Resurgence

Not that Ben would be easy to miss. As the Savior descended, he hovered at Hans’s shoulder. Was he going to shout, “Right. Now it’s my turn,” the moment that the ship touched down?

Not quite that bad. As soon as the Savior made contact, feather-light on the frigid surface (courtesy of the autopilot—Hans had learned his lesson), Ben said, “Exit stations, but hold it there. This is a totally alien world. We look, and then we look again before we leap.”

The landing site had been selected with as much care as possible, given an almost total lack of information. The most promising areas were the nodes, regularly spaced in a triangular grid on the surface and connected by narrow lines of what seemed to be the same material. It made sense to land on top of a grid patch, since they were composed of familiar Builder materials. If Darya were correct, the Savior could then generate an electromagnetic field inhibitor which would allow an individual, or even the whole ship itself, to sink into the unknown interior of Iceworld. On the other hand, those grid areas were also the places where the probing laser had produced a flash like orange fire. Maybe it made more sense to land on the cold and inert spaces between the grid points.

Hans had made the decision—perhaps the last decision he would be allowed to make until they left Iceworld. They would bring the Savior down on the frozen plain, just a couple of kilometers from the edge of a grid patch. They would keep the drive in full stand-by mode. In a few seconds it could propel the ship forward onto the nearby grid point area, or loft it at high acceleration back into space.

Until touchdown, everyone had been in full suits and in Emergency Mode position. At Ben’s order to take up exit stations, Lara moved to stand by the airlock. She did not walk so much as float. Hans estimated from the response of his own body that weight on Iceworld was just a few hundredths of the inter-clade standard. Walking would be easy, running impossible. Let’s hope they wouldn’t need the latter.

The view on all sides did nothing to suggest danger. Iceworld appeared as a black, featureless plain with a horizon so far away that it showed as a ruled straight line below which no stars were visible. The temperature sensors in contact with the surface failed to report any value whatsoever. The surface conductivity was so high that the ship’s instruments could not offer a measurement. The whole exterior of Iceworld formed one giant superconductor. That solved one possible problem that had occurred to Hans while they were still in orbit. No matter how slippery the surface might be, a walking person could gain a firm footing through an electromagnetic field in the extremities of the suit.

They watched and waited, expecting nothing and seeing nothing. It was Lara who at last said, “Well?”

There was more than a suggestion of “What are we waiting for?” in her tone. Hans would have ignored her while he watched all the instruments through a second and confirming set of negative readings, but Ben glanced at Hans, shrugged, and said, “We’re in no hurry. However, I authorize you to cycle the lock and step outside. One step. Then we wait and see how your suit readings run.”

Lara was cycling the inner door before Ben finished speaking. The hard vacuum on Iceworld made it in effect an exit into open space. The Savior’s cameras in the airlock and outside recorded Lara’s passage through the inner door, then there was a brief wait while that door closed and the outer one opened with a puff of air condensing to ice crystals. As Lara appeared, Hans at once referred to the monitors that provided all-around surveillance of the surface. He still sat in the pilot’s chair, his hands instinctively hovering over the controls, but there was no reason to take action. Everything remained calm and dark.

“One step, and all’s well.” Lara was equally calm. “Are you receiving the readings from my suit?”

Ben nodded, then apparently realized that Lara had no video feed from inside the ship. “Yes, we’re receiving. Everything is nominal.”

“I’m testing the surface traction, and it’s adequate. Walking should be easy. Should I test my suit’s cancellation field?”

“No. Definitely not. For one thing, you are not above a grid point area, so we would expect nothing to happen. On the other hand, if it did, the last thing we want is for you to sink down alone through the surface. When we penetrate the interior, we all do it together.”

“Then I request authorization to take trial steps on the surface.”