"Very simple the way he explains it.” Aldo said distastefully, dabbing at his nose and examining the results on his handkerchief. "But it doesn't work out that way in practice. No signals are getting through. And our friend will not agree with me that we'll have to step up the strength of our output if we're ever going to punch through all that pressurized gunk out there."
"It's quality not quantity!" Nissim shouted, and Stan stepped in once again.
"By that do you mean that we're going to have to unlimber the MT monster down under the floor?"
"I damned well do. That's why it was built in the first place, with adjustable components rather than sealed block units."
"It will take us a month to move everything and we'll probably kill ourselves trying.” Nissim shouted.
"Not that long, I hope," Stan said, sitting up and trying not to groan with the effort. "And the exercise will be good for our muscles."
It took them almost four days to clear away and get up the flooring, and they were over the edge of exhaustion before they had finished. Mechanical preparations had been made with this eventuality in mind; there were ringbolts to suspend the equipment from, and power hoists to lift it, but a certain amount of physical effort was still needed. In the end almost the entire floor area had been cleared and raised, leaving a ledge around the wall, on which their test equipment and couches alone remained. The rest of the floor consisted of MT screen. From the hard comfort of their couches they looked at it.
"A monster," Stan said. "You could drop a landing barge through it."
"It has more than size," Aldo told him, gasping for air. He could hear the hammer of blood in his ears and was sure that his heart had suffered from the strain. "All the circuitry is beefed up, with spare circuits and a hundred times the power-handling capacity it would need anywhere else."
"How do you dig into its guts for adjustments? I can't see anything except the screen?"
"That's deliberate." He pointed into the threaded hole in the armor, from which they had unscrewed a foot-thick plug. "Our operating controls are in there. Before we leave we put the plug back and it seals itself into place. To make adjustments we have to lift up sections of the screen."
"Am I being dense or is it the gravity? I don't understand."
Aldo was patient. "This MT screen is the whole reason for this expedition. Getting the MT to work down here is vital to us — but only secondary to the original research. When we get out the technicians will come through and replace all the circuitry with solid-state, block-sealed units — then evacuate. The upper section of the interior of the hull will be progressively weakened by automatic drills. This screen will be tuned to another MT in space above the ecliptic. Eventually the weakened Ball will collapse, implode, push right down on top of the screen. The screen will not be harmed because it will transmit all the debris through into space. Then the phasing will be adjusted slowly until transmission stops. At which point we will have access to the bottom of Saturn's sea. The cryo-genicists and high-pressure boys are looking forward to that."
Stan nodded but Nissim was looking up at the cluttered dome above, almost openmouthed, thinking of that imploding mass of metal, the pressure of the poison sea behind it…
"Let's get started," he said quickly, struggling to rise. "Get the screens up and the changes made. It's time we were getting back."
The other men helped with the labor of lifting the screen segments, but only Aldo could make the needed adjustments. He worked intensely, cursing feebly, on the units that the remote handler placed before him. When he was too tired he stopped and closed his eyes so he would not see Nissim's worried glances at him, up at the dome above, and back to him again. Stan served them food and doled out the G drugs and stimulants with a cheerful air. He talked about the varied experiences of space flight, which monologue he enjoyed even if they did not.
Then the job was done, the tests completed and the last segment of screen slid back into place. Aldo reached into the control pit and pressed a switch: the dark surface changed to the familiar shimmer of MT operation.
"Transmitting," he said. "Here, send this," Stan said, scribbling How do you read usl on a piece of paper. He threw it far out into the center of the screen and it sank from sight. "Now receive."
Aldo flipped the switch and the surface of the screen changed. Nothing else happened. For a heartbeat of time they watched, un-moving, not breathing, staring at that barren surface.
Then, with smooth sinuousness, a length of recording tape sprang mto existence and, bent by its own weight, curved and began to pile Up. Nissim was the nearest and he reached out and grabbed it, reeling it in until the cut end appeared.
"It works!" Stan shouted.
"Partially/7 Nissim said coldly. "The quality of transmission is sure to be off and finer adjustments will have to be made. But they can analyze at the receiving end and send us specific instructions."
He fed the tape into the player and switched it on. A booming squawking echoed from the metal walls. It could be perceived as the sound of a human voice only with a great effort.
"Finer adjustments.” Nissim said with a small smile. The smile vanished instantly as the Ball rocked to one side, then slowly returned to vertical. "Something has pushed us.” he gasped.
"Currents perhaps.” Aldo said, clutching to his couch as the motion slowly damped, "or maybe solid floes; there's no way to tell. It's past time we got out of here."
They were fighting against the unending fatigue now, but they tried to ignore it. The end was so close and the security of Saturn One station just a step away. Nissim computed the needed adjustments while the other two lifted up the screen sections again and reset the components. It was the worst kind of work to do in the more-than-doubled gravity. Yet, within a solar day they were getting sound-perfect tapes and the samples of materials they sent back tested out correct to five decimal places. The occasional jarring of the Ball continued and they did their best not to think about it.
"We're ready to begin live testing now," Nissim said into the microphone. Aldo watched the tape with these recorded words vanish into the screen and resisted a strong impulse to hurl himself after it. Wait. Soon now. He switched to receive.
"I do not think I have ever been in one place for so long before in my entire life," Nissim said, staring, like the others, at the screen. "Even in college in Iceland I went home to Israel every night."
"We take the MT screens for granted," Aldo said. "All the time we were working at Satellite One on this project I commuted to New York City after work. We take it for granted until something like this happens. It's easier for you, Stan."
"Me?" the pilot looked up, raising his eyebrows. "I'm no different. I get to New Zealand every chance I have." His gaze went back instantly to the empty screen.
"I don't mean that. It's just that you are used to being alone in a ship, piloting, for longer times. Maybe that's good training. You don't seem as… well, as bothered by all this as we do."
Nissim nodded silent agreement and Stan barked a short, hard laugh.