Recently, it was billionaires in space that made the news, getting into orbit just to say they could. I think most of us roll our eyes, think about what the money spent could have benefitted society. This story says it will still happen, but that billionaire will get a double helping of just desserts…
1
Marco and I were in his home in Patagonia when the first results arrived from the government orbiter circling Titan, Saturn’s largest moon. The orbiter had confirmed the existence of deep surface oceans of methane. The oceans stretched across most of the northern polar region of Titan, and instruments suggested that they reached a depth of almost 1,000 meters and that their temperatures were below -180 degrees Celsius. The search for life by instruments on the orbiter was inconclusive.
As the news came in, Marco smiled and muttered a single, emphatic, “Mofo.” The word sent a chill through me. I am head of Marco’s space systems corporation, and was, perhaps, his only friend. I had known Marco since before he became, you know, “Marco,” and I suppose I knew him better than anyone. I knew, for example, that Marco happily muttering “Mofo” had never failed to cause me irritable bowel syndrome or ulcers, certainly something intestinal.
“Felix,” Marco said to me, “do you like to swim?”
“Of course,” I replied. And now I really began to worry.
“You know,” Marco said. “I’ve been working very hard, and I think I am entitled to a vacation. Perhaps a swim in the ocean. Yes. Definitely – an ocean swim. I hear that Titan is lovely in the Spring.”
“No, no, no,” was all I could reply. “You can’t go to Titan to swim in its ocean. Can’t be done; shareholders wouldn’t stand for it; and my stomach is already starting to act up.”
“Cheer up,” he replied. “There’s nothing I can’t do; screw the shareholders; and you can take some Tums.”
The rich can generally get what they want, and Marco, as I am sure you know, was very rich. He had pioneered the colonization of Mars and commercial mining of the inner asteroids. He often told me that the hardest part of his life was deciding what he wanted. After that, he said, the rest generally came easy.
2
A few days later, Marco publicly announced his intention to send a crewed expedition to Titan. He, of course, neglected to say that he would lead the mission. The personal risk involved would have sent the value of stocks in his companies plummeting.
I quickly assembled the team to design and construct the components of the mission. The only surprise to the team was Marco’s insistence that the methane oceans be explored, not in a crewed submersible, but in an individual diving suit. I did not tell them that its purpose was to allow Marco freely to swim in the ocean. Ensuring life support in a free ranging diving suit in the environmental conditions of Titan’s oceans created extraordinary technical challenges, but Marco’s teams were used to challenges. They were also used to Marco’s deadlines. He announced that the mission to Titan would leave in eighteen months.
The announcement of the mission produced excitement among many and controversy among a few. The controversy arose from concerns that the mission might contaminate Titan with Terran life and limit the possibility of discovering alien lifeforms. Marco had long dismissed the possibility of extraterrestrial life in our solar system, but part of his genius was his ability to manipulate the government and public opinion. Placating the threats from international bureaucrats and do-gooders, Marco promised to take steps to minimize the risk of contamination; he had dealt with similar nonsense on his first Mars landers. Bureaucrats and do-gooders could not thwart him in achieving his desires.
Marco and a crew of three lifted off from Earth only twenty-three months after his first announcement. Marco, the bastard, made sure I was one of the crew; he wanted someone he could talk to. Marco explained that he could hardly have a conversation with me if I didn’t come along. Transmissions between Earth and Titan would take about an hour and a half.
Titan is a long, long way from Earth, but using the “Marco Continuous Thrust Nuclear Engine”™, we entered orbit around Titan after a mere eight-month trip. Marco and two of the crew members, Jacques and Bruno, took a lander to Titan’s surface soon after we entered orbit. Marco had named the lander Iapetus. Iapetus was one of the Greek Titans and the God of Mortality: Marco was known for his love of irony. I, thank Zeus, got to stay in the ‘safety’ of orbit. I, too, had my moments of irony.
Marco, Jacques, and Bruno stood on the surface of Titan in environment suits (themselves a technological achievement given the intense radiation emanating from Saturn) and marveled at both the beauty and harshness. Titan’s dark, swirling atmosphere obscured the view of rocks and lakes that stretched to the horizon. But their mission – Marco’s mission – focused on the ocean’s edge that began a few clicks from the landing site.
“Felix,” Marco said into his transmitter. “It is beautiful down here. You are going to regret not coming down here with us.” This produced my inevitable reply, “Non, je ne regrette rien.” Edith Piaf would have been proud.
3
Bruno drove the bumpy distance to the ocean in their rover, while Jacques helped Marco secure himself in the diving suit. At the ocean’s shore, a crane arm lifted Marco and gently lowered him into the freezing liquid methane. When Marco was fully immersed in the ocean, he released the tether. He was now connected to the surface only by a cable that ensured he could be quickly pulled to the surface in case of an emergency. A few small drones circled him enabling full video views of his dive.
Marco smiled a quiet smile and I heard him softly say “Mofo.” Once again, he had done the impossible and achieved his goal. With a pull of his arms, he was swimming in the dark ocean. “Felix,” Marco said. “Can you hear me?”
“Yes,” I replied. “Reading you five by five. Whatever the hell that means.”
“I did it!! Don’t ever tell me something can’t be done! Now let’s try a little somersault.”
“Careful,” I yelled back. “Don’t tangle your cable. I’m not coming to pull you out, and I’m ruling out any mouth-to-mouth resuscitation. So be careful.”
“It’s dark but beautiful down here. The light from Saturn refracts on methane crystals and it’s like I’m swimming in a rainbow. I can only see a short distance, but I can see swirling currents of liquid methane. My sensors show an outside temperature of minus 175.3 Celsius. In other words, ‘Baby, it’s cold outside.’ Are you getting my video feed from the drones?”
“Yes, your video is clear. Can you identify the solid specks I’m seeing?
“Not really,” Marco replied. “They appear inorganic, and my best guess is that they are larger methane crystals. I have taken samples. Felix, I’m going deeper.”
Marco descended further into the ocean. At greater depths and greater temperatures, the methane flowed more freely and seemed to swirl around him. The rainbow refraction had stopped, and the ocean seemed darker and more frightening. The spotlight on Marco’s helmet illuminated a small area around him; the methane crystals still appeared, but interspersed among them were other dark blobs. Unlike the crystals, these blobs did not flow with the liquid methane, but seemed to dance to their own music. Puzzled, Marco looked around to see the dark blobs seeming to orbit his diving suit. A thrill ran through Marco as he realized that they might be living organisms capable of sensing his presence. At once, his skepticism about the existence of extraterrestrial life vanished, and he was certain that he was watching a new lifeform.
“Felix,” he said. “Are you seeing what I’m seeing? These new blobs have independent motion and appear to be moving with volition. I think I have found extraterrestrial life! Marco’s critters! I’m getting a closer look.”
Marco moved towards some of the blobs and tried to collect samples, but as he manipulated the collector, they would swirl away. “They are avoiding capture,” Marco exclaimed in wonder. “They have amazing sensory and motive capabilities. I’m going to try again to get one of the little bastards.” He swung the collector arm of his suit, but again the blobs swirled away and avoided capture. “Now I’m starting to get a little pissed,” Marco said. I knew that tone. Marco was not known for handling frustration very well.
“Slow and steady,” I told him.
“Screw that,” he replied, and swung the collector wildly, smashing into groups of the blobs. Some of them shattered and streams of chemicals swirled from their crushed bodies. “That’ll show them who’s boss,” Marco said with his characteristic petulance.
The other blobs seemed to respond to the oozing chemicals and began to collect around the smashed bodies. Marco and I watched, mesmerized, as the group of blobs seemed to combine into a larger organism. Soon, we noticed that other individual blobs were streaming to the larger mass and merging to form an ever-growing organism.
“Mofo,” Marco said as he saw the organism differentiating into discrete components. Pseudopod-like arms began to extend from the creature, and sections of it opened in what resembled the mouth of a Terran sea urchin. The arms propelled the mass in a controlled motion that took it in a circle around Marco. “Amazing,” Marco said as now pulsating mass began to swim elegantly through the freezing methane ocean.
Switching channels on my communication with the surface, I spoke to Jacques and Bruno privately. “You’re getting all this.”
“Yes,” they both replied.
“I want you ready to extract Marco if I give the word. Don’t listen to him, listen to me.”
“I don’t think Marco will like that,” Bruno said.
“I don’t care!” I replied. “While Marco is submerged, I’m in charge of this mission.”
“Got it,” they both replied.
4
Marco felt his first pang of fear when a sensor on his diving suit alerted him to pressure on his back shoulder. Swinging around, he saw another mass with its extended pseudopod pressing on his suit. Marco swam a few meters and turned to see the organism with its arm-like pseudopod extended towards him. Where he had once been surrounded by small blobs, he was now surrounded by growing groups of maneuvering organisms that increased in size as individual blobs joined their mass.
“Felix,” Marco said. “I’m not thrilled with the look of this. They are clearly exhibiting something like intelligence. They’re moving in a coordinated fashion, and they’re taking way too much interest in me.” At that point, Marco’s fear began to turn into terror. But Marco was Marco, and he had never succumbed when faced with a challenge. Fear and stress fed his intellect.
“Felix, you know what they remind me of?” Marco said as he resumed his examination of the swimming masses.
“Swim away from them,” I yelled.
“….plasmodial slime molds.”
“I don’t care if they remind you of your mother,” I said. If anything, my fear was greater than his. “I want you out of there. Jacques, Bruno, pull him up!”
“Belay that,” Marco barked. “Pull me out now and you two can walk home. Felix, listen to me. Are you familiar with slime molds?
“You’re talking crazy, Marco. I want you out of there.”
“Wait and listen. Terran slime molds exist as individual unicellular organisms until some form of environmental stress causes them to merge into a large fluid plasmodium that contain the free nuclei of the individual organisms. As a plasmodium, they are like one enormous cell with multiple nuclei. And, as a plasmodium, they can differentiate into discrete organs. These creatures seem very similar, and I’m pretty confident that I can outwit a slime mold.
“Let me see if I can get a response from them.” Marco focused his high intensity light on the center of one of the “plasmodia” hoping that it would retreat. There was no response.
“Marco,” I yelled, “your left foot.”
Marco looked down to see another plasmodium engulfing his foot. Kicking with his right foot, the plasmodium retreated. “Good,” Macro said, “they react to pressure.”
“It’s time to get rid of these pests,” he shouted. I watched as he swung the arms of his diving suit, smashing into several plasmodia. Although they retreated, the spreading chemical from their broken surfaces seemed to attract more of the blobs to join the growing masses.
“Jacques, Bruno, pull him up. That’s an order,” I yelled. “Marco, your cable!”
I watched as several of the growing plasmodia engulfed the cable that connected Marco to the surface. Before Marco could react, the cable parted; dissolved, presumably by some substance secreted by the organism. Marco was now truly swimming freely in the oceans of Titan.
The video feed from the drones continued to transmit, and I watched helpless as Marco began to wildly swing his arms and legs. Sensors showed that Marco was trying to blow the tanks on his suit that would send him to the surface. When his suit didn’t respond, I saw in horror that pseudopods from the blobs were encircling his chest and preventing any release from his tanks. Other blobs surrounded his helmet and obscured the faceplate and sensors that provided his awareness of the situation. I still received information from his biosensors, and I saw in amazement that Marco’s heart rate and breathing were stable; Marco was relaxed.
“Well, Mofo,” Marco said. “It appears that I have been outwitted by slime molds. Who’d have guessed it.” Those were his last words.
The transmission from the drone cameras showed the blobs pressed around his diving suit, and I could see it begin to dissolve; bits of carbon fiber floating with the slime mold specks.
In the end, the cold was the thing that actually killed Marco.
As the blobs dissolved the suit, his body in turn began to dissolve. Although most of tissue was stripped away, some of his cellular material merged in the plasmodium engulfing him. His free-floating nuclei soon exchanged genetic material with those of the Titan blobs, forming complex mixtures of Titan and Terran nucleic acids. As the last of Marco was absorbed, the blobs began to disassociate into individual dancing black specks.
It was only later, after subsequent missions analyzed their nucleic acids, that we figured out that his genetic traces remained in “Marco’s Critters.” What else could we call them?
I imagined that in the very last moments before he died, Marco had smiled his quiet smile. He had shown the bureaucrats and do-gooders. Life on Titan may have been contaminated, but bits of Marco remained. I was absolutely sure that, at the end, it was all Marco could ever have wanted. And Marco, a very rich man, always got what he wanted.
END
