Worlds Spinning Round: Part 2: Decisions

By T. E. Greene

Mike Wallingford volunteered for a dangerous assignment, a diplomatic mission beneath the red-hot soil of Venus. Locked alone in a sealed container to reach a tunnel headquarters that is far more that in seems, Mike must brave heat, pressure, radiation and the suspicions of a native clan struggling for survival. Mikes friend Ellen, bewildered by their recent encounter with the reclusive hill people and weakened by a mysterious illness, is devastated by Mikes friend Ellen, bewildered by unexpected action. Neither suspects they are being cleverly manipulated. Back on Earth, a developing plot could leave the Venture project stranded without supplies or a way off the hostile planet.

• Language: English
• Publisher: AuthorHouse
• Release date: Jun 21, 2012
• ISBN: 9781452037721

T. E. Greene

T. E. Greene lives in Connecticut with his wife and frequent visits with their children. He holds a masters degree in computer science from Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, a teaching certificate from Eastern Connecticut State University and a bachelors degree in mathematics and general science from Barrington College. Moving on from a career teaching high-school math, science and computer programming, he enjoys music, coaching, travel and research "in just about anything." Current projects: fractal-based structures and a computer-generated timeline. "Math you can’t use is just pretty."

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© 2012 by T. E. Greene.

All rights reserved, including the right to reproduce this book, or portions thereof, in any form. No portion of this book, including the text, cover, artwork, graphics and inline fonts, acknowledgements and dedications, may be reproduced or transmitted by any means, electronic or mechanical, without express, written permission from the copyright holder. Permission is granted to use brief quotes for the purpose of educational reference or literary review.

Published by AuthorHouse 05/18/2012

ISBN: 978-1-4520-3770-7 (sc)

ISBN: 978-1-4520-3771-4 (hc)

ISBN: 978-1-4520-3772-1 (e)

Library of Congress Control Number: 2012907560

Any people depicted in stock imagery provided by Thinkstock are models, and such images are being used for illustrative purposes only.

Certain stock imagery © Thinkstock.

Because of the dynamic nature of the Internet, any web addresses or links contained in this book may have changed since publication and may no longer be valid. The views expressed in this work are solely those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of the publisher, and the publisher hereby disclaims any responsibility for them.

Cover design by Sarah L. Greene

Map by Jonathan T. Greene

Front cover landscape photo by T. E. Greene

Cover graphics are based in part on images courtesy of NASA/JPL-Caltech. Thank you for making this vast treasure house of knowledge available to the public.

Contents

Part Two–Decisions

Preface

Acknowledgements

Cast of Named Characters from Discoveries

Glossary of Terms from Discoveries

1. Underground

2. None of the Above

3. Crisis of Response

4. Tangled Webs

5. Declarations

6. Treks

7. Crack in the Sky

8. Shell Air

9. Wolves among Sheep

10. Generations

11. Regeneration

12. Nevertheless, It Moves

13. Inside Loop

14. Slingshot

15. Contract

16. Bumps in the Night

17. Teamwork

18. Punching the Envelope

19. Through the Wall

20. Bringers of Colds

21. What Is Good

22. Shadows

23. Coverage

24. Responsibilities

25. Sheep among Wolves

26. Sacrilege

27. Justice

28. Balance of Forces

29. Extended Forecast

30. Out of the Frying Pan

31. Times Together

Preface

This volume is the second in a trilogy. It may be read as a separate work if Volume One is hopelessly unavailable by the time you read this, otherwise I would recommend starting at the beginning.

While the events and characters in this book, with the exception of obvious, historical references, are fictitious, this work was based on factual research and checked by specialists in their various fields. However, much of the material is speculative, as is the nature of science fiction. Any errors, therefore, are mine, and mine alone.

Volume Two contains about half the material not included in the first volume from the text of the original, single-volume version (unpublished) first put to paper beginning in 1978. The expansion became necessary due to implications of discoveries made in the interim, what if questions that could not be given proper treatment between two book covers and which would not be left unasked.

The world has been changing rapidly. Already, Volume One contains more than a few scientific and technological anachronisms for no other reason than the passage of time. I have been trying just to keep up with writing about possible, future events before they happen. Sometimes, I am able to catch a change in progress. For example, the original darkroom scene in Discoveries was reset as the historical version portrayed by Ellen to Mike. Of course, when it comes to general principles, the more things change, as they say, the more things stay the same. So bear with me when a future event or invention has already come to pass. Or if something came out differently or not at all. That is part of the risk of the adventure that is science fiction.

Many of you will disagree with one or more of the ideas that are expressed in this book. You may even find errors in my use of the background material. I hope so. This writing is intended as a springboard for constructive discussion, the exchange of ideas, not the last word on everything. The collision of ideas is the foundation of creativity, after all.

I know there are bound to be mistakes in here. Well, non-fiction writers are entitled to upgrades. Maybe this is the solution to the literary, post-partem blues. In any case, if I held out for perfection first, nothing I write would ever get published. Who knows? There could be a second edition.

I would love hearing from you.

Readers’ comments may be directed to:

[e-mail]

or through the publisher.

Readers’ comments may be read at:

http://totalcontext.net/thoughtpool/

Acknowledgements

First of all, I would like to thank all the friends who allowed me to bounce ideas off them in putting this story together. I am especially grateful to those who consented to examine the text regardless of whether it might agree with their own views. Their expertise included, but was not limited to: aviation, biology, chemistry, computer science, English, ethnic culture, geology, law enforcement and youth services, law, linguistics, mathematics, mechanical engineering, music, nursing, science research and teaching in various disciplines.

I would like to thank Carmen McKinney for continuing to put up with all this for over a quarter of a century, Loretta, Melissa and Judy for reading on into this volume long before there was any chance that they would see the ending anytime soon, and Tracy Whipple, who couldn’t wait to read the first third of the second manuscript. Special thanks go to my daughter Sarah, who provided her own growing expertise on one of the conditions I had researched for this volume, also to numerous medical staff whom we besieged for details far beyond the call of normal consultation. Likewise, to the members and friends of the Navajo Nation who continue to chip away at my hopefully diminishing ignorance of the more-subtle aspects of their society and customs. In addition to those mentioned elsewhere, I would like to thank Betty House, Leonille Kadambaya and Russ Stewart for their valuable insights.

This volume and its intended sequel became necessary when a question arose in my mind over certain implications of Venusian geography. I couldn’t ignore the implications, once the question arose, nor would a proper treatment fit into a single volume. My son Jonathan had already given me the key to splitting the work into a trilogy when he said during the writing of the original story, You have to have bad guys.

Another acknowledgement I could not have included in Volume One without giving away too much of the plot goes to the staff at Barrington College whose philosophy that the continued examination of the facts will strengthen support of the truth has formed a major basis for my own investigations. Notably, Harold E. Snyder, my department chairman, provided the initial impetus for this story with the assignment six years earlier to teach a biology lab that concluded with a question of how extremes of environment might affect the forms of life on another planet.

Second, and this isn’t really an acknowledgement of anything but the discovery of a couple of apparently kindred spirits. In 1997, David Grinspoon made a request in his book, Venus Revealed, that someone write a story like the one I began in 1978, most of which is now Volume One of this trilogy. If it had been possible for me to read his book back then, I’m sure I would have made some changes. But the story is firmly begun, and on we go. Also, shortly after completing the first volume, I discovered Melissa’s husband John showing some children in a parking lot just after sunset how to spot the planets and explaining their motions in much the same way as I did in the book. He kept his balance quite well during the demonstration, although a couple of the kids looked wobbly (see Grinspoon, p. 4). She had proofread the manuscript thoroughly by then (Acknowledgements, Volume One), but I doubt that his evidently relentless research schedule left him enough time to more than glance at the cover on his way by. Hopefully, these encounters mean that there are a lot more of us.

Finally, I want to (again) thank my wife Lynn who was still by my side every minute of this writing.

To all the Mike Wallingfords of the world—who go where angels might fear but fools would never find—we, often unknowingly, owe you a great debt of thanks.

Cast of Named

Characters from Discoveries

Glossary of Terms

from Discoveries

WSR-Decisions%20Map.jpgWSR-Decisions%20Map.jpg

Chapter One

Underground

Mike Wallingford stood balanced in his armored pressure suit on an insulated pad fitted into what was currently the bottom of a heavy-walled, steel alloy chamber. He was sealed in as not even the most paranoid coffin-nightmare victim had envisioned. Beneath ninety-two atmospheres of toxic pressure, an undetermined depth of Venusian soil, glowing orange at five hundred Celsius, lay above him. He could not see the glow, except what showed around the edge of the cover that protected the three small viewports overhead. Two ports at his waist level, one before and one behind him, had been used originally to allow a medical scanner to examine a native patient, but for this mission had been covered with heavy alloy plate and welded shut against abrasion and the reversed, outside-in pressure. Around him, the invisible soil Mike could hear scraping slowly by the chamber would have held the shell-like cover plates shut firmly enough to keep him from ever getting out had they not already been sealed and bolted from the outside. Somewhere nearby, he hoped, his construction supervisor and friend Anton Petrov rode in an identical vessel. The objective of this madness was an underground visit of Anton and Mike to the Tunnel of Meeting of the Venusian Clan Mizhban.

The plan had called for testing the pressure chambers three times before the actual descent, the first two unmanned. The first required native diggers to tow the chambers in a horizontal direction just beneath the surface of the ground, the second, a vertical run to the Tunnel of Meeting itself in order to confirm that the pressure chambers could be made to reach their destination and return while preserving the Earth-normal environment within against the weight and heat of the soil overhead. Translated, Mike thought nervously, an occupant would have survived. The third experiment was set up as a manned repetition of the first, horizontal test.

The sand squall had changed all that. The third test had been canceled when conditions on the surface became too dangerous for humans to remain outside the two fortress-like crawlers assigned to support the mission. Despite successful completion of the first two test runs with the living-space environments monitored by an unoccupied pressure suit inside each chamber, uncertainties remained. Human-excavated tunnels aside, this was the first time humans had descended beneath the surface of the planet Venus.

If only that were the sole matter occupying his mind. Ellen McFarland, the woman to whom he had proposed marriage not a week ago, had held back and seemingly distanced herself from him, because, rumor had it, of attraction to another man, the expedition doctor, Ed Shigamatsu. Not even a triangle, the relationship had become more like a sandwich with Ellen both positioned and caught between levels of age and of education. A clear enough choice, to his tortured mind. Nevertheless, Mike preferred being in his own dangerous condition, totally helpless, rather than in Ellen’s apparent dilemma.

At the moment, Mike’s suit was running slightly but measurably warmer than the values recorded by the unmanned suits. The change in operating level did not appear to pose an immediate threat, but any anomaly bore watching. One could get very and quickly dead down here.

He would have to watch whether the rate of consumption by his suit’s fuel cells increased appreciably as the suit worked harder to maintain its original temperature setting, since fuel supply was the limiting factor to the time of the visit. His suit bore two high-pressure, liquefied-gas tanks, one filled with hydrogen for the fuel cell, the other with oxygen shared between the fuel cell and his need to breathe. There were six spare oxygen tanks racked along the sides of the pressure chamber’s interior, enough, counting the one he was already using, to last about a week with active filtering. There were only two hydrogen spares. The suits were not expected to exert themselves much while underground, except for refrigeration.

Well, let’s see, what’s different from the unmanned tests? Himself, for one. He gave off heat. The test suits had been empty. So, how much of an effect could his body temperature have? Would it be enough to affect the air temperature in the chamber outside his suit? Mike checked the readout. Warmer than the inside of his suit, but no less livable than a hot summer day. He called up, on his suit’s computer, the profiles of the unmanned tests in order to see a side-by-side comparison of temperature over time and got an unpleasant surprise. There was no data for chamber temperature.

Of all the things to leave out, he grumbled. Then he remembered. The unmanned tests had been made with vacuum in the chambers to increase the pressure difference with the outside, a safety factor before committing people to the mission. There were no readouts because vacuum has no temperature, just like space.

That could account for the temperature difference. Vacuum is also an insulator. Air conducts heat, not as quickly as metal, certainly, but a factor to deal with nonetheless.

It seemed, then, that since the air surrounding his suit was warmer than the air surrounding him, the majority of the extra heat was being conducted to the suit from the soil outside by the air in the pressure chamber and by any contact he made with the insulated walls of the chamber itself. He could increase chamber cooling, but that would use more fuel. Mike became very careful not to touch any of the ceramic-fiber-covered metal with anything but his armored and over-gloved fingertips, and then only for balance on his insulated boots as the pressure chamber scraped and shifted and sank deeper.

Mike could only guess at the temperature outside. Attempts had been made to mount external thermocouples that would be not only sensitive to changes in soil temperature but also sufficiently well-protected to survive the scraping action of the packed soil. The result was a surrounding flange that both shielded and limited the sensors to reporting a rough average between the residual temperature of the ever-present chamber exterior and that of the changing soil sliding past.

In a similar way, Mike reflected, caves on Earth, in response to average climate conditions, were generally cooler than the summertime temperatures that brought the tourists who visited underground. On Venus, the average was the air temperature, with variations so slight over a day measured in months that only a thermal imager or maybe a digital thermometer could tell. The only other factors were related to the planet’s interior, which just made the subsurface hotter, but not the same in all places. Perhaps due to the depth of the soil at this location, the temperature had not risen noticeably after the first thirty minutes of the descent. Mike hoped the lack of change would continue.

The pressure chamber tilted slightly as the natives outside made a small course correction or avoided a buried rock or switched duty assignments as even their incredible stamina must require. Mike had no way of knowing, no way to ask, no way to receive an answer.

At the moment, Mike was feeling a desperate urge to talk with somebody, anybody. Even a suit-gyro-stressing palm slap with one of the low-built, heavy-framed natives, hydraulics against seemingly iron-bound muscle of obvious origin—if they dug like this all the time—would be welcome. He could call Ellen’s name at the top of his lungs for all the good it would do. Maybe it would help his frustration. No one would hear him. On the other hand, if he let himself go that far, he might start screaming and not be able to stop. So he went back to forcing slow, deep, regular breaths, one at a time.

Almost out of mental resources, Mike thought back to the last meaningful communication he had initiated with another person before the departure for Earth of the Venture expedition’s deep-space ship Serendipity for supplies.

John Travers had listened carefully, as he always did, while Mike told of his family’s situation brought on by his father’s sudden unemployment and explained his idea of sending them part of his deferred salary.

Good idea, John replied when Mike had finished, but it’s a short-term solution. Why don’t we start with your plan. Then we’ll see what it takes to get your father a decent job. Good accountants are always in demand. Would it be alright for me to send him an invitation to apply for a position in our Denver office?

Mike, in spite of twenty months of surprises, was mildly startled. You’d do that?

Why not? They’re your family. Venture is closer to being a family than it is to being a company the way the world in general views such things. Besides, this is not a made-up job. We need more people. He still has to interview for it. But I don’t think that will be a problem. Who knows? With your sister in college, your mother might be interested in doing something, too. Maybe part time, as she is now.

That was an interesting thought. Mike also couldn’t think of any problems with their moving. They had moved often. They had no particular ties to the area where they now lived. The only objection Mike could think of was one his mother would make. His sister Sam would soon be no longer living at home, but the college was only a couple of hours drive from there. Moving the household to Denver would alter that arrangement severely. Then again...

It’s certainly worth a try. Thanks, John. Mike left the psychologist’s cubicle not-quite consciously aware of a subtle but significant change in their relationship.

Speaking of changes in relationship...Mike had picked up the folded and tape-sealed note he had found on his customary co-driver seat in the crawler Turtle as they were heading out to the site of the first test, but had not had a chance to look at it, or so he had told himself. It was from Ellen, if the way Mike was written was enough of an indicator. Well, no better time to read it than during this descent. He had absolute, total privacy, unless Anton’s idea of God could see through meters of solid dirt—and an hour, at least, with nothing to do but worry.

Mike immobilized his suit arms in a bracing position and pulled the note from his shirt pocket. He broke the seal and held the paper against the instrument panel, the only place inside the suit both far enough for him to focus on and still in line-of-sight.

Dearest Mike, the inside of the note began. Mike’s insides squirmed as if entering free fall. This was a strange way to start a goodbye. It did not help that Ellen’s voice was just as clear in his mind as if she stood next to him.

"This may seem a strange way to thank you for thinking enough of our friendship to want it to become something more. In some ways, it already has. I feel, Mike, as if I have known you a very long time, almost as if we already shared something when we first met. I think we still do, more now than ever.

Perhaps this note is the best way to talk to you right now, although it wouldn’t have been my first choice. I want to see you again soon, schedules or not. Mike looked at the date and time at the top of the note—Ellen was a scientist, after all—and blinked in surprise. This message had been left for him before his first perception of trouble between them, before he had overheard that unwelcome rumor. Perhaps she had not been avoiding him as he had come to think.

"The odd thing is, Mike, that for perhaps the first time in my life, my mind is filled with uncertainties, none of them about you. It’s not even about the hill people, although that’s when it all started. It was Anton, Sally and Doris, anticipating their every move and endorsing everything they said. If what I was taught is true, then what they did is impossible. So where does that leave my whole world?

"I want you in my world, Mike. I want to know what that world will be. I want us to be in the same world. Please get back to me somehow: link, note, tell a friend, anything. I miss you.

"All my love,

Ellen

All my love. Somehow, Mike knew that Ellen was not using a figure of speech, that she meant the phrase literally. She also did not mean it the way his sister did. He swallowed deeply. Then she had been waiting for his response. For over a week. The rumors could not be true. It was his move, and there was nothing he could do about it.

Mike’s tear-stained face and ragged breathing would not have seemed to match his expression. Perhaps secure in the knowledge that no one could possibly see or hear him, he broke down. Oh, Ellen. And there was no possible way to contact her.

Ellen McFarland could not sleep. It was not the location; the mobile laboratory she and Mike had named the Turtle was a second home to her. It was not the storm; the low hiss of sand pushed against the crawler’s armored shell by the sluggish flow of the superdense air was already diminishing. It was not even Mike—beyond the inexplicable behavior over the past week of her more-than-best friend, in variance with the known facts. For example, allowing alien natives to bury oneself alive under the pulverized-lava soil of this furnace-like world without consulting anyone was not what Ellen considered normal behavior. Especially not for Mike.

She was scared for him, she admitted to herself. She was afraid for their relationship. She missed him terribly. But the world she knew was coming apart. Without a frame of reference, she had no way of coping with the waves of change that threatened to overwhelm her.

Ellen bit back a quiet sob in the darkness. Others were hopefully asleep in the close quarters of the bunkroom, which occupied three-fourths of the stern section left over on the upper deck by the laboratory space. The adjacent fourth was the bathroom.

Ellen slipped quietly out of her bunk and padded to the connecting door. The flatpanel readout was green, unoccupied. Once inside, she brought the lights up from full dim just enough to see and activated the tiny shower, opted for flow, steady; volume, light; texture, between fine and needle; temperature just a shade past medium-hot. Soon after the tears began, not even Ellen could distinguish them from the tempered onslaught of the recycler.

Variance with which facts? Was she sure of a contradiction? Did she lack vital information, or had she overlooked something? Perhaps something she didn’t want to accept. Occam’s Razor was being wielded like a machete in a rainforest this off-shift—she was afraid of cutting herself. On what? she half-cried silently. The truth? The explanations she had long accepted generated too many complications to best fit those known facts. The simple explanation was unacceptable. So, she told herself firmly, there must be additional, relevant facts. Okay, what are the relevant facts? And what don’t I know?

Well, Mike wants to marry me. At least he did. I said that I’d love to, but we need to talk first. Then I don’t hear from him for a whole week, and he pulls this stunt. Could my response have pushed him that far? Over an edge no one can see but me?

Has he cut me off, or is he sending me a message? Is he retreating in confusion? Or is he depressed?

Then why, she wondered, hasn’t Anton seen it? Or John Travers? Master psychologist was an understatement. He would never have let Mike go out like this if he knew. Or is there something I still don’t know? she asked herself again. When the storm ended, she told herself, she was going to start some careful investigating.

Alma. The name froze her motionless in the swirling steam. The chief scientist had been behaving atypically over the same week. Could there be a connection? Venture sponsor Theodore Fredericks’ paternal niece had apparently not been feeling well, observation seemingly confirmed. Yet the timing was strangely coincidental. What could have affected both Mike and Alma?

There were those Zezmulites again. Mike had been badly shaken by the incident, as had Ellen. Alma had not been present, although usually in touch by radio link, both voice and telemetry. She had reacted adversely to discoveries before, when they had threatened her worldview. She and Ellen had disagreed professionally on a number of other occasions, but this time Ellen could identify with the likely source of her supervisor’s conjectured distress.

It all seemed to boil down to a single incident in the hill people’s oral history. A native who had claimed divine origin, or something, had been lynched by a kangaroo court of off-duty officials of a puppet government. The upstart movement those bureaucratic paranoids had sought to quell should have dispersed with the death of its leader. Instead, far beyond post-mortem martyr veneration, the assertion that the deceased had returned from the dead—that is, alive—which would have verified the self-proclaimed identity that had caused the split with the parent status quo in the first place, had generated an unprecedented wave of religious fervor instrumental in eventually overturning the culture of the entire region.

Ellen shook her head. All the establishment needed to have done, she reflected, was to exhume the corpse from its well-guarded burial sandpit to kill the legend along with its originator. Rather, they had resorted to bribes and innuendo and more killing. It hadn’t worked. That meant, she realized, that, if the legend had any basis in fact, including the evidence unwittingly provided by the acts of opposition, they didn’t have the body. Also explain, a little voice seemed to say, the inconsistency of dozens, even hundreds of self-proclaimed eyewitnesses dying fanatically for what they knew to be a lie.

Okay, so Earth had a similar legend. Maybe any species would make up something like it, sooner or later. But then, Ellen complained almost fiercely, along came Anton and his group. They seemed to know the legend already, even though they didn’t know the culture or the history. The more detail we uncovered, she brooded, the more accurate their predictions of what kind of things we would find next. As if the cultural aspects of both stories were just an overlay to an underlying, common reality.

But—Ellen felt her knees weaken from fatigue, heat and emotional disorientation—if the pattern of details agreed even more closely than the surface-level stories (underlying reality was also reality, after all), then both legends must be true. Otherwise, there must be a hidden discrepancy somewhere. Ellen knew she had to find out. Suzy was right. The resolution of this issue was pivotal to the rest of her life—and her relationship to Mike.

Self-doubt crept upon weariness, undetected at first. Was she up to an honest assessment, regardless of the outcome? Either way her conclusions came out, the cost could be tremendous. Everything she thought she knew, her whole outlook on life, weighed against her peace of mind and her intellectual and emotional self-respect. Even Mike—the thought hit her like a club—her relationship with Mike could not be a deciding factor in her determination any more than she could have justified influencing him to stay on Venus. Moreover, she no more knew his current mental state than she understood her own. Inwardly, she began to collapse. She would have to be willing to let everything go. Even Mike. Otherwise, she would never again be able to face herself in the mirror or the small hours of the night. And she would never be sure of anything ever again.

Totally exhausted, Ellen cut the water and triggered the moisture scavenger. The sound of her slippered movement obscured by the faint whir of the sensor-deactivated fan, Ellen dimmed out the lights and tiptoed back into the bunkroom. She was asleep before her head settled deep into the pillow.

The pressure chamber tilted again. This time, it did not return to an upright position. Mike braced the arms and legs of his hydraulically powered suit to hold its armored body away from the interior wall before him as it gradually turned once again into a floor. Mike speculated that he might be nearing the end of his journey although nothing else happened for several minutes except the continued scraping of sand outside.

The past hour had given him time to think. Too much time, actually. The imminent danger of being baked alive had faded into a constant, no more of a threat now than in the preceding moment, nor the moment before that, less of a disturbance than the issues that had plagued him even before they had been locked in together with him in his isolation as confrontational cellmates in this mobile tomb.

Ellen. She was never far from his mind, nor from his heart. But the greater problem that faced him was hers, also. He could not make up her mind. She could not make up his. They could certainly discuss the issues, when he got back. However, it would be wrong for either to base a decision on the other’s, and futile. Personal conviction was, by definition, just that, whether or not it was arrived at privately.

That meant, he realized, that she might not arrive at the same conclusions as he did. Or not at the same time. In either case, their relationship would be plateaued at just good friends, no more, and possibly less. They could not spend the rest of their lives working toward divergent goals.

Mike saw no alternative. Failure to resolve this crisis of belief honestly would compromise their relationship for the rest of their lives, perhaps as long as forever, if Anton’s claims were true.

But could they be true? Some serious investigation was in order. Given Mike’s state of mind, no other kind was possible. Serious was redundant, as in, The man fell off the tall building. His situation was becoming serious. Except perhaps to the man, who was heard by the window washer to say, So far, so good. Mike was resolved that, if the ground existed, he would not be the next greasy smear on the sidewalk.

He could play it safe. It would be better to think that there was some existence after this life and never find out he was wrong than to insist, as he had until recently, that this was it and be unpleasantly surprised.

No. He could not do that. Hedging his bets was not belief. Nor was it intellectually honest. He had to live with himself. He had to know.

Anton had said that it was possible to know.

Everyone has a threshold where the evidence would be sufficient. Then one has to decide what to do about it, one way or the other.

The pressure chamber tipped past horizontal with a mild crunch. Mike re-braced for his now-head-downward position, still unable, for the moment, to retrieve the package of food concentrates that tumbled, past his front faceplate, from where he had dropped the cup-sized meal earlier. The tilt continued to increase for several more minutes, then the chamber settled level. The crunch of sand ceased. The viewport cover flipped up to reveal a beak-prowed native face glowing dully red. Beyond was the red-orange of a massive stone arch fronting the hollow of a half-domed interior wall.

A gesture from the native to others unseen preceded the chamber’s being turned. Mike could now see down the length of the vaulted hall that must be the Tunnel of Meeting of the Clan Mizhban.

Mike, are you there? Anton’s voice. They had both made it. I have a small problem. An irregular vibration told Mike that tools were being applied to the bolt heads on the outside of his chamber. He checked his suit hatch and instruments.

What kind of problem?

One of the disconnects to a hydrogen tank was leaking, and I had to reset it, the foreman replied. I don’t know how much of the gas got into the pressure-chamber airspace. For some reason, my analyzer isn’t giving me consistent partial-pressure readouts. When they open the chamber and the air-hydrogen mix hits the high temperature outside, there could be an explosion. I may be able to pump a little of the air out, although one atmosphere against ninety-two is nearly all the pressure difference this pump will handle. I’m already running the active filter, but this unit is much smaller than the ones we use in the dome. I don’t know how long it will take to reduce the hydrogen concentration to a safe level. I’m also scavenging out the oxygen, but that will take even longer. Removing either gas completely would be enough; removing part of both will help.

Mike was also recovering the oxygen from his chamber’s air mix. Ideally, only nitrogen and carbon dioxide would be left in any significant amounts. In actuality, the less of a substance remained, the slower the rate of removal. The working rule had been established that the time the natives needed to open a chamber would be long enough to save most of the oxygen; it would have to do.

Anton’s problem was twofold: Would the gas mixture still be combustible when the chamber opened? How did one tell the native mechanics to slow down? They were clearly getting better at their work with practice, using tools designed for human hands. Mike tried banging on the chamber wall next to the viewports. The nearest native nodded seeming understanding, and the group redoubled its efforts.

The external speakers used during testing had never been part of the chamber structure itself but instead had been separate, short-range radio transceivers. They would have survived neither reentry from space nor being towed through the ground. The nearest units were at the surface above the Clan Tunnel, presumably on board one of the crawlers as protection from the storm.

We could tell them to bring a transceiver down from the surface in a pressure case, Anton quipped apprehensively, but how do we tell them?

First we’d have to get Chief Mizhban’s perm... Mike began, then realized the irony of his companion’s statement. They could talk to each other, sealed away separately though they were, but not to people outside, human or not, who lacked radios.

Mike had another thought. Too bad you can’t block the pressure-relief valve. Then they couldn’t get the chamber open even with the bolts removed. The twin shells of the chamber were held together like a pair of wet suction cups by many tons of atmospheric pressure.

The pressure-relief valve? But it can also be opened from the inside. Mike, you’re a genius!

Mike didn’t feel like a genius, whatever a genius felt like. What he felt was confused and fearful. You’re not going to open the valve yourself, are you? What an explosion inside the confines of the pressure chamber would do to Anton even inside his armored suit, he didn’t want to find out.

Think this through with me, Mike, Anton asked. "If I let the outside air in very slowly, it will cool from decompression as it enters the chamber, and the scrubber will have time to take out most of the corrosives. By the time the pressure rises enough to minimize the refrigeration effect, the hydrogen will be so diluted in the native carbon dioxide that it will not be able to burn fast enough to cause an explosion. I need to start now, or the riggers outside will open the valve too far before it’s safe.

If anything happens, talk to Doris. Anton paused briefly. Mike could visualize the big man turning his suit on its side to reach the valve control. Actuating valve now.

Doris Hunter opened her eyes in the darkened bunkroom of the Turtle. She had heard the padded footsteps, Ellen’s by the sound, return from the bathroom and climb into a bunk. The soft whir of a ventilator accompanying the brief opening of the access door suggested a shower. A shower preceded by sleeplessness and followed by great weariness. Ellen was smitten, there was no doubt. That, and something more.

But it was Anton to whom her thoughts were drawn. Not their most-recent conversations. An urgency. Be very sure I need it, therefore... Doris made her request, was answered by peace. Not a guarantee of specific events, but assurance of a plan under control. The sometime-chemist extended her petition to cover her fellow scientist sleeping nearby and drifted off to a land of ancient villages and stony hills.

Are you still there? Mike’s anxious voice rang in Anton’s suit speakers.

I’m doing fine, Anton replied. Inexplicably, he had placed the free hand of his armored suit around the inflow port as he activated the flood valve control for the minimum possible opening. He was not sure he had imagined a momentary flicker of blue within the curl of the fingers of his cupped hand. Nevertheless, he kept the hand in place as the slowly diminishing partial pressures of hydrogen and oxygen were supplemented by many times their value in carbon dioxide.

A creak of gaskets told him he had not acted too soon. The pressure in the chamber was approaching Venus-normal although the temperature had not yet risen much above Earth-standard room temperature due to the length of time the cooling equipment had had to flush the heat of the native air entering the chamber. The slow rise in chamber pressure was not a factor in the final, average temperature as it was balanced by decompression of the air on entry. In fact, Anton noted with some surprise, the suit hand that covered the inflow tube was coated in ice from the drop in pressure at that location.

Mike saw the native technicians move to open Anton’s chamber apparently just out of Mike’s line of vision. Unable to do more than hope, Mike fought an urge to hold his breath. Lifting motions were followed by a sudden retreat before a rolling billow of white mist that quickly dispersed, pursued by a lick of blue flames reaching out in every direction.

Mike’s attendants immediately backed away from his own chamber. Unable to get himself out, Mike strained helplessly for any sign of Anton’s fate.

I’m okay, Mike. Anton’s voice came in over the foreman’s suit channel instead of the chamber link. It worked. No explosion, and the fire just helped to bring the air spilling from the chamber up toward local room temperature. Anton’s pressure-suited figure stepped out into Mike’s view. Look, my glove has ice on it. Mike could see the shiny remnants sizzling into steam. I am glad that the chamber’s upper shell was opened before the hydrogen caught. Gave it someplace to go.

Anton turned to the native group gathered some distance away and explained that it was safe to let Mike out. Reluctantly at first, they returned to complete the task. Relief was evident when Mike’s chamber refrained from emulating its predecessor.

It seems, Anton told Mike, "that they have never seen anything like that before. I am starting to wonder that perhaps they do not know about fire, although they certainly understand heat. Their references to volcanic eruptions do not automatically imply knowledge of combustion, but of higher-than-local temperatures. There are very few substances that will burn in a carbon dioxide atmosphere, even with some corrosives thrown in.

By the way, I’m recommending installation of wire-mesh enclosures over the inflow openings. Anton related his experience with the inflow tube. The mesh would draw heat away from any flame, just as my suit glove may have, as well as even out any temperature differences remaining after decompression. I don’t think temperature was the problem this time. Remember the ice. I think something in the remaining corrosives reacted with the hydrogen. The mesh would hopefully allow that reaction to take place safely within the enclosure, just as with the mantle of a miner’s or camper’s gas lamp. What impurities remained would be well-dispersed by the time they made it into the living space.

In spite of Anton’s analytical approach, Mike was shaken. You could be dead right now.

Possibly true, Anton seemed calm enough, if my suit’s airseal had failed from the gas lighting off with the pressure chamber still closed at the time. But it didn’t, and there’s no use worrying about the past, only learning from it so as to prevent similar problems in the future. Let’s button the chambers up before they overheat along with our food. The delegation is forming.

The two humans needed only to lower the top shell on each chamber. Fastening the bolts was unnecessary for now and perhaps counterproductive. Mike and Anton would need to return to the chambers at intervals to access the food cases.

While closing the covers, Anton and Mike took the opportunity to check that both data recorders were functioning properly and that the relays from the suit recorders were also working. Four points of view, two stationary and two mobile, should provide a wealth of detail for later analysis.

The pressure chambers and their recent passengers were located near one end of the main tunnel. As the humans turned from closing the shells, Chief Mizhban and First Assistant Zedvol approached to a point halfway down the centerline of the tunnel from the nearest of three round platforms spaced down the middle of the hall.

At least we’ve seen this done before, Anton radio-linked to Mike. As the two Venusians had advanced together, Anton and Mike did likewise, Mike crossing behind Anton as they walked in order to line up with Zedvol’s position.

Anton initiated a palm-slap, Mike imitating him closely. They were in this together, that was for sure. The eyes of their counterparts widened in surprise, then the large heads nodded and the slaps were completed. Even though the pressure suits interfered with actual body contact, thus rendering the gesture merely symbolic, the promise it represented was still binding by established contract.

[We welcome you to the Tunnel of Meeting,] Mizhban intoned in the language of the Clan, somewhat briefly, it seemed to Mike, as if the Chief were uncharacteristically in a hurry. [The Witness of Two or More is about to begin. The witnesses will speak from the center platform. The Cross-Examiners will speak from the far platform. The acting Keeper of Customs will preside from the near one.] A dozen Venusians filed in along a ledge-like platform connecting two arched openings based at its level along one side of the tunnel and matching for length the span between and including the round platforms it faced. [The Council,] Mizhban explained. [They will determine what truths are borne out by the testimonies. I will base any executive judgments on their conclusions.]

The platforms along the other side of the tunnel were shorter and separated, one per upper-level arch. Two groups of two or three natives, one usually much larger than the others in the group, emerged from each opening. Taking position near the ends of each platform, the groups were evenly and noticeably spaced. [The Storytellers and their attendants. They will remember the testimonies of the witnesses and the conclusions of the Council and also provide recountings of these and other records as required by the Cross-Examiners. The witnesses will enter from the lower arches. So that you may return to your chambers as needed without causing distraction and also provide your own responses and statements after the initial testimonies, it is best that you remain as near to your present location as will allow you to clearly observe the proceedings. The Cross-Examiners will doubtless have questions for you after you speak.] Mizhban began to turn away. [We must go. For this part, we are also witnesses. If you are unsure at any point of how to proceed, Keeper Dhazhbun will guide you.] The Chief and First Assistant vanished through an archway.

Dhazhbun, newly appointed as Second Keeper of Customs, entered the great chamber from a central archway beneath the Storytellers’ flat balconies, mounted the stone dias nearest the humans and raised a paw for silence. As the murmur of conversation died away, the young official drew up into a taller stance in preparation to speak. Mike realized that this was Dhazhbun’s first experience at presiding over a full meeting of the Council. With both the Clan Chief and immediate supervisor as witnesses, no less.

[I greet you, members of the Council,] Dhazhbun began in a tone forceful enough to betray nervousness overlaid by determination that the hearing would proceed properly. [I am pleased that the full complement of Senior Storytellers were able to delegate their busy tasks in order to record this proceeding.] The Second Keeper turned on the round dias and nodded deeply to each group on that side. Completion of the movement left the speaker facing Anton and Mike. [I am also most pleased that the two human envoys have been successful in devising a means of reaching the Tunnel of Meeting. I commend them for their courage and determination.]

Mike was embarrassed by the formal compliment. If they only knew why he was down here. If only he knew why he was down here. Grabbing the jaw of a frozen native during a forensic procedure and fleeing a seemingly failed relationship did not qualify one as an envoy. Worse, now they were going to ask him to make a speech. When Anton returned Dhazhbun’s nod with a slight bow, being unable to give a visible nod from within the neckless pressure suit, Mike merely imitated him.

The witnesses were called. The list was not limited to the four Venusians who had visited space via human ferry. Second Assistant Gabvig first recounted the coming of the humans as seen by the energetic native while leading a foraging expedition to the outlying regions of the Clan. Investigator Malzig described the first attempts to discover the human’s intentions. The narrative expanded in detached, clinical detail the ghastly effects, experienced firstpaw, of a massive dose of radiation from an operating fusion reactor. First Assistant Zedvol gave an account of the first Venusian venture into space, but beginning with that official’s own digging explorations and the resulting blow-in preceding the collapse of the humans’ first dome. The account continued with the Clan’s first delegation to the humans. Keeper of Customs Vundol followed with a corroborative account of the experience in space seen from a slightly different point of view. Where testimonies overlapped, a panel of three cross-examiners attempted to resolve differences of perception and interleave details observed by one party but not another.

Mizhban spoke next, but not as Chief. A simple and somewhat dry account of the events since the Clan’s first encounter with the humans culminated in Mizhban’s impressions of space. From the dispassionate treatment it received, space might have been an oil painting. Mizhban was overcompensating, Anton realized, to avoid biasing deliberations the Chief might have to act on later.

Bodyguard Benmab spoke last, paralleling Mizhban’s story in an unembellished yet passionate style. As with the others, the veteran footsoldier began with the first human encounters. To Mike’s surprise and discomfort, Benmab unhesitatingly revealed details of Mike’s line of questioning in Mizhban’s absence concerning the location of the Tunnel of Meeting in which they now stood.

Mike linked frantically to Anton. I’m dead. They’ll charge me with spying for sure. What do I do?

Tell the truth, Anton advised. Give details. After all, you never finished finding out the location of the Tunnel and you never tried to use the information. And now you’re here anyway. At their invitation. So relax.

Anton was called. To Mike’s surprise, the foreman prefaced his commentary with a summary history of the entire Venture project. Then, point by point, he explained the significance of each of the observations of space by the four primary Venusian witnesses in simple yet graphic terms, much as a grade-school science teacher might weave a lesson about the solar system.

The testimony had gone on for hours already, almost a whole Earth-day. Anton had alternated with Mike in one taking a short break every two hours for a bite to eat back in their respective chambers, and one change of suit-oxygen tanks each. Neither had required much sleep—yet, so they had taken turns napping upright in their suits in case the hearing took much longer.

Now it appeared that it might. The cross-examiners asked question after question, Anton patiently answering each at great length. Mike desperately felt the need of a break from all this information, but he didn’t dare. Who knew what vital piece of data he’d miss that would prove his undoing. He looked up at the stone ceiling. If something went wrong, there was no escaping this place. He was sealed in until and unless they decided to transport him back to the surface.

Anton, Mike noticed, was speaking entirely in the language of the Clan Mizhban, as were the cross-examiners. It appeared that the convention had become to speak the language of the place where one was, if possible. In Mike’s case, that might be a problem. He understood the language basics fairly well after weeks of intensive study, but he was not ready to engage in prolonged, public conversation, including speechmaking. One misunderstood phrase, he thought grimly, could turn this hearing into a trial with him on the wrong end.

When the cross-examination of Anton’s testimony finally ended, the foreman turned toward Second Keeper Dhazhbun. [The Second Envoy may require some aid in rendering testimony into the speech of the Clan. Is there one qualified who is present but not a witness to space?]

[There is such a one,] Dhazhbun replied after a brief consultation with three or four of the well-built attendants standing at floor level. They might have been guards, bailiffs, sergeants-at-arms or some combination of the three. [If, having given background information only and thus having been discharged as a witness from this hearing before the recitation of incidents of the matter of concern itself, would Second Assistant Gabvig be acceptable as an intermediary by all parties concerned?]

Anton shut down his external speaker and linked back to Mike. A good choice, I would say, Mike. They won’t be able to claim bias in our favor. And I believe that trustworthiness based on personal honor has already been demonstrated. You will have to answer the question on your own behalf when you are called. I will be bound not to transmit to you during your testimony, just as you did not during mine. The foreman spoke once again to Dhazhbun. [Second Envoy Michael Wallingford, of course, must make the determination with respect to personal representation.]

Mike accepted the choice numbly while hoping that a few minutes’ consultation with Anton would help provide some kind of basic presentation strategy. Some of Ellen’s visuals might help, if there had been any way to obtain or show them. But when Anton reached the base of the roughened, conical slope surrounding the central dias in lieu of stairs, presiding Keeper Dhazhbun boomed out, [Witness: Second Envoy Michael Wallingford.]

Mike’s legs suddenly felt like lead. His knees trembled in the suit harness. Suddenly appreciative of the onboard computer’s capabilities, Mike activated the Walk subprogram. In the few moments it took Anton and Mike to pass each other, Anton gave some last-minute advice.

"Don’t make