Orphans of Apollo - S2 E13
September 2056
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Previously: Aiden thinks there might be a way to make an attachment to go on Brant’s suit so he will still be able to take part in EVAs. He also tries to convince Lana that what happened during the landing was not her fault.
Lana stretched, her arms hitting the wall of her room. Opening her eyes, she looked at her watch, 18:37. The crew had agreed to have dinner together at 19:00. Earlier, Lana had briefly talked to Brant about Aiden’s idea of making a mitten for his suit. As she expected, Brant had loved the idea. He had been writing off his chances of going out on expeditions and was blaming himself.
After reviewing the plans for the various expeditions the crew had scheduled, Lana had decided, as she suspected the others had also done, to take a nap. Sitting up in bed, she realised how hungry she was.
The upstairs living area was deserted. She padded softly downstairs, barefoot. The mechanical whining noise of the 3D printer in the corner of the lab grew louder as she reached the bottom. On its bed there were what looked like two halves of a fingerless glove that extended up the forearm. At least if you used your imagination. It was hard to tell exactly what it was with all the various support structures hanging off the side. These would be broken off once the print was complete. She admitted to herself she only knew what it was because she had seen the model on the screen of the medical scanner.
Lana headed over to the toilet, relieved they were still subject to Earth’s gravity. Going to the toilet in space was something she was not looking forward to. She retied her hair and splashed some water on her face. After shutting off the water, she heard voices emanating from the upper floor and she headed back upstairs to join them.
“Let me help you with that. You’re going to get it all over yourself,” Joanna said to Brant.
He was trying to squeeze some sauce from a vacuum pack onto a tortilla on the table in front of him.
“I can do it.”
“Well, you can single-handedly clean it up when you squirt it everywhere.”
“If I were you, I’d let her do it for you because in an hour that cast will be done and you won’t have any excuses,” said Aiden.
Brant fumbled with the package, and it dropped on the table. He picked it up and handed it to Joanna. She took it and rolled her eyes before continuing to squirt the contents onto the tortilla.
“You sound better,” said Lana.
“Yeah, I think the drugs are working now. Aiden told me more about his idea of modifying a glove for my suit. Sounds like it should work.”
“I don’t see any reason why not. Let’s all discuss it over dinner and see if anyone has any concerns or ideas about how we might have to adapt the tasks we have planned.”
Lana opened her food cupboard. Each crew member had a cupboard where the meals they had chosen for their stay were stored. As this was the first expedition, the construction crew had put a few packages of food for each crew member in the cupboard. The rest were stored in the supply packs containing the various consumables, such as food, clothing and sanitary products they would need during their stay. These had been transported in convoy across the ice by the last construction team and now sat by the greenhouse.
When she woke up, Lana had felt hungry, but now she felt ravenous. She opted for mashed potato and a package of what was supposed to be minced beef in gravy with vegetables.
Everyone had now emerged from their rooms and as the others went about preparing their own meals, Lana was pleased to see the normal friendly banter had returned. Once they were all seated around the large table in the centre of the room, she let the banter continue for another couple of minutes.
“Ok, while we are all together, let’s get some business done, then we can relax for the rest of the evening. It’s been a long day.”
“Sure has,” said Brant, rubbing his wrist.
“So, a few of us have talked about the implications of Brant’s injury on the tasks planned for this expedition. Aiden might have come up with a solution so we can continue with minimal changes.” She looked across to Aiden.
“As you probably know, with a cast on his broken wrist, Brant cannot put the glove of his suit on properly, meaning he cannot do EVAs. That is obviously going to be a bit of a problem when it comes to collecting ice cores and helping Zawadi with her meteorite collection expedition.”
“Maybe I should go instead,” said Pieter.
“Well, there might be a solution,” said Aiden. “If I take one of the spare gloves I can cut off the locking ring and then print a mitten which Brant can fit his hand into.”
“He won’t have the same dexterity as a glove, though. How is he going to be able to do anything?” asked Pieter.
“I could also incorporate an attachment clip onto the mitten and print some basic tools.”
“It’s still a bit risky, don’t you think? What if there was an emergency and he had to help Zawadi out?” said Joanna.
“I’ll need some training on how to help Brant operate the drill rig,” said Zawadi.
“I could go on the expedition too, so there is an extra pair of hands,” said Pieter. “I wouldn’t be doing much here anyway.”
“What if you guys have a problem and need help? That would only leave three of us here and we all know we’re supposed to be in pairs if we go any significant distance from the hab. It would mean leaving one person behind alone or all three of us would have to come on any rescue mission,” said Joanna.
They all looked expectantly towards Lana.
“We might have to bend a few regulations. I agree sending an extra person with Brant and Zawadi on the expedition is probably a prudent idea. It does leave only three of us here, but it’s probably the least risky option. In the event of a rescue, we could leave one person in the hab alone, but again, it’s the least risky option.” Lana looked around the faces. “Pieter, you are right. It also makes most sense for you to go on the expedition with Brant and Zawadi.”
“I think it’s our best option,” agreed Aiden.
“Think they will go for it back at the foundation?” asked Pieter.
“We could do a trial run,” said Brant excitedly. “We have a shorter expedition in the program anyway. If that works out ok and I’m not a complete liability, then we go ahead with the long distance one to the Transantarctic Mountains.”
“You’re the reason we are sitting here and not halfway across the Antarctic being dragged behind a parachute. I wouldn’t worry,” said Pieter.
“That’s not necessarily the case,” said Lana.
“Sure it is.”
“Let’s just leave it there, shall we?” said Aiden, sitting up straight in his chair and turning towards Pieter.
“Just saying.”
“Anyway,” said Lana, raising her voice slightly. “Assessing Brant’s capabilities on the shorter expedition is a good idea. If there are no problems, we will go ahead with a longer one, with Pieter as an extra pair of hands. I’ll advise mission control this is what we intend to do and see if there are objections.”
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I hope you enjoyed the latest episode of Orphans of Apollo. I am pretty much back to full health, which is great. I find every time I get sick it makes me realise how much I take being healthy for granted.
This week we watched the final episode of “Prime Target”. I really wanted to enjoy this show more. It had so much potential and some parts were good. The premise of the show is interesting. A young mathematician is on the verge of completing a theorem for finding prime numbers. Primes are key to all modern encryption and so this would effectively break all forms of encryption. There are clear parallels between this and the Manhattan project, the ethics of which I find fascinating. Scientists racing to develop an immensely powerful weapon so the good guys get it first, but then the gene is out of the bottle. If you don’t develop it then there is a risk the bad guys will do it anyway. As I said, the premise for a great show is there, the execution is just half-baked, in my opinion.
Incidentally, the breaking of modern encryption could be not too far around the corner, even without a prime finder. As I read in the Techno-Optimist Microsoft seems to be making great strides in quantum computing.
These moral quandaries always produce good stories as there is often no clear good and evil, as is often the case in real life. This is something I am hoping to achieve with Orphans of Apollo.
I also read the fascinating short story “Mr Lim” by SDG Lemaître. North Korea and the Kim dynasty have always fascinated and enraged me in equal measure. So much so that for years I have been regularly giving to the charity Liberty in North Korea, which helps rescue and resettle North Koreans in the west. It is worth checking out their work.
I hope you all have a good week.
Thanks for reading,
Alex
Thanks for the shoutout! And for the info about Liberty in North Korea. Have you seen the documentary “Beyond Utopia”?