Tom.
“You’re out of gas, buddy.”
“Ouch,” said Tom.
“I told you, you should let me drive,” Dirk said.
“Um….” said Tom.
“Just kidding -we are out of gas. No help for it – carrying the attachment load and the three of us burned up the fuel. If we really want to use these things to do any real work we’re going to have to add more fuel capacity.”
“But that is something we can worry about after our current task is completed,” said Radius.
“Agreed,” said Dirk, who in his enjoyment of the Crane ride had momentarily forgotten the seriousness of their situation. “Is there another Land Crane refueled?” Dirk asked Radius.
“Yes, but it will take more time to get the Land Crane, drive it here, reload and deliver the assemblies than simply carrying them ourselves,” Radius replied.
Dirk started untying the connector assemblies. “Ok, we’ll carry them from here,” he said.
“Roger that,” said Tom, starting to untie the other end.
“Radius,” Tom said, “Can you carry one end by yourself?”
“Certainly,” Radius said.
“Ok then, Dirk and I will take the front and Radius you can take the back.” They lifted the assembly from the Crane to the ground, and then with a “1, 2, 3” picked it up and continued on to the Crane Farm where the Cranes Mr. K had refueled were waiting.
“One more to go,” said Dirk.
“You have the energy to get the final load, or should we get your dad?” Tom asked.
“No worries – I’m feeling great,” Dirk said.
“Ok, let’s go.”
As they jogged back to get the other assembly Dirk suddenly realized not only was he not depressed, he was actually happier than he could remember being in a long, long time, certainly since arriving on Mars.
“Given the circumstances happiness certainly doesn’t make any sense,” he said to himself. “But I’ll have to figure this out later – right now I’ve got to get these Cranes together and airborne to knock that dirty snowball away from Tharsis Minutus.”
(66) Day 30 1315 (2 hours 45 Minutes) Crane Combination and New Challenges
As they put the last connector down next to the four Cranes, Mr. K walked out of the Control Tower.
“Radius and I pushed them together, and we have the wheels locked on the first two, which have been secured by the connectors,” he said, walking up to the group as Dirk was peering intently at the connectors.
“It looks great, thanks, Dad,” said Dirk. ?
??Let’s get the other two into position. Then if you guys can attach them together I’ll start wiring them up as a single unit.”
“Ok,” said Tom as he and Radius began pushing the other two Cranes into position.
“How are you feeling?” said Mr. K to Dirk quietly.
At first Dirk thought that he was referring the blood “donation”. “Did Mandy or Tom tell him about it?” he wondered.
“Uh, ok, nervous about getting these Cranes to work as a single unit.”
“I’m sure you’ll be able to do it. You’ve been messing around with these Cranes enough. Let me know if I can help,” his dad said.
“Dad, have you slept at all?” Dirk asked.
“Yes, after Radius and I moved the Cranes there was nothing left to do down here, so I racked out in the control chair. How about you?”
“Yeah, I slept plenty actually. I’m not sure who fell asleep faster, T2 or I. I was afraid I’d be too nervous to sleep, but that turned out not to be a problem,” he said with a wry grin.
“I’m glad you rested – you need to be sharp to get all this done.”
“Speaking of which,” Dirk said, “Is my electronics tool kit in the Tower?”
“No, it’s in the garage. Want me to get it?” his dad asked.
“Thanks, that’s ok. I have to go to the garage anyway to get the gear required for removing and reattaching the master motherboard. I’m going to program each Crane to act as a single unit (not 8 separate engines) with the control module from another Crane serving as the master control. It will read each Crane as a single engine rocket and fire them as necessary to both gain the required altitude and stay on course.”
“Ok, then, I’ll help Tom and Radius get these Cranes together.”
“Thanks, Dad. I’ll be back in a few. I’m going to load the programs on the Book and then feed them into each of the Cranes here.”
Dirk quickly scanned his workbench as he walked into the garage. He saw the test cables laying in a heap where he’d last used them to do the conversion on the Crane for land use. “I probably should have put those away more carefully,” he said to himself as he plugged his Book into the diagnostic test unit on the workbench, pulled up the control program for the Cranes, copied it, and began modifications.
“Keep it simple,” he told himself as he scanned through the code. “I’ll integrate the rocket engines so they act as a single unit. I’ll put the entire propulsion system into a unified subroutine. Then I can use the normal control program to manage each of the Cranes as if it was directing a single engine on an individual crane.”
He wrote the necessary lines and ran a couple of simulations using the Book as a test platform.
“Success!” he said out loud, and then realized his sense of accomplishment was more than a little premature – the program modification was the easy part. The actual wiring of the Cranes together and making them function as a single unit constituted the bulk of the challenge, and was something he’d never done before. He’d hacked individual Cranes but that was a orders of magnitude easier - a complicated problem, not a complex one.
And he only had two hours left in which to do it.
Dirk removed the control unit from the nearest Crane and jacked it into the test unit in order to load the program into its flash memory. He deleted the existing program, verified the root drive contained only the new program and that the routing was correct on startup. “That’s all I need – not!” he said to himself. “The motherboard looking for the old program because I didn’t modify the directory.”
He double checked the directory and then quickly gathered up all the connection cables he could find. Although only four were required, he brought all of them in case one had a fault, a fairly likely eventuality considering the Cranes had not only experienced a difficult descent through the Martian atmosphere, but had been exposed to the elements for months before Dirk arrived and began his salvage/modification activities.
Tom and Radius were tightening the last bolt on the Cranes when he arrived.
“To get these any tighter we’d have to weld them together,” said Tom.
“The play in the connections is actually good – too brittle and it could break up on launch,” Radius said.
“Sweet!” responded Dirk. “Then I need to wire these up,” holding up the mess of cables.
Tom laughed. “How about I untangle that mess while you get started.”
“Thanks,” said Dirk.
Mr. K walked up.
“Hi, Dad.”
“Hey guys, I was thinking,” Mr. K said, acknowledging Dirk’s greeting with a smile. “Should we shield the Cranes somehow from the coma, the envelope of burning gas and steam that surrounds the comet?”
Dirk looked at his dad with a suddenly sad expression.
“I should have thought of that!” he said. “The control circuitry I’m modifying will melt before we get close enough to the comet to affect its trajectory.”
“Exactly,” said his dad. “But I think I have a solution that will satisfice. The packages are wrapped in a protective fabric, right?”
“Yes,” Radius said.
“We’ll wrap the top of the Cranes in the fabric, leaving openings for the rocket engine exhaust,” Mr. K said.
Dirk thought for a moment. “That will work,” he said. “It will add some weight, but not a significant amount.” He smiled, relieved. “Nice catch, Dad!”
Mr. K smiled. “I’m glad I thought of it now, and not as the MegaCrane falls out of the sky after the coma fries its electronic control systems.”
“I’ll collect the blankets,” Radius said and headed off to the ‘junk pile’ behind the largest garage where they kept the extra stuff that they had so far failed to find a use for.
Dirk climbed onto the MegaCrane and began removing the covers to the electronic controls.
“Can I help with that?” Tom asked.
“Sure,” said Dirk. “Open up each of the controls so I can wire them together. I’m using this one as the control unit. Let’s refer to them as Alpha, Bravo, Charlie and Delta, moving clockwise.”
As Dirk began fiddling around with Alpha, Tom and Mr. K removed the covers from the other three Cranes, placing them back on loosely to keep out the dust.
Mr. K handed the screws to Dirk who carefully placed the screws in his zippered chest pocket.
“Thanks, Dad,” Dirk said absently. “And Tom. But there is a problem – I can’t see a way to connect multiple Cranes – there are not enough ports.”
“What do you mean?” said Tom.
“The processor sends a control signal to each of the engines for steering purposes. For example, it will add more thrust to the right engines if it is falling too fast on that side, or conversely, reduce the thrust if the reentry turbulence is causing the Crane to heel over too far to the right. Since it is fundamentally a braking system, that is all the steering it can do.”
“Yes,” said Mr. K. “That is what we expected. We only to have shift the comet’s trajectory – just about any change will suit our purposes.”
“Yeah,” agreed Dirk, “But the problem is that the rocket controls are hard wired, and there is only one open port, the test port. I thought there were going to be multiple extra ports. I was going to program each Crane to act as a single unit, including this one, and then port the Bravo, Charlie and Delta into Alpha, replacing the individual rocket inputs from Alpha with the inputs from Bravo, Charlie and Delta.”
“So you can’t attach the other Cranes,” finished Tom.
“Precisely,” said Dirk. “And I don’t have any ideas on how to work around it, and we don’t have time!” Dirk’s positive mood had entirely evaporated.
“Let’s go into the Control Tower,” said Mr. K, “and look at this on the white board.”
“We’re out of time!” Dirk exclaimed.
“We have time. Remember what Abraham Lincoln said. ‘Give me six hours to cut down a tree and I’ll spe
nd the first four sharpening the ax.’ In time compressed situations effective prior planning is even more critical,” his dad said, heading for the Tower.
“Come on, Dirk,” Tom said. “We’ll figure it out.”
They passed Radius, who was loaded down with hastily folded blankets, as they walked to the tower. Tom filled him in on the problem.
“I’ll drop the blankets off and join you in 6.4 minutes,” Radius responded.
Mr. K turned on the white board and had already started sketching by the time Tom and Dirk walked in.
“Dirk, you should grab another water,” his dad said.
“I’ll take one too,” Tom said to Dirk. “And get one for your dad.”
Dirk grunted in response and mumbled, “We are wasting time here.”
Mr. K ignored the mumbling and continued sketching. He drew four rectangles, one in each of the corners of the screen, to represent the component Cranes of the MegaCrane and a question mark in the middle.
“Our task: figure out how to connect the four Cranes to act as a single unit. So what is the root of the problem we face now?” he asked the group as Radius walked in.
“There is not a quick way to link the other three units to the Master unit, Alpha. I could rewire them, but that requires more time than we have,” Dirk said dejectedly.
“So what is the problem formulation?” his dad asked again. “And what is the root cause of the problem? We must have perfect clarity on the nature of the problem we are trying to solve.”
They all thought for a minute, though Dirk’s thoughts were less than productive. “This is a waste of time,” ran through his mind like a mantra.
Tom spoke up. “To function, the MegaCrane requires a router that will send the appropriate signals to the engines on each of the Cranes.”
“Yes,” agreed Mr. K, waiting for more.
“Integrating a router into the control system in order to shift the comet Water Balloon’s trajectory with the MegaCrane, is essential,” Radius said.
“An elegant formulation,” Mr. K smiled, and wrote it on the board.
Tom approached the board. “What possibilities exist for a router? What can we use as a router or tweak to create the same functionality? Shout it out if you think of anything. Dirk, are there any other parts on the rockets that we can use, maybe in the wheel control system?”
Distracted from his mantra by Tom’s question, Dirk shifted his thoughts to more productive activities, at least for that instant.
He visualized the wheel control system. “They are all individually electric motor driven. There is a control system, speeding up and slowing down individual wheels for turns and increasing traction, but it is integrated into the main control – it is all done through software, so there isn’t any hardware that we can repurpose.”
“Tom,” Mr. K said, “Is there anything on the Ship we could use?”
Tom thought for a moment, and began writing down the names of equipment and systems on the Ship as a way to stimulate his memory.
“Or maybe a pump controller in the greenhouse?” Mr. K suggested.
“Yeah, maybe, hold on,” said Tom, thinking.
Dirk stood up and wandered aimlessly around the Control Room, examining the Crane schematics in his mind’s eye. He’d messed around with the Cranes so much he didn’t need to check the Book. “But maybe I should check the Book,” Dirk thought. “Maybe I’m overlooking something.”
“I’m going to get the Book from the garage,” Dirk said, walking out.
“Ok,” said his dad. Tom and Radius were too deep in contemplation of the problem to bother answering.
Dirk looked up, wondering if the comet was visible. He didn’t see the comet, but far to the West saw a bright spot in the sky. “Is that it? Is it so close already?”
He sped up, entered the garage, and grabbed the Book off the workbench.
As he walked back to the Control Tower it hit him – the solution. The only solution that would work in the time they had available – but he couldn’t even suggest it.
(67) Day 30 1430 (1 hours 30 Minutes) Dirk’s Horrible Idea
Tom continued writing on the white board as Dirk walked in. Mr. K, spinning slowly back and forth in the main control chair, stared through the canopy at the sky. Radius stood searching his own (internal) copy of the Book for ideas.
Dirk was profoundly disappointed – after the idea came to him, his hope that someone else had arrived at a different solution became overwhelming, the emotional equivalent of an approaching sneeze. He physically wanted Tom, his dad or Radius to yell out an alternative. “Eureaka!” they’d scream with joy. “Let’s implement this now!”
But only his dad looked over at him as he entered the room. Tom was clearly not any closer to a solution than he was when Dirk left, and Radius looked as he always did.
“Maybe the comet will go off course on its own,” he thought suddenly, and went over to the main terminal to check the atmospheric conditions.
Calm. Perfect weather for a delivery. He heart sank further.
“Checking the weather?” his dad asked.
“Yeah,” said Dirk. “No luck there.”
“No, I’ve been compulsively checking it myself, hoping for a cyclone,” he said with a rueful smile.
“Dad, come outside with me. I have an idea.”
“Great!” his dad hopped out of the chair. “Fantas-“
“No, Dad, keep it quiet,” Dirk said, with a sideways glance at Radius.
“Ok,” his dad said, and led he way out of the Control room.
“So, what is this idea?” his dad asked.
“Its bad, really bad,” said Dirk, afraid to look his dad in the eye.
“Spit it out – we don’t have a lot of time. Don’t be embarrassed, get all the ideas out. As they collide we may come up with a better one – it is all part of the brainswarming process.”
“I don’t mean that it is a bad idea in that it is not fit for purpose, but that it is an evil idea.”
“Say it, son.”
Dirk took a deep breath, his eyes on the ground. “We can use Radius.”
His dad opened his eyes wide in shock. “What do you mean?”
Dirk continued to look at the dirt at his feet. “The control system for the 4337 type is compatible with the Cranes. The connectors are the same, and they use the same language. We can wire Radius into the Cranes and he can serve as the router.”
His dad thought a moment. “We can back him up.”
Dirk was confused. “What?” he said, looking at his dad.
“We’ll copy Radius’ memory to the Control Tower computers, and then download him into a new unit. This body will be sacrificed, but he will be reborn.”
This made Dirk feel a little better, but not much.
“How do we tell Radius?” Dirk asked sadly.
“He has probably reached that conclusion already,” his dad said, “But if he hasn’t he’ll be compelled by the logic of it and volunteer.”
They returned to the Tower.
(68) Day 30 1450 (1 hours 10 minutes) Implementing an Unpalatable Solution
“Guys,” Mr. K said, “Dirk has arrived at a solution, an unattractive solution, but one that I believe is our only realistic option.”
“What is it?” Radius asked.
“Yeah, what is going to save the Martians?” Tom chimed in.
Dirk sighed, and looked at Radius. “We can use you, Radius. You are compatible with the Cranes…”
Silence.
“That’s crazy,” Tom protested. “We cannot allow our favorite Robot, our friend, who ‘bent’ the First law to protect T2, get roasted by a comet.”
“The Laws pertain to all life,” said Radius. “I’ll do it.”
“I’m sorry, Radius,” Dirk said with a catch in his voice. “I can’t think of anything else. But we’ll back you up!”
“Yes,” his dad added. “We have plenty of memory within the Tower??
?s systems. We’ll back you up completely, and then reinstall you into one of the ‘embryos’ in storage.”
“Very well,” said Radius. “Let’s begin.”
They stood there uncomfortably for a moment. Tom walked up and shook Radius’ hand. Dirk, dejected walked over to Radius and stood facing him. Suddenly he smiled.
“Ok, Radius, please power down – it will speed up the download if we do it in the maintenance mode.”
“Very well,” said Radius.
“Lay down on the table, please,” Dirk said.
Dirk helped Radius climb up, and when Radius was flat Dirk said, quickly, “Please initiate power down.”
“Initiated,” said Radius, and closed his eyes.
As soon as he powered off, Tom spoke up.
“Dude, that was cold! You didn’t say goodbye or anything!”
“I didn’t have to say goodbye, because we are not going to use all of Radius, only one part,” Dirk responded with a happy smile.
“Fantastic!” said Mr. K. “But which part?”
“I remembered when we replaced his leg that it didn’t work immediately because the control signal goes through a router in the back of his neck. The router has a memory of its own and ‘learns’ the specifics of each limb in order to control them appropriately. It is the source of his ‘muscle memory’. It conserves processing power by freeing his main brain from doing the bulk of the body control work. The brain gives the basic direction, and this router figures it out and directs the limbs to move in order to implement the direction signal.”
“So we only need his router!” Tom said, relieved.
“Yeah, and I plugged the new leg into it before, so I know how to get to it and the connections it uses. I was thinking Radius’ brain had to do the controlling, but then I realized that we can wire the router into the basic navigation system and control it that way. The Book will run the program, the signal will go from the navigation system to the Book, and from the Book to the router to the engines.”
“Brilliant!” said Mr. K. “And Radius will be here with us!”
“Help me turn him over so I can access the router. Then we’ll put him in one of the control chairs so he can help me with the intercept,” said Dirk.
“Gladly!” said Tom enthusiastically.
(69) Day 30 1515 (45 minutes) Awakening
The usual black screen with the initialization code streaming by appeared before Radius’ ‘vision’ or more precisely, the sensory pathway that delivered data primarily based on light. That first screen was the only one that he ‘read’. The other information he simply accessed. The initialization screen was a relic of humans viewing the startup code to discern errors. The legacy function proved its utility as an error message flashed on the screen: “Mobility control failure”.
Radius waited for the initialization process to finish and ‘normal’ vision resume. He wondered where he was. “Am I the reinstalled me or the me on the MegaCrane? If on the MegaCrane, this will probably be a short, but interesting, experience. Too bad I will not be able to review it later,” he thought. “We are going to lose all this data. The Tower will of course record the bulk of the datastream, but not from my immediate and intimate perspective.”
“Curious,” Radius thought, as he saw the familiar Control Tower dome with the various Crane landing trajectory zones marked in grease pencil above him.
“Hi, Radius!” Dirk said, walking into his view. “I had to get another grease pencil- we’re going to mark the intended track of the comet so I can see if we are shifting it sufficiently. Are you sufficiently awake to access the proposed track and help me graph it?”
“Yes,” Radius said. His normal connection to the network came online and he accessed the track data. “180, 80; 160, 82; 140, 81; 120; 70; 100; 60; 80, 40.” Dirk, standing precariously on the other chair, drew a line described by the points on the dome.
“Thanks, now I can track it visually. We only have one chance, and help is welcome,” Dirk said.
“How are you feeling?” he continued, standing directly in front of Radius.
“Fine,” Radius responded. “What is the status?”
“Oh, yeah, sorry. I removed your mobility router – that is why you can’t move. We’ll get you another one from storage after we deal with the Water Balloon. The comet should be here in about 30 minutes. We optested the MegaCrane – optest complete, optest sat. Now it’s time to review the energy mobility equations. If you guide me during the intercept, and let me know when to go to full thrust then I think we can knock the baby away from Tharsis Minutus!”
“So I am not a copy?” Radius said.
“No! And I’m super happy about that, I must say. I think the distinction between soul and body has been exaggerated – you are everything you and that body have done and I’m glad all of you, almost all of you, is still here.”
“Thank you,” said Radius. “The Control Tower picked up the comet on the long range radar.”
Tom and Mr. K came into the Tower.
“Dad, Tom, you guys have got to get out of here! We picked up the Water Balloon on the long range radar,” Dirk said anxiously.
“No, I’m going to stick around with you guys and see this through,” Tom said.
“That is an admirable sentiment,” Mr. K said, but you have multiple responsibilities that trump your desire to be here.”
“But…” Tom started to say.
“No time to argue,” Mr. K responded. “I won’t risk the Chief Engineer.”
Tom sighed. “Ok, you’re right.”
He walked over to Dirk and stuck out his hand. “Good luck man, I’m sure you’ll make it happen.”
Dirk shook his hand – “Thanks, Tom, I’ll see you, Mandy and T2 later.”
“See you later Radius – I’ll ‘visit’ the supply depot and get you a replacement router.”
“Thank you,” said Radius.
Tom left, and Dirk looked at his dad. “Dad, aren’t you leaving too?”
“No, I’m staying here to help you guys.”
“But Dad…” said Dirk.
“Son, if anything happens to you (such as getting obliterated by a comet) I want it to happen to me too. But I don’t think that is going to happen, and by being here to assist you I’ll be able to increase the probability that it doesn’t. We don’t have time for discussion, so you review those mobility equations with Radius and I’ll check the MegaCrane one last time. I want to double check the thermal shielding we jury rigged.”
“Thanks, Dad” said Dirk. “Ok, Radius, I’m going to pull up the mobility equations. We are going to have to trade altitude, vertical movement, for horizontal if we have to make any corrections for the intercept. Please make the calculations and tell me what to fire to make the course corrections.”
“Roger,” said Radius. “We have ten minutes to review before the comet will be in range of our short range radar, and in 12 minutes we launch the MegaCrane.”
“This is going to be a short review,” Dirk said, staring at the Control Tower Book in his hands.
(70) Day 30 1557 (3 Minutes) The Comet Arrives
“Dirk, 3 minutes to launch,” Radius said.
“Is it still tracking on the predicted path?” Dirk asked, hoping it was off course in a non-City threatening way.
“Yes,” said Radius, without elaboration.
“This is it,” Mr. K said. “Do you need any water or anything Dirk?” he asked.
“No, Dad. I feel too nervous to eat.”
“Have a sip of water at least,” his dad said, handing him a bottle.
“Thanks,” Dirk said, not looking up from the Book. He took a small sip and then a longer drink – he was actually thirsty.
Dirk climbed into the control chair and grabbed his customary controller.
“Hey, Dad, could you please run out and give me a thumbs up if the control indicator on MegaCrane gives a green receipt signal indication?”
“Sure,” his
dad said, jogging out of the room. A few seconds later Dirk saw him by the MegaCrane, and hit the “test” button on the controller. His dad signaled back, and Dirk felt a little better. They’d tested it earlier, but he had the irrational fear that it had broken between the last test and now.
His dad hustled back into the Control Tower.
“Standby for launch,” Radius said.
“Remember,” Radius continued, “We are not going to impact Water Balloon head on – we rendezvous and then just before we impact make a sort of hooking maneuver so that we contact the comet at the same speed – it is a meet, hook, chase, connect maneuver.
“Yeah, ok, ok,” concurred Dirk.
“However, the maneuver must be executed quickly and confidently – we lack enough fuel for a long tail chase – you must hook closely, and then immediately accelerate into the comet and give it all we’ve got to push it slightly up and away, affecting its trajectory enough to miss Tharsis Minutus,”.”
“Water Balloon in visual range,” Mr. K said quietly.
“Prepare to launch,” said Dirk. “Radius, I can execute the maneuvers, just tell me when – you have better insight into the time and distance than I can figure out with the grease pencil or even looking on the radar.”
“Roger, Dirk. As we discussed,” said Radius.
“You are ready – you can make this happen!” said Mr. K enthusiastically.
Dirk watched Water Balloon as it began to track along the line he’d drawn on the dome and took a deep breath to keep from throwing up. He felt like he was in the final minute of a Games deciding set of thrusters, falling further behind the leader.
(71) Day 30 1555 Exploration at Tharsis Minutus
Ailani paused at the spot where she’d found the strange equipment. Nothing, not even impressions in the wet soil, indicated anything unusual.
She activated her lantern and continued.
Slowly, she climbed up the slope through the increasingly dark tunnels – the bioluminescent lichen cultivated to light the tunnels was not present, since they had stopped using this part of the tunnel over a generation ago.
The change in atmosphere when she passed through the tight turn in the tunnel was immediately noticeable. She’d never felt air like this before, and had to stop for a minute to catch her breath. It was not the normal air she was accustomed to – it felt thinner, and much, much colder.
Ailani, slowly, continued up the tunnel. “Perhaps grandfather was the last one here,” she thought.
He’d told her about the distant tunnels after their extended family festival last year. “In the old days, when I was a boy, we left our home once a year to go to the Great Festival. There the young men met their wives, and the girls their husbands. Some came back home with us, and others stayed with their new clans,” he’d explained.
“Why did you stop,” she had asked.
“I don’t know,” he said, thinking back. “We simply stopped going. I was very disappointed, but no one ever explained. Perhaps it was because our clan size had decreased so precipitously? I don’t know.”
As she walked up the tunnel, one hand on the wall for reassurance, Ailani thought she knew why – “This is terrifying!” The thin chill, and the increasingly strong movement of the air was like nothing she’d ever experienced. Fighting the urge to run back down the tunnel, she continued on.
“Light!” It was getting brighter, but it was not the bioluminencese to which she was accustomed.
Continuing around a curve she suddenly stopped, covering her shut eyes with her hands against the painful brightness. After a minute, still keeping her hands over her eyes, she opened one slightly, barely enough to see. Peering between her fingers, she allowed her eye to adapt to the light level and walked slowly forward. More by feel than sight she knew she had reached an opening into a space larger than any she had ever imagined.