Absolutes

Chapter 04

The flying vehicle took about half an hour to cross the two hundred kilometers from the Colony Alan Turing to the Shackleton crater. It was a service vehicle, designed for short routes, not long journeys. With its intelligent legs, which gave it the appearance of a huge insect, it was capable of landing on almost any terrain. The Shackleton was at the limit of its flight range, so they limited the team to a pair: Laura and Marco. Most of the vehicle's internal space was filled with extra fuel jugs and equipment that could be used locally.

The automatic control of the flight led them to the mysterious ellipsoid, but the approach would not be simple. The rounded structure was located fifty meters below the top of a rocky wall that was part of the edge of the crater. At that point, the wall was almost five hundred meters high. Before leaving the colony, they had studied the satellite's recent images. They defined a route that began with an inspection of the ellipsoid in flight, hovering in front of it for a few seconds. Then the plan was to find a landing place for the vehicle at the top of the cliff and descend down to the ellipsoid by rappelling.

The vehicle now was floating in the void few meters away from the wall, in front of the ellipsoid. The time they had was scarce, because they were sustained high by the constant discharge of the small propellers of the vehicle. As cameras and dozens of other devices recorded information, the two people crew crowded at the forward window.

"No sign enabling identification..." Marco said.

"It's a window!" Laura stated. "It's covered by dust, but you can see the reflection of our headlights on the glass."

The reflection really suggested that there was a smooth surface under the layer of frosted dust. Marco frowned, because that dust was a mystery for him. Anyway, he kept quiet about that. It was a piece in a puzzle. He should find others.

The thrusters put more pressure and they began to gain height, to reach the top of the cliff. Guided by Laura, the artificial intelligence landed the vehicle using its six mechanical legs. They stretched each in a direction and distance, so that they lined up horizontally. The vehicle clung to the uneven terrain like an insect.

They both donned their helmets, sealed their suits, and then depressurized the cabin where they were.

In a few minutes they were descending that natural wall, supported, almost hanging, by cables they had clamped in rocks above. The Moon's weak gravity made that work easy. Although the suits had a mass of sixty kilograms, that meant an extra weight of only ten kilos. Their bodies were also reduced to one-sixth of what they weighed on Earth.

The descent lasted no more than a few minutes, and they were at the side of the ellipsoid. Laura decided to test her theory that it was a window and as soon as she got there, she ran her hand through the dust that covered the shiny surface. She was not surprised, thus, when the dust came out and revealed what looked like glass. She turned to Marco, smiling from inside her helmet. Then she bent over and looked in at the stretch she had just cleaned.

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