Silent Running (6 page)

Lowell picked up a plastic bottle and began washing each drone’s manipulator arm in alcohol. This done, he adjusted the operating light over the lowered table, then managed to ease himself down to it.

The drones hovered over Lowell and he addressed the drones. They whirred and clicked silently as he talked: “The procedure’s a simple one. You’ll remove the tourniquet, suture the artery, clean the wound, then close it and bandage it. Drone One, you will do the procedure, Drone Two, you will assist. Is that clear? Drone Three you will administer the oxygen anesthetic.”

The drones’ whirring and clicking changed rhythm, increasing in speed and intensity.

“All right,” Lowell said, grasping the oxygen mask. “I’ll take a mild anesthesia.” In moments, he nodded okay.

The drones began working over Lowell with precision and remarkable intensity. In addition, they coordinated their activities amazingly well, seeming to work in tandem, but with no visible communication between them. But when Drone One required an instrument, it was within easy reach of his motorized arm—held there by Drone Two.

At first Lowell reflected anxiety. This quickly changed to surprize and delight. Under mild anesthesia he began to relax, though still keeping an eye on the procedure.

“Good,” he applauded. “Nice work . . . just a little lower there, Drone One . . . That’s it . . . excellent.”

The drones worked on, unperturbed.

Drone Two began to prepare the dressing for the wound, as Drone One closed the wound with a liquid.

“Good . . . very nice . . .” Lowell commended.

Drone One finished, backed away, and Drone Two applied the bandage. Then Two backed away as well, and both drones’ motors seemed to return to idle.

“Neat and tidy,” Lowell said surveying the work. Very pleased, he raised himself from the table and tested his leg. It held. “Wonderful . . . superior work . . . You can return to your regular duties now.”

The drones clicked and whirred, then turned to leave.

Lowell limped slowly from the Drone Control room and headed for Main Control.

Before going inside he paused a moment.

Valley Forge
was alone now, and still in darkness. Saturn was closer, much closer, and huge. Like some cosmic talisman of terrible, preternatural power, it stood against the sky, mute and silent, gripped in its swirling, misty-silver rings.

Lowell could make out the drones working on the hull as usual.

He walked through the door and into Main Control. He sat in a chair, weak, and a little groggy. His breathing was thin, and his motions slow. He began to transmit: “Commander Anderson . . . I can’t get anywhere near the main buss duct. It’s just all torn up down there.”

“. . . AAH . . .”
Anderson’s voice was patronizing, and there was a long pause. Then he said,
“LISTEN, FREEMAN . . . THAT’S YOUR FIRST NAME, RIGHT?”

“Right,” Lowell replied.

“HAVE YOU GOT ANY FAMILY, FREEMAN?”

“No, sir,” Lowell said.

“WELL . . . LISTEN, FREEMAN . . . YOU’VE BEEN WITH THIS PROJECT SINCE THE START . . . AND YOU’VE KNOWN THE RISKS.”

“Yes, sir,” Lowell’s voice was weak.

“I DON’T REALLY KNOW HOW TO SAY THIS, FREEMAN . . .”
Anderson talked as though talking to a common sailor.

“That’s all right, sir.”

“WE’VE GOT SOME TROUBLE,”
Anderson went on.

“I figured.”

“YES, UH . . . I’M REALLY SORRY.”

“For what, sir?”

“WE’LL NEVER BE ABLE TO STOP YOU BEFORE YOU HIT SATURN’S RINGS . . .”
Anderson’s silence mixed with the radio static.

Lowell’s smile came twisted. “I see,” he finally managed. “And no one’s ever survived it before . . .”

“YOU . . . YOU MIGHT WANT TO CONSIDER TAKING A . . . A PILL?”

Anderson’s voice was heavy with meaning.

“Suicide . . . ?” Lowell queried, then shook his head. “No sir . . . I just couldn’t.”

Anderson went on:
“THEN THE BEST THING WE CAN DO IS SEND OUT A SEARCH PARTY THE LONG WAY AROUND . . . BUT IT’S KIND OF LIKE A NEEDLE IN A HAYSTACK, IF YOU KNOW WHAT I MEAN.”
He paused a moment then said,
“FREEMAN . . . ?”

A moment passed. “Yes . . . ?” Lowell asked.

Anderson’s voice came with static, then cleared, and became husky with remorse.

“GOD BLESS YOU, FREEMAN,”
he blurted out.
“YOU’RE A HELL OF AN AMERICAN!”

Lowell passed a hand across his eyes and looked toward Dome One, with its forest and gardens still riding there intact . . . ready for Earth, when summoned. “Thank you, sir,” he managed. “Thank you. I think I am . . .”

Lowell flicked off the radio and there on the screen lay the night sky, and Saturn hanging right there beyond the hull.

Anderson’s words “You’ll never make it through Saturn’s rings,” came back to haunt him. He’d said, “Take a pill . . .” Lowell’s hands lay idly at his sides. His long face was solemn, his eyes deep in thought.

All at once, the memory of Wolf’s inert body lying in the grass came sharply into Lowell’s mental focus.

Almost dreamlike was the gesture of his hand—as though to rub it from his mind.

“It would be a way . . . out,” he managed.

He sat on . . . But the beauty of the forest still clung to Lowell’s mind and along with it, the precious, dedicated words hanging over his bed that read:

CONSERVATIONISTS’ PLEDGE

I GIVE MY PLEDGE AS AN AMERICAN TO SAVE AND FAITHFULLY DEFEND FROM WASTE THE NATURAL RESOURCES OF MY COUNTRY—ITS SOIL, ITS FORESTS, WATERS, AND WILDLIFE.

 SIX 

S
uddenly, with a long look at Saturn’s rings that loomed so close, Lowell rose from his chair.

“We’ll see,” he said, his voice echoing in the deathly silence. “We’ll see about navigating those babies.”

He hobbled to the corridor, went to his room and began strapping down his botanical equipment. At length he made it into the kitchen where he strapped down the utensils. At last he reached the hold of
Valley Forge
to check the tie-downs of the cargo nodules. Saturn’s colored rings seemed to lie right there beyond the hull.

“My forest, Dome One,” Lowell murmured and swung toward the tunnel that led to it. Once there, he began stringing guide wires to the trees.

Time seemed to race by.

Now, with the closer approach of
Valley Forge
to Saturn, Lowell could discern discrete particles of Saturn’s rings beginning to slam into the more distant parts of the structure.

He became aware of the three drones waddling hastily toward the hatchway, making clicking sounds as they went.

From the control room red warning lights began to flash. Alarms buzzed and shrieked. Lowell turned to grapple his way toward the control room.

The heaving ship flung him against the tunnel wall. He staggered and fell, clutching his thigh in pain, then pulled himself up and through the doorway to Main Control.

He passed the Drone Control console and realized that the drones were outside. He gaped at the screen.

The drones fought to get to the hatchway. But Number Three lagged behind. Lowell yelled into the mike, “Number Three, keep moving!”

Following a close-up of the drones on the screen Lowell saw that drones One and Two were already descending into the hatchway. But the image of Number Three began to flutter and run as the drone got buffeted.

“Keep moving!” Lowell screamed. “Follow One and Two!”

Lowell saw Drone Three cling desperately to the ship. Iridescent plasma and frozen gas of the rings ripped at the Drone, scraping it, pushing in and tearing at his metal body. Finally the drone could hold on no longer. Lowell watched it slip away into the rainbow of color, and Three’s screen went blank.

Lowell, faint and in anguish, tried to hang on to the console.

“Three . . . Thr . . .” he cried out in frustrated anger. “Why didn’t you keep moving?”

He looked through a window and saw an antenna shear off and tumble away.

Lowell struggled to the main console and watched the displays in terror. He began to throw switches and punch buttons, trying to fire the engines. But lights began to wink out on the giant display board, and the giant engines began to idle down.

Lowell kept on trying to get the engines to fire, but it was futile. He could just watch the screen and hang on against the surging of the ship. Finally, the only sounds left were the howling of the plasma rings and the creaking of the ship.

Suddenly the shaking stopped and the howling tailed off, leaving the ship in total silence. Lowell slowly sat back in a chair and breathed a long sigh of relief.

Looking at the screen’s picture of the ship’s bow he saw a sea of stars. Off at an angle he made out Saturn, suddenly smaller now, and receding in the distance.

All at once a giant lassitude crept over Lowell.

He struggled to his feet, out of the control room, and to his bedroom where he flung himself on his cot.

 SEVEN 

H
ours later, Lowell opened his eyes. How long he had slept he didn’t know. His room was a mess—books were strewn about the floor, and some of his lab equipment was shattered and broken. He awakened slowly, trying to remember all that had happened. He saw the two drones, inert in a corner.

“Drones One and Two,” he said, yawning. The drones turned to face him, idling quietly. “Straighten up in here, will you, please?” Lowell waved a hand around the room.

The drones began to tidy up. Lowell rose and began washing at the sink. Suddenly he stood, staring at himself in the mirror. For a moment, in stricken silence, he thought of Wolf.

He turned to the drones, saying, “Drone One . . . Drone Two . . .” They turned to face him, waiting. “Go to . . . Dome One,” Lowell ordered.

The drones turned to leave, while Lowell made his way out of the bedroom and down a corridor to Drone Control. Taking a seat before the Drone Control panel, he watched the drones approach the dome.

They finally entered it through the tunnel.

“Turn right,” Lowell ordered, leaning close to the microphone.

The TV images of the drones panned to the right, and suddenly, shockingly, Wolf’s body came into view.

Lowell stared transfixed for a moment, then passing a hand across his eyes, said, “Drone One . . . Drone Two . . . take the dead man deeper into the forest. Dig a hole six feet deep, seven feet long, and three feet wide.”

He turned from the screen, waiting . . . At length, he turned back to watch the two drones dig a grave with their odd-looking pneumatic claws. At last the hole was ready, and Wolf’s body lay nearby, contorted, dead.

Lowell sat motionless, held almost entranced by the strange TV image. Everything seemed so unreal, grotesque, as though it were all a horrible dream.

At last he roused from his lethargy. “Now put him . . . in the grave,” he ordered.

He sat watching the drones maneuver Wolf’s body into the grave. Wolf’s hat fell off, strangely unnoticed. Lowell stared at the drones placing Wolf in the ground.

“And now, remain there,” Lowell went on, softly. “Because I would like to say something . . . before you cover him over.”

Questions pounded at him. “How could I have killed Wolf—a good kid? How could I?” He stared on into the screen.

The answer lay right there, just beyond the grave: his forest. Not his, really. Lowell shook his head: America’s forest that he, and he alone, had saved. But at what a price. Lowell gave a deep sigh.

“Aah,” he managed, “I . . . would like to be able to say a . . . prayer,” he stumbled out. “But I . . . don’t really know . . . how to say it. Wolf and Barker and Keenan, they weren’t exactly my friends.” His voice trembled. “But, I did like them. And . . . I don’t think,” he went on, his voice breaking, “that I’ll ever be able to excuse what it is that I did. But I had to do it. And . . .” Lowell fought for control, “I guess that’s all that I have to say.”

Lowell was silent for a moment, then added in a choking voice, “You can cover him over . . . now.”

He sat at the console, and again there came that dirgelike drumbeat through his consciousness.

At length he rose to begin cleaning up the control room. After a few minutes he came out of Main Control, carrying some papers and trash. He noticed Barker’s nameplate on a door and ripped it off, then methodically ripped the plates from Keenan’s and Wolf’s doors as well.

“Okay,” he said, and gathered them up with the rest of his trash to head for a refuse module.

From there he walked back to the main console and sat down to begin checking dials. Finally satisfied, he swiveled around to see the two drones silently looking on.

“I am Captain now,” he declared. Lowell studied them thoughtfully, for they had registered nothing. They had just stood there, idling quietly.

“Drone One,” Lowell went on, “you will answer to the name of Huey . . . Drone Two, you will answer to the name of Dewey.”

Lowell smiled at them gently and understanding while an expression of sadness crossed his face. “Louie,” he went on, “God bless him, is no longer with us.”

The two drones uttered little bleeps from their shutters.

Lowell continued, “Huey, step forward.” The drone obeyed. “Good. Dewey, step forward, also . . .” Dewey obeyed.

“Excellent,” Lowell applauded. “Now, I’ve reprogramed you both so that you’ll answer directly to me. I don’t think you’ll have any difficulty making the necessary adjustments. You’ll maintain the ship as usual, but you’ll also spend more time with me in the forest . . . We’ve had a rough journey, and I suspect we’ll have our work cut out for us.”

The drones continued to stand before Lowell, their engines idling, then waddled back to Drone Control room.

Lowell swung around to the console getting instrument readouts on the various functions of the ship’s engines. Indicator lamps for power pods one and four indicated a malfunction in the system. Lowell snapped on the drones’ intercom and addressed the drones: “Huey . . . Dewey . . . proceed to power pods one and four. Repeat: proceed to power pods one and four.”