Going Interstellar (collection)

CHOICES Les Johnson

Interstellar flight is the most audacious of human dreams. Barring a Star Trek breakthrough, the voyage will require a high level of technology, and people willing to get on board for a destination so far distant in time and space that most of them will not live to see it. We can only admire the talent of those who might make it possible, and the courage of those heading out for Rigel or wherever. Despite all our efforts, the technology may, at some critical point, break down. So we will of course build in as much redundancy as we can. Unfortunately we cannot do the same for the passengers.

Les recently completed his first novel, Back to the Moon (Baen, 2010), a collaboration with Travis Taylor.

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The air was thick and putrid. Peter Goss slogged through knee-deep water with a broken branch in one hand and a machete in the other. The swamp was brightly lit by the reflected light of the two moons hanging low on the horizon. All he could think of was survival. Mosquito-like creatures the size of small birds dove at him constantly, ignoring his wild swatting. Their sting hurt. Beneath the surface he imagined large creatures watching and waiting for him to slip and fall so they could pounce and enjoy a tasty human delicacy for that night’s dinner.

Relentlessly, he moved forward. No distraction would stop him tonight. There, just ahead and across this last bit of waterlogged purgatory, was the tower. Rising out of the swamp at least twenty-five stories, it dominated the horizon and demanded investigation. Made of what looked like stone, which he knew would have been all but impossible given its size, the tower taunted him.

Goss stopped. And listened. He heard only the sounds of the night, the buzzing of the monster-mosquitoes and the distant splashes of other creatures stirring the waters.

He was only a few hundred yards from the tower, a small distance compared to that which he had already covered, but now it seemed distant. His muscles hurt and he was tired.

The swamp ahead looked much like the swamp behind, but looks could be deceiving. Two of his compatriots were now dead because of this place and he was not about to join them. He whacked one of the oversized mosquitoes with the branch, raised his machete, and started forward.

The tower was dark and quiet. Goss intended no harm; he was there to find out what it held, why it was there, and, if possible, who had built it. For on this water world, the tower was the only artificial structure in evidence.

Three weeks ago, Goss and his crewmates had arrived on this planet because their long-range instruments told them that it had an oxygen/nitrogen atmosphere suitable for human life. Though planets seemed to be plentiful everywhere, those with breathable atmospheres and temperate surface conditions were very, very rare. That’s why he and his two colleagues had taken a shuttle from the mothership to investigate.

From space, the world was a brilliant blue that reminded him of Earth. Except that instead of the familiar landforms surrounded by water, the entire planet was covered by water, with only a few islands dotting its seas. It was on one of these islands that they’d spotted the tower, standing alone. It had been a glorious moment, looking down at the structure, the first evidence anywhere that humans were not alone. And of course, still in a state of shock, they’d gone down.

Goss lost the first of his crewmates, Charlie Edward, when he slipped on slick, moss-covered rock, pitched forward, and landed on his head. Not a graceful way to die. It had happened so fast that he hadn’t even had time to throw out his hands. By the time Goss reached him, Charlie was gone.

The other crewmate, Julie Gold, died after her leg was ripped off by an alligator-like creature that had been lying in wait beneath the surface of the water in an area they had mistakenly assumed to be safe enough for a short break. All Goss remembered was the rage that overcame him after seeing his friend writhe in the water, trying to shake off what had attached itself to her right leg. Goss had hurried to her rescue, but the thing had ripped her apart within seconds. He’d brought the machete down on its armored neck again and again until it collapsed.