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Section 8: The Spark of Life
Chapter 6: Small Steps
Victoria do Sul reminded Jane of something out of a military recruitment ad. An especially bombastic military recruitment ad. The type of ad that involved ballsy men, ballsy women, lots of explosions, and uplifting music. Hell, do Sul looked like the type of person who'd directed those ads.
"So remember, you're all operating alone in your designated areas. We've got six months on this rock and I don't want to waste a single minute of it."
She even talked like someone out of the USIF. Even the way she stood, hands behind her back, her single eye casting its gaze over the shuttle's occupants, was like something out of a holo-movie.
"But even now, OBL-eleven has some surprises. So remember to send updates. One every fifteen minutes. I'll be remaining on station in case one of you sorry sods needs help."
Jane wondered if do Sul were a man, she'd have said "ladies."
"Are we clear?!"
Affirmation rippled through the shuttle.
"I said, are we clear?!"
"Yes ma'am!"
Jane remained silent. And when do Sul's single eye lingered on her, she suddenly found the floor much more interesting.
"Approaching landing zone," came the pilot's voice. "ETA, five minutes. Air decompression will begin in two."
All the terraformers reached for their helmets. All but Jane put them on.
The helmet's glass was clear. She knew that as soon as she put it on, text would scroll across it informing her of everything from atmospheric composition to temperature. In the suit's in-built backpack was everything she needed to conduct tests for life, including whatever Clarence had given her.
Clarence…
"Something wrong?"
Jane looked up. Do Sul looked down at her, in all her one-eyed, scarred face, intimidating glory.
"I'm…fine," Jane murmured, fingering her helmet and refusing to meet the terraformer's gaze. "Just…well…."
Do Sul yanked her to her feet. "Woman up sweetheart. In ninety seconds you'll be sucking vacuum. I'd rather not have a corpse on my hands yet."
And would it bother you if you got one later?
Jane put her helmet on. It sealed with a hiss. Her HUD was yet to be activated, so she could still see do Sul's features.
"First time?" her commander asked.
Jane murmured an affirmation.
"Well tough shit."
Jane started to turn around. She didn't want this. Not from do Sul. Not from anyone. She wanted to bring life to the stars, not be sandwiched between Clarence on the ship and do Sul on the other. Who grabbed her on the shoulder and forced Jane to face her superior again.
"I know your background Miss Anne," do Sul said. "I know you're a newbie. I know you probably thought flying out to the stars was the best thing that ever happened to you."
"You could say that," Jane murmured.
"Well, it won't be," do Sul snapped. "The best thing that'll ever happen to you is when you settle down with a lifetime of cruddy work behind you, able to relax and watch as other people go through the same shit."
Jane raised an eyebrow. "That's a bit cynical isn't it?"
"Decompression in thirty seconds."
Do Sul chuckled, though it quickly turned into a spasm of coughing.
"Decompression in twenty."
"Cynicism keeps you alive, newbie," do Sul said, after recovering from the bout. "Idealism didn't save me from these burns and a lost eye on Bellerephon. And it sure didn't stop hydrogen sulphide from entering my lungs on the moons of Tau Bootis either."
"I'm sorry," Jane said.
"Don't be. Save your sorrow for when it happens to you."
"Decompression in ten."
Jane turned round to face the exit hatch and grabbed one of the overhead hooks. Beside her, do Sul did the same.
"Was it worth it?" the elder terraformer asked.
"Can't this wait?" Jane hissed.
"Just answer the question newbie."
Jane sighed. "I don't know."
Do Sul remained silent. Jane glanced at her, and saw surprise flicker through her remaining eye. She suspected that she hadn't received the response she was expecting.
"Beginning decompression."
"I mean, I wanted this," Jane said as the air left the shuttle's passenger section. "Really. I wanted to go out into the universe. Spread life." She snorted. "Play God. Or gods. Or do whatever deities are said to do, and give out the spark of life. Over decades rather than six days of course, but who's counting?"
"You'll stop counting eventually," do Sul murmured.
"But…I dunno. I mean, I've heard so much," Jane continued. "Seen so much. I've been asked…" She fingered her backpack, wondering if she should mention Clarence and the "job" he'd given her. "I don't know anymore."
Do Sul snorted. "You will. You'll eventually make up your mind."
"And what conclusion did you reach?"
"That it's not worth giving a shit. We screwed up Earth. We call it fixed, but it's not. And we'll do the same on every other planet we touch. We're humans. Fucking up is all we can do."
"So why do you do it?" Jane asked.
"Because I don't care."
The shuttle lurched. "ETA to LZ is…seventy-five seconds," said the pilot.
"But hey, if you care, that's great," do Sul sneered. "You tell yourself you're building better worlds. You tell that to everyone who dies out here. You tell that to every lifeform that doesn't get to climb the evolutionary ladder. Tell yourself that as long as you want to."
Jane remained silent. Part of her…the old her…wanted to point out that the evolutionary ladder was a fallacy, that evolution actually worked more like a tree. But the old her was as silent as the new her. The new her who kept her eyes on the exit hatch, and wondered, not for the first time, why she was here. What she was doing. And what she'd gotten herself into.
"ETA in forty-five seconds."
Guess I'll find out.
At ETA thirty seconds, the ship lurched again. At ETA fifteen seconds, Jane could hear the thrusters working overtime, making the final reduction in velocity. At ETA minus five seconds, the ramp started opening. And as the zero was reached, do Sul barked "everyone out." And everyone obeyed, marching towards the swirling dust before them.
"Welcome to hell boys and girls," do Sul's voice crackled in Jane's radio. "Give the devil my regards will you?"
Jane kept walking. She walked out, and didn't stop walking, instead heading straight for her assigned sector.
Maybe this was Hell, she reflected.
If so, as the shuttle doors closed, the gates to Heaven were locked up tight.
It was said that Hell hath no fury like a woman scorned. Jane didn't know. She was too tired to feel scorned, and if OBL-11 was indeed Hell, it was lacking fury of its own.
Her HUD registered the temperature at 93 degrees Celsius. Over the last few hours, it had never gone higher than 96, or lower than 90. She felt tired and sweaty, but it was more from the physical ordeal of walking from one site to another for hours on end than the temperature itself, which her suit protected her from. Even the wind wasn't too bad. The temperature of the planet was quite uniform, so while the wind still blew, it would never approach the level of the type of storms found on worlds with large temperature variations such as Earth or Atlas. Not unless the planet was terraformed. Which, after carrying out inspections of four sites, seemed quite likely. No signs of life, or even organic matter. Nothing but dust, dirt, and a human whose suit was covered in both.
And yet Jane kept walking. Her mouth dry, her forehead covered in sweat, her HUD flickering signals that gave her information she was past caring about, she kept walking. Following the topographic map displayed on her visor – the only piece of information that really mattered anymore. To the fifth site she had to inspect. She sighed, her breath briefly misting up on her visor.
Great.
Site 5 was coming up, looking just like sites 1 to 4. A pool of bubbling water, fed by an aquifer located below the surface. It bubbled not because of internal heat, but because of the temperature around it. The type of place where life could conceivably emerge from, and ergo, the terraformers were required to check. As in, perform a quick chemical analysis and bio-scan, then move on. It was basic, not very thorough work, but after the last few hours, Jane couldn't care.
So she walked over to one of the rocks surrounding the pool. She sat down on it and got out the gear from her suit's pack. She glanced at the top-right corner of her HUD as it flashed a red light.
Crap.
She stood up and put her gear on the rock behind her. Check-in time. do Sul's way of ensuring she didn't have to use the shuttle for anything else bar command and control. The light turned green.
"Anne, Jane."
The light turned red again. The terraformer turned around, back to the rock and the gear. She lifted it up, ready to-
Wait a minute.
A cross. There was a cross on the boulder.
Clarence…
How hadn't she seen it, she wondered? When she was walking over to the pool. Maybe she'd been too tired to care, she wondered. Maybe it had been too obscure. Then again, this boulder could have moved somehow since the mark was made. And as she ran a finger through the indentation, she knew that there was no way nature could have caused this. Nature wasn't so precise.
So…what now?
The terraformer postponed the question as she walked over to the pool, set up the kit, and stuck out the tube-like samplers into the water. She could call Clarence. But part of her didn't want to. She just wanted to get the job done, get up to the ship, play some cards, have a shower, then wake up tomorrow morning knowing that she'd have to go through the same routine over the next month, then likely help with atmospheric processor maintenance over the next five. She-
Your trial by fire, Jane. You want a future in Worldbuilders Inc.? You want Cairo to keep you on, even as more qualified people vie for positions? Then get down there and contact me when you find it.
…heard Clarence's words in her mind.
Why this pool had warranted the mark, she didn't know. As she got out the kit Clarence gave her with one hand, while adjusting her radio frequency with the other, she wondered about the possibilities. Buried treasure? An alien artefact? Nothing at all? Maybe this was just a way of hazing her, of ensuring she was dedicated to the job. Either way, she sent out the signal.
"Jane?"
"Hey Clarence, it's me," the terraformer said, sitting back down on the boulder. "Found the cross. I'm no Jim Hawkins, but-"
The kit flipped open. Inside were a trio of vials, each with the letters "EtO" on one side, and text on the other side that said EtO was highly concentrated, lethal, and adapted to be applied to a liquid solution.
"Ethylene oxide?" Jane asked. "What-"
"Pour it into the pool Jane," Clarence said hurriedly. "Do it."
"Huh? Do what? Clarence, you-"
"Do it Jane!"
"Clarence, these are sterilization chemicals," she exclaimed. "What? You trying to dispose of them or something?"
"Just pour them in the pool and get moving Jane. That's an order."
"Clarence, I…"
Jane trailed off. A green light on the bio-scanner was flashing.
"Hold on a minute."
She closed the kit Clarence had given her and walked over.
"Jane, what is it?" Clarence asked, his voice high pitched.
"Hang on a sec."
"Jane!"
She knelt down. The green light was flashing on the kit's display. Below it was a chemical reading
"ATP," Jane murmured, reading it out aloud.
"What?" Clarence exclaimed.
"Adenosine triphosphate," the terraformer said. "It's a chemical. Released by archean bacteria through chemiosmosis. It…oh my God…"
"Jane!"
Two words had appeared below the chemical reading. Two simple words. One noun, one verb. Yet staring at them, unable to believe it, Jane realized that the ramifications were as non-simple as could be.
LIFE CONFIRMED
"Jane, what's happening?!" Clarence shouted. "Talk to me!"
Jane stepped back. She barely heard him.
LIFE CONFIRMED
"Jane!"
"Clarence, I…" Jane collapsed down on the ground, her rump hitting a protruding shard of rock. She barely felt it. "Life, Clarence. There's…there's life here." She giggled. "Clarence, I've found life!"
It all felt worth it, she exclaimed. Life. Out here, so far from home. She'd found life. In this bubbling pool of water, no different from any other…there was life. So small. So insignificant compared to her. Yet here, on an alien world, confronted by confirmation that Earth was not the only world who could give rise to biological matter…she felt dwarfed by it…
"Life, Clarence…life…"
"Pour the chemicals in."
And suddenly, all the feeling of wonder was gone.
"Pour the chemicals in Jane," Clarence said, his voice as hard as stone. "Do the job."
"Clarence, what…what are you-"
"Pour the chemicals in Jane. Sterilize the site. Then walk away."
"Clarence…the hell?! Why are you-"
"Complete the mission Jane. Do it. Sterilize it."
"Clarence-"
"Now."
In that moment, Jane felt small again.
But for all the wrong reasons.
A/N
I'd actually originally envisioned Jane and Victoria driving in a single land vehicle together, and writing the the first section from Victoria's POV. Still, scrapped both - the dropship made far more sense in the context of letting each terraformer go it alone, and two writing courses plus two years of writer's group meetings has changed my POV on...well, POVs. It's counter-productive to introduce a new POV so late in the story when the character isn't going to get another beyond that.
