“Have you got emergency equipment with you?”
“Yes, Sir. We loaded an additional pallet with things that might be helpful.”
“Good. We’ll see you on the surface.
In front of Jeff, Joanne was pushing her way through the opening. She activated the small jets on her combat suit and floated down. Jeff stepped forward and gaped in amazement at the surface of the alien body, which was about twelve miles below him. It was lit up by the Charon’s powerful landing lights. He had the feeling he was staring down on a man-made planet—the surface looked like it was made of black metal sheeting. It was as if a surrealist painter had tried to recreate the moon out of the most bizarre metal pieces they could find. The view to the horizon was obscured by spiny outgrowths and terrace-like overhangs. Below him, Jeff saw the red illuminated area with the opening in the middle. He didn’t want to go inside. He didn’t know where the feeling came from, but something was telling him that if he went in there, he would never come out again.
“Get a move on, Captain Austin!” the major shouted at him.
Jeff took a deep breath. He pushed off with his boots so that he floated headfirst. Then he activated the fine-control jets on his suit and was thrust forward. Gently, as if in a dream, he began to fall. Joanne and the others had already reached the ground, which was bathed in red light, and were casting jerky shadows on the black metal surface whenever they moved. Beside them, the open lock glowed like a red-hot eye. The pale white light from their helmet headlamps danced like ghosts over the ground. A few seconds later, Jeff had also reached the ground. He activated his magnetic boots and was relieved to find that the ground was ferromagnetic. The gravity of the planetoid body was too low to be able to move about normally.
“We’re all down,” Irons said. “Get the spaceship to a safe distance!”
“Sir!” said Joanne and jabbed some buttons on her arm console.
Jeff looked up to where their ray-shaped bomber hovered motionless in space. The landing lights were so dazzling, he couldn’t see the ship clearly, but even so, he could tell it was badly damaged. The starboard engine pod was torn off about halfway along the outrigger—cables and wires dangled out of the cavity like entrails. Frozen coolant was leaking from several parts of the fuselage and there were numerous spots where the outer skin had been torn off, revealing the ugly bowels of the ship.
“How much longer?” Jeff asked.
“One to two minutes,” Green said.
“What’s going on, Lieutenant Rutherford?” Irons asked impatiently.
“I’m ready. I’m starting the program.”
The bomber gradually accelerated while rising up at the same time. It spun slowly on its axis, turning its nose away from the artifact. Jeff saw the faint glow of the Vernier thrusters, then the Charon accelerated quickly. A few seconds later, it had almost disappeared from view. If it weren’t for the landing lights, it would have already been swallowed up by the darkness. A few more seconds, and it was just a small white dot. Jeff squinted as he tried to follow its course. Then it was gone completely.
“Lieutenant Rutherford, has the Charon—” Major Irons began, but he didn’t finish his sentence.
A painfully bright flash lit up the sky and Jeff closed his eyed, dazzled by the light.
So that was it.
They were stranded. In the middle of the darkest void, dozens of light years from the nearest manned outpost, unable to send a hyper-radio message. They were now standing on the outer shell of the first extraterrestrial artifact ever to be found by mankind. Jeff’s thoughts swirled like mist. Their fate and survival now depended on whether they could get into the interior of this spaceship—or whatever it was—and in what they found there. Judging by the open lock, it looked like getting inside would be possible at least.
“Gone…” Green peered up into the blackness. “Now we’re really up shit creek.”
“Please keep your pessimism to yourself,” Irons retorted sharply.
“What do we do now?” Shorty whimpered. Jeff looked up. Although he couldn’t see any of his shipmates’ faces through their visors in the dim light, he knew it was Shorty from his hulking, six-foot-five form.
“We’re going in,” Irons said.
“All of us?” Joanne asked. “What if we can’t get back out?”
“Then I wouldn’t know what to advise those of us left out here. If there’s a solution to our problem, it can only be inside this thing. And I think it makes more sense for us to stick together.”
“What do you think’s down there?” Jeff mused out loud.
“I wonder if there’s anyone living down there, waiting for us,” Owl added.
“I doubt it,” Irons said. “By the looks of it, this thing is ancient. It’s probably been abandoned for eons.”
“But somebody turned on the light and opened the lock,” Joanne pointed out.
“That was probably triggered automatically. Our approach must have activated some kind of program,” Irons retorted.
“An automatic program could just as easily have thought we were an enemy and shot us down,” Green pointed out sardonically.
“But it didn’t,” Irons snapped back. “Corporal Fields, please take the emergency equipment into the lock.”
“Yes, Sir.”
Without waiting to be instructed, the two privates, Shorty and Mac helped Green push the sled-shaped construction that was hovering above the ground on repulsor fields. They steered the equipment into the yawning, red hole in the ground of the artificial asteroid. A few seconds later, the technicians had disappeared into the lock. Irons waved over Joanne, Owl, and Castle, and waited for them to descend into the hole, too, before bringing up the rear. Finni stepped up to the edge, looked nervously down, and then jumped. Only Jeff and Green were left standing on the surface.
“Come on!” Irons urged them.
“This is how Jonas must have felt when he was swallowed by the whale,” Green said, and jumped.
Jeff took a last look up at the stars, which were so unfathomably far away. He wondered if he would ever see them again. Then he, too, stepped over the edge and drifted down into the red cavity.
As the walls glided past him, he looked around. It really did seem to be a lock and resembled similar ones on their own spaceships and planetary bases. The walls were made of dark metal plates that dully reflected the red light emanating from a source he couldn’t see. Yellow and red stripes marked the hazard areas around the hatches. Jeff could make out alien-looking pictograms, which must be the aliens’ warning signs, and strange characters that were vaguely reminiscent of Sumerian cuneiform. Jeff landed softly on the ground. In front of him he saw a hatch with a small window in the middle. He peered through, but all he could see on the other side was darkness.
“And now?” Castle asked. “How do we operate the airlock?”
Jeff looked around in vain for a manual control panel or something similar.
“Maybe hidden behind flaps in the wall or something…” Joanne wagered a guess.
Fields and Mac began to tap along the walls.
“Or maybe they controlled the lock by remote control,” Joanne added.
“Or the aliens had telepathic powers and used their minds.” Green began to laugh. “Then we’re really—”
“Lieutenant Green!” Irons spoke sharply and the engineer fell silent.
“It could be…” Jeff began, but stopped as he noticed a movement above him. He craned his neck to look up. “The outer hatch is closing!”
Because of the vacuum they couldn’t hear anything, of course, but they could see the door sliding over the opening.
“Let’s hope we can open it again,” Green said in a snarky tone. Jeff waited for a dressing down from the major, but Irons didn’t respond.