Leviathans of Jupiter (36 page)

NANOTECHNOLOGY LABORATORY

Franklin Torre's normally genial expression was lost in a puzzled, almost suspicious stare.

“And just what is it you want down here?” he asked Rodney Devlin.

Devlin was wearing his usual white cook's T-shirt and baggy pants, immaculately clean this early in the morning. He grinned as he looked from Torre to his sister, standing next to him, and then took a quick scan of the nanotech lab. Small, he thought. More like a kid's playroom than a proper laboratory. The two people facing him were both in white lab smocks. They looked enough alike to be twins. Or clones.

Janet Torre mistook Red's silence. “You
do
realize this is a nanotechnology lab, don't you?”

Devlin nodded briskly. “That's what they told me.”

“So why are you here?” Franklin asked again.

With a careless shrug, Devlin said, “Well, you're new here. I'm sort of like the station's unofficial meeter and greeter. I'm sorry I haven't come down to say hello earlier. Been kinda busy, dontcha know.”

“I don't understand,” said Franklin.

“Have the folks here been takin' good care of you? Is there anything you need?”

“Such as?” Janet demanded.

Devlin kept his sunny smile in place, although he was thinking that this would be much easier with the guy by himself instead of the two of them together.

Shrugging again, Devlin replied, “Oh, stuff the paper pushers can't supply for ya. Entertainment vids, maybe. Or certain foods—”

“Lobster,” Franklin Torre exclaimed.

Devlin blinked. “Lobster?”

“At Selene we can have a lobster dinner anytime we want,” Torre said.

“Aquaculture,” Janet explained. “They have big fish farms at Selene. Shellfish, too. More protein per watt of energy input than meat animals.”

Scratching his head, Devlin said, “Well, I can requisition some from Selene. Might take a while, though.”

“I like lobster,” Torre said.

“Anything else?” asked Devlin. “Technical supplies, personal items…” He hesitated, then in a slightly lower voice went on, “You're a long way from all your friends. Maybe you need some VR simulations.”

Janet arched a brow at him. “You mean sex?”

Trying to look innocent, Devlin said, “Well, yeah, if that's what you have in mind.”

Torre glanced at his sister. The two of them were grinning slyly. “No,” he said to Devlin. “We don't need sex sims.”

For once in his life Devlin felt embarrassed. “Well … if there's anything you do need, anything at all, you just call on ol' Red. I can cut through all the regulations the paper shufflers put on ya.”

“Thank you, Red,” said Janet.

Changing the subject to what he really came for, Devlin said, “So this is a nanotech lab, eh?”

“It's sort of rough and ready,” said Torre, “but, yes, this is our nanotechnology laboratory.”

“We never had one here before,” Devlin said, taking in every detail of the room. “You must be here for something special.”

“That's right,” Janet said. And nothing more.

“Aren't nanomachines dangerous?” Devlin asked, all innocent curiosity. “I mean, I've heard stories…”

“Everything's perfectly secure here,” Torre assured him. “We have all the necessary safeguards in place.”

Devlin said, “Sign out in the hall said something about UV lights.”

“That's to protect against any nanos that might get out of the lab,” Torre explained. “Ultraviolet light kills them.”

“Deactivates them,” Janet corrected. “They're machines, not organisms.”

Torre nodded at his sister.

“So there's nothing at all dangerous in here?”

Torre stepped over to a domed stainless steel chamber sitting on the lab bench. “The only dangerous thing is in here,” he said. “When we first construct the nanomachines they're undifferentiated, not yet specialized for a specific task.”

“If they got loose at that stage there could be trouble,” Janet added. “We'd have to flood this area with high-intensity UV.” She pointed to the lights hanging from the ceiling.

Gobblers, Devlin thought. They're talking about gobblers. But he didn't mention the word to them, didn't want them to get the slightest bit suspicious.

“So what happens to 'em?”

Tracing a finger along the pipe leading from the domed chamber to a smaller, square container, Torre said, “The undifferentiated nanos are fed in here, where we reshape them and program them for the specific task they're designed to perform.”

Janet pointed to the display screen at the end of the workbench. “You can see them here.”

Devlin followed the pair of them to the screen. It showed a half-dozen shapes that looked to Devlin like little mechanical toys, each with two grasping arms attached to its main body.

“That's them, huh?”

“That's them,” said Torre, with some pride in his voice. “They'll seek out molecules of a specific shape and take them apart into their constituent atoms.”

“Atoms! They must be pretty small.”

“The size of viruses. A couple of nanometers across.”

“Wow!”

Janet Torre looked at her wristwatch, then said, “Actually, we do have a lot of work to do.…”

“Oh! Sure!” Devlin backed away from the display screen. “I'm sorry for gettin' in your way.”

Torre walked him toward the door; his sister sat on a stool by the display screen and turned it on.

“I appreciate your takin' the time to show me around,” Devlin said.

“That's okay.” Then, glancing back at his sister and lowering his voice, he said, “Can you show me some of those VR sims you mentioned?”

Acting surprised, Devlin said, “The sex sims? Sure. Any time. Just come and see me in the galley. Any time.”

“Uh, can you tailor them? Put specific people into them?”

“Who'd you have in mind?”

“Well, there's this girl from the Belt … her name's Deirdre Ambrose…”

Devlin's surprise was genuine now. “You know Dee?”

“We've dated a couple of times.”

“So you want simulations of her, do ya?”

“If you can do it.”

With a nonchalant shrug, Devlin said, “I'll see what I can do, Frankie old boy.”

Torre grinned and ushered Devlin through the door. Once outside in the passageway, the Red Devil grinned also. I've got the layout now, he told himself, and there's no real security in there. Scientists. They think everybody's honest.

LAUNCH PARTY

The largest conference room in the station's first wheel had been cleared of its furniture by Katherine Westfall's assistants, except for the long conference table, which had been pushed against one wall and loaded with drinks and trays of finger foods.

Red Devlin stood at one end of the table in a spanking clean white outfit, smiling benignly at the crowd of scientists, engineers, technicians, and administrators who crowded the room. The wall screens displayed views of Jupiter as seen from the station, and scenes of the leviathans recorded by the robotic probes that had been sent into the ocean.

Katherine Westfall, the party's hostess, stood by the door, graciously greeting each new arrival. She wore a splendid gown of shimmering blues and indigos that shifted and sparkled with each move she made. Grant Archer and his wife stood beside her, smiling and chatting amiably.

Deirdre was off in a corner, feeling self-conscious from the feeding port that had been implanted in her neck. She knew that her high-collared dress covered the site, but still felt that it bulged noticeably. She glanced at Dorn and Max Yeager, standing beside her; their shirts covered their ports completely. Andy Corvus, standing halfway across the room deep in conversation with one of the launch controllers, scratched unconsciously at his port.

Andy and Max had both been shaved bald. The mission protocol required it: Living for days on end in the perfluorocarbon meant that all excess hair had to be removed from their bodies. Andy looked like a scrawny newborn chick without his thick mop of red hair. Max somehow looked nobler, wiser, more serious, almost like a bust of some august Roman emperor. Dorn, of course, had no body hair to shave off.

Deirdre had put off her own shearing to the last possible moment. She dreaded losing her thick shoulder-length auburn locks. At least she wouldn't have to go completely bald, Isaac Lowenstien had told her.

“You can go with a buzz cut,” the head of the station's safety department had allowed. “That'll be good enough.”

When he saw the unhappy expression on Deirdre's face, he tried to console her. “Hey, you're lucky. In the old days they depilated you completely, head to toe. Took months to grow your hair back.”

Deirdre thought that it was scant consolation.

A petite woman in a form-hugging jade green jumpsuit stepped up to Yeager, smiling brightly at him. Deirdre noticed that she had a splendid crown of radiant golden curls.

Tipping her fluted glass toward Max, she said, “To you, little father.”

Yeager looked embarrassed, but touched his glass to hers. Turning to Deirdre and Dorn he introduced, “Linda Vishnevskaya, mission control chief.”

Vishnevskaya said, “You are going on the mission with Max. Take good care of him, please.”

Deirdre thought that the woman was slightly drunk. She herself was drinking only fruit juice; she didn't want alcohol in her bloodstream, not with the mission launch less than forty-eight hours away.

“We will take good care of each other,” Dorn replied, very seriously.

“Of course, of course,” said Vishnevskaya. Patting Max's shoulder, she went on, “But Max is very special. He cares about his ship like a loving father.”

Yeager's face reddened noticeably.

Standing at the end of the laden conference table, Red Devlin watched the partygoers with professional interest. Food's holding out all right, he said to himself. Archer unbent enough to let me rustle up some faux champagne and rocket juice, but nobody seems to be getting sloshed too badly. Of course, the night is young.

He saw that Grant Archer had moved slightly away from Mrs. Westfall and was deep in conversation with Dr. Johansen, the scientist who headed the group studying Jupiter. Mrs. Archer and Westfall were yakking away at each other like old friends. Funny, Devlin thought, how two women can both talk at the same time and keep the conversation going without missing a beat.

Michael Johansen was still less than happy with Archer's decision to send Corvus and the other three on the mission.

“That ship was built for scientists to go into the ocean,” he was telling Archer, raising his voice just enough to be heard over the chatter of the crowd.

“We've been through all this, Mike,” Archer said gently. “The decision has been made. And implemented.”

Shaking his head, Johansen said, “You can still add a man to the crew. One scientist. There's room—”

“I'm sorry, Mike, but the answer is no,” said Archer. “This mission is strictly to see if Corvus can make any meaningful contact with the leviathans.” He hesitated, then added in a lowered voice, “And to see if the ship works without killing anybody.”

Johansen frowned. “You're wasting an opportunity to acquire more scientific data, Grant. Corvus isn't going to get bubkes, you know that.”

Archer grinned at him. “You've been hanging around Ike Lowenstien too long, you're starting to speak Yiddish.”

“This isn't a joke, Grant.”

More seriously, “Only God knows what Corvus will accomplish, Mike. I don't know and neither do you. That's what research is all about. If you already know the answer, you're not doing research.”

Johansen's long, angular face settled into a gloomy pout. Even Katherine Westfall, halfway across the crowded room, could see that the scientist was displeased.

Westfall turned back to Marjorie Archer, who was still going on about some biochemical studies she was undertaking. “Would you excuse me, Marjorie? Now that everyone is here I ought to offer a toast to the mission's success.”

Marjorie looked more relieved than displeased. “Oh. Of course. I've been bending your ear long enough.”

“Not at all,” said Westfall. “Not at all.” But she stepped away gladly and headed toward Rodney Devlin, who was still standing at the far end of the table, like a sentry in a white apron.

Devlin saw her coming and recognized the little nod that Westfall gave him. He quickly poured two champagne flutes. Handing them to her one by one, he said, “This one's for you, ma'am, and this one's for Ms. Ambrose.”

Smiling knowingly, Westfall took the glasses and made her precarious way through the crowd toward Dierdre, Dorn, and the others. Devlin was right behind her, clutching three more of the long-stemmed glasses. Westfall handed one of the flutes to Deirdre as Devlin passed out the other three to Yeager, Dorn, and Corvus.

Then Devlin emitted an ear-piercing whistle that stopped every conversation dead in its tracks.

Into the sudden silence, Westfall said in her little-girl voice, “I want to propose a toast to the crew of the good ship
Faraday
: May you find what you're looking for.”

Everyone in the crowded room raised their glasses and repeated the toast. Deirdre, Max, Andy, and Dorn smiled appreciatively and sipped.

That's a good girl, Westfall said silently as she watched Deirdre down her faux champagne. Drink it down. The nanomachines will do the rest.

IV

THE MISSION

Did He who made the lamb make thee?

—“The Tiger”

William Blake

IMMERSION CAPSULE

This is it, Deirdre said to herself as she ducked through the small round hatch and sat herself on the padded bench that ran around the interior of the circular chamber.

She waited for one of the men to make a comment about her skinned scalp. The buzz cut was hardly a centimeter long; Deirdre felt almost naked. She had nearly cried when she saw her beautiful auburn curls piling up on the floor as they cut her hair away.