The great spaceship was still just thirty days out from Earth, yet Maisam Dhala sometimes found it hard to believe that he had ever known any other existence than the closed little world of Pesquisador. All his years of training, all his earlier missions to the Moon and Mars, seemed to belong to another man, in another life.511Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ2kjFuA2Olm
Antonio Quadros admitted to the same feelings, and had sometimes jokingly regretted that the nearest psychiatrist was the better part of a hundred million miles away. But this sense of isolation and estrangement was simple enough to understand, and certainly indicated no abnormality. In the 150 years since (Brazilian) men had ventured into space, there had never been a mission quite like this one.511Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡlB1bp3q3zN
It had begun, five years ago, as Project Jupiter---the first manned round trip to the greatest planet of them all. The ship was nearly ready for the two-year voyage when, without warning, the mission profile had been changed.
Pesquisador would still go to Jupiter, yes, but she would not stop there. She would not even reduce speed as she raced through the far-ranging Jovian satellite system. On the contrary---she would use the gravitation field of the gas giant as a sling to cast her even farther away from the Sun. Like a comet, she would streak on across the outer reaches of the solar system to her ultimate goal: the ringed glory of Saturn. And she would never return.
For Pesquisador, it would be a one-way trip---yet her crew had no intention of committing suicide. If all went well, they would be back on Earth within seven years---five of which would pass like seconds in the dreamless sleep of hibernation, while they awaited rescue by the still unbuilt Pesquisador II.
The word "rescue" was carefully avoided in all the Viagens Interplanetarias's statements and documents; it implied some failure of planning, and the approved jargon was "re-acquisition." If anything went really wrong, there would surely be no hope of rescue, almost one billion miles from Earth.
It was, like all voyages into the unknown, a calculated risk. But a century and a half of research had proved that artificially induced human hibernation was perfectly safe, and it had opened up new possibilities in space travel. Not until this mission, however, had they been explored to the utmost.
The three agrimensores, who would not be needed until the ship entered her final orbit around Saturn, would sleep through the entire outward flight. Tons of food and other nonessentials would thus be saved; almost as important, the team would be fresh and alert, and not fatigued by the 10-month voyage, when they went into action.
Pesquisador would enter a parking orbit around Saturn, becoming a new moon of the giant planet. She would swing to and fro along a two-million-mile ellipse that took her close to Saturn, and then across the orbits of all its major moons. They would have a hundred days in which to map and study a world with 80 times the area of Earth, and surrounded by a menagerie of at least fifteen known satellites---one of them as big as the planet Mercury.
There must be wonders enough here for centuries of study; the first expedition could only carry out a preliminary reconnaissance. All that it found would be radioed back to Earth; even if the explorers never returned, their discoveries would not be lost.
At the end of the hundred days, Pesquisador would shut down. All the crew would go into hibernation; only the essential systems could continue to operate, watched over by the ship's tireless electronic brain. She would continue to swing around Saturn, on an orbit now so well determined that men would know just where to look for her a millennium hence. But in only five years, according to present plans, Pesquisador IIwould come. Even if six or seven or eight years elapsed, her sleeping passengers would never know the difference. For all of them, the clock would have stopped as it had already stopped for Castilho, Kongju, and Ramos. Sometimes Dhala, as capitão geral of Pesquisador, envied his three unconscious colleagues in the frozen peace of the Hibernaculum. They were free from all boredom and all responsibility. Until they reached Saturn, the real world did not exist.
But that world was watching them, through their bio-sensor displays. Tucked inconspicuously away among the massed instrumentation of the Control Deck were five small panels marked CASTILHO, KONGJU, QUADROS, RAMOS, DHALA. The last two were blank and lifeless; their time would not come until a year from now. The others bore constellations of tiny green lights, announcing that all was well; and on each was a small display screen across which sets of glowing lines traced the leisurely rhythms that indicated pulse, respiration, and brain waves.
There were times when Dhala, well aware how wasteful this was---for the alarm would sound instantly if anything was wrong would switch over for audio output. He would listen, half transfixed, to the infinitely slow heartbeats of his sleeping comrades, keeping his eyes glued to the sluggish waves that marched in unison across the screen.
Most captivating of all were the EEG displays---the electronic signatures of three personalities that had once existed, and would one day exist again. They were nearly free from the spikes and valleys, the electrical explosions that marked the activity of the waking brain---or even of the brain in normal sleep. If there was any wisp of consciousness remaining, it was beyond the reach of instruments, and of memory.
This last fact Dhala knew from personal experience. Before he was chosen for this mission, his reactions to hibernation had been tested. He was not sure whether he had lost one week of his life---or whether he had postponed his eventual death by the same amount of time.
When the electrodes had been fastened to his forehead, and the sleep-generator had begun to pulse, he had seen a brief display of kaleidoscopic patterns and drifting stars. Then they had faded, and darkness had engulfed him. He had never felt the injections, still less the first touch of cold as his body temperature was reduced to only a few degrees above freezing. He woke up, and it seemed that he had barely closed his eyes. But he knew that was an illusion; somehow he was convinced that years had really passed.
Had the mission been completed? Had they already reached Saturn, carried out their survey, and gone into hibernation. Was Pesquisador II here, to take them back to Earth?
He lay in a dreamlike haze, not able to distinguish between real and fake memories. He opened his eyes, but there was little to see except a blurred constellation of lights that puzzled him for some minutes.
Then he realized that he was looking at the indicator lamps on a Ship Situation Board, but it was not possible to focus on them. He soon gave up the attempt. Warm air was blowing across him, removing the chill from his limbs. There was quiet, but stimulating, music welling from a speaker behind his head. It was slowly growing louder and louder.
Then a relaxed, friendly---but he knew computer generated---voice spoke to him.
"You are becoming operational, Maisam. Do not get up or attempt any violent movements. Do not try to speak."
Do not get up! thought Dhala. That was funny. He doubted if he could wiggle one finger. Rather, to his surprise, he found that he could.
He felt quite contented, in a dazed and stupid kind of way. He knew dimly that the rescue ship must have come, that the automatic revival sequence had been triggered, and that soon he would be seeing other human beings. That was fine, but he did not get excited about it.
Presently he felt hunger. The computer, of course, had anticipated this need.
"There is a signal button by your right hand, Maisam. If you are hungry, do press it."511Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡnJJlCwSb9t
Dhala forced his fingers to hunt around, and presently discovered the pear-shaped bulb. He had forgotten all about it, though he must've known it was there. How much else had he forgotten: Did hibernation erase memory?
He pressed the button and waited. Several minutes later, a metal arm moved out from the bunk, and a plastic nipple descended toward his lips. He sucked on it eagerly, and a warm, sweet fluid coursed down his throat, bringing renewed strength with every drop.
Presently it went away, and he rested again. He could move his arms and legs now; the thought of walking was no longer an impossible dream.
Though he felt his strength swiftly returning, he would have been content to lie here forever, if there had been no further stimulus from outside. But presently another voice spoke to him...and this time it was wholly human, not a construct of electrical pulses assembled by a more-than-human memory. It was also a familiar voice, though it was some time before he could recognize it.511Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ7jX7bVh6GO
"Hi, Maisam. You're coming around fine. You can talk now. Do you know where you are?"511Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡjc2HDFr65f
He worried about this for some time. If he was really orbiting Saturn, what had happened during all the months since he had left Earth? Again he began to wonder if he was suffering from amnesia. Paradoxically, that very thought reassured him, if he could remember the word "amnesia" his brain must be in pretty good shape. But he still didn't know where he was, and the speaker at the other end of the circuit must've understood his situation completely.
."Don't worry, Maisam. This is Antonio Quadros speaking. I'm watching your heart and respiration--everything is perfectly normal. All you have to do is relax and take it easy. We're going to open the door now and pull you out."511Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡhwPjrNMYJR
Ambient light flooded into the chamber; he saw moving shapes silhouetted against the widening entrance. And in that moment, all of his memories came back to him, and he knew exactly where he was.511Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡguqc6JnzqW
Though he'd come back safely from the furthest frontiers of sleep, and the nearest frontiers of death, he had been gone merely one week. When he left the Hibernaculum, he would not see the cold Saturnian sky, for that was more than one year in the future and one billion miles distant. 511Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡotSTeuuYg6
He was still in the trainer at the Manaus Aerospace Training Center until the hot Brazilian sun.511Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡCOq4mtqcx6
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