The Last Days of Krypton - Kevin J. Anderson [121]
Several hours after sunset, the zone around the crater had cooled enough that the brothers could venture down to the drilling site and take additional readings. None of the other technicians wanted to accompany them into the hellish place. The smoky air was nearly unbreathable, forcing the two to wear protective goggles and filter masks.
In the charred darkness, Jor-El and his brother walked through the remnants of the empty refugee camp, feeling the eerie mood, the strange sense of loss. So much had been abandoned in place: support frameworks, sanitation pits, garbage dumps. Toxic soot covered the landscape for kilometers around. Rocks cracked, rumbled, and popped as they cooled. Waves of heat shimmered up from the impossibly deep hole. Jor-El hoped that later generations wouldn’t curse them for causing so much destruction. Then again, if later generations survived at all, it would be due to their efforts here.
Zor-El walked ahead, intent on reaching the lip of the crater. From his pack, he removed a glistening scaled device, another of his diamondfish detectors. Once activated, it squirmed and twitched in his hands, its impenetrable armor flashing reflections from their handlights.
Zor-El touched a particular scale to activate a fuzzy, glowing envelope around the diamondfish. Leaning forward, he whispered, “Drop down to the warm depths, my friend, and tell us how far we have drilled.” He tossed the diamondfish over the edge, and it tumbled, flashing, into the shadows. He tuned the handheld receiver and watched the trace as the diamondfish fell for more than four minutes down the shaft. When the mechanical creature finally struck the bottom, it took a moment to recover and get its bearings before it began sending back images of the melted rock.
Jor-El looked at the readings. “Yes, we should break through by midmorning tomorrow.”
Zor-El remained silent for a moment and then said, as if the thought had just occurred to him, “I’ve revisited my calculations using a slightly different set of assumptions and initial conditions. There may be a…problem.”
“You revised your calculations? Shouldn’t I proof them? What did you find?”
“There’s a chance—an extremely slight one—that instead of relieving the pressure in the core, this breach just might…crack open the planet. All of Krypton could explode like a punctured pressure vessel.”
Jor-El stared at him in disbelief. “We’re going to break through tomorrow, and now you raise this possibility?”
“As I said, it’s a very remote chance, hardly worth mentioning,” Zor-El replied, sounding defensive. “You know what’s happening down there. We have a choice that’s not really a choice at all. Even raising the question would have invited months or years of tedious discussions—discussions among people who haven’t got the slightest understanding of the science. You and I are the only ones qualified to make the decision.”
“For the whole planet?”
“Yes, for the whole planet! We either accept the risk that our actions might cause a disaster, or we do nothing and ensure a disaster. I’ll take the chance.”
Jor-El let out a long sigh. “Let me look over your calculations. If I don’t find the risk acceptable, I’m calling a halt to our operations here.”
Zor-El was not happy, but he conceded. Later, back in their habitation hut, they hunched over the light of a glowcrystal as Jor-El pored over line after line of his brother’s mathematics. He did find one error, but it was in Krypton’s favor, reducing the chances of disaster even further. Zor-El flushed with embarrassment, even though the results made the risk of planetary destruction orders of magnitude less likely.
Jor-El was still uneasy, but could see no better choice. “All right, I’m satisfied. We drill tomorrow, and we finish this.”
CHAPTER 54
The next day, the scarlet beams shot downward again, and after