CHAPTER SIX
Kai had as much to reflect upon as Varian as he sledded back to the encampment. For one thing, he was minus some irreplaceable equipment which Paskutti and Tardma had dropped down a crevice. EV had allowed him only the minimum of seismic spares and the last group he’d expect to be careless with equipment were the heavy-worlders. They moved so deliberately they avoided most accidents. He couldn’t restrict the heavy-worlders from drinking the distillation but he’d have to ask Lunzie to dilute any given them from now on. He couldn’t afford more losses.
An expeditionary force was permitted so many credits in loss of equipment due to unforeseeable accidents but above that figure, the leaders found their personal accounts docked. The loss of the equipment was bothering Kai more than any possible credit subtraction: it was a loss caused by sheer negligence. That irritated him. And his irritation annoyed him more because this should have been a day of personal and team satisfaction: he had achieved what he had been sent to do. Ruthlessly now he suppressed negative feelings.
Beside him Gaber was chattering away in the best spirits the cartographer had exhibited since landing. Berru and Triv were discussing the next day’s work in terms of which of the coloured lakes would be the richest in ore-minerals. Triv was wishing for just one remote sensor, with a decent infra-red eye to pierce the everlasting clouds. A week’s filming in a polar orbit and the job would be done.
“We do have the probe’s tapes.” Berru said.
“That only sounded land mass and ocean depth. No definition, no infra-red to penetrate that eternal cloud cover.”
“I asked for a proper pre-landing remote sensing,” Gaber said, the note of petulance back in his voice.
“So did I,” said Kai, “and was told there wasn’t a suitable satellite in stores. We have to do it the hard way, in person.”
“That would seem to be the criterion for this expedition?” said Gaber, giving Kai a sly glance. “Everything’s done the hard way.”
“You’ve gone soft, Gaber, That’s all,” said Triv. “Not enough time in the grav gym on shipboard. I enjoy the challenge, frankly. I’ve gone flabby. This trip’s good for all of us. We’re spoiled with a punch-a-button-dial-a-comfort system. We need to get back to nature, test our sinews, circulate our blood and …”
“Breathe deeply of stinking air?” asked Gaber when Triv, carried away by his own eloquence, briefly faltered.
“What, Gaber? Lost your nose filters again?”
Gaber was easy to tease and Triv continued in a bantering way until Kai turned the sled through the gap in the hills to their encampment. Kai had affected not to acknowledge Gaber’s glance although, tied in with Gaber’s notion of planting, “doing everything the hard way” could well be a prelude to the abandonment that was euphemistically termed “planting”. It could account for quite a number of deletions in Kai’s original requisition list. Remote sensors were expensive equipment to leave behind with a planted colony. But, if the colony were supposed to be self-sufficient, surely some mining equipment would have been included so that they could refine needed metals for buildings and for replacement of worn-out parts, like sled members. There would have been … “Do it the hard way” rang ominously in Kai’s mind. He’d better have a long chat with Varian as soon as he could.
However, if this expedition were genuine–the urgent need for the transuranics was a chronic condition in the FPS–then someone, if not their own ARTC-10 EV, would strip the message from the beamer satellite, and take the appropriate action of returning to Ireta to extract the all-important ores and minerals and, incidentially, rescue them. The positive thought encouraged Kai, and he employed the rest of the trip by formulating messages; first to the Thek and then for the long distance capsule. No, he’d only the one capsule. Two large deposits did not really constitute dispatching it. So, first he would frame a message for his next contact with the Thek about the old cores, and the uranium deposits. He would hold the ldc until he could justify its trip. He’d no genuine cause for alarm, apart from a vague suspicion of an ageing cartographer.