'Let's go', Leonides says.
We swing down and outwards into the cheerless Plutonian dawn. How still it is, an alien sunrise. No birds sing, no insects buzz and drone. We spread out across the surface of Pluto, moving easily, all but floating, our backs to the rising sun, looking out on a harsh and silent landscape.
We traveled as four, also in silence. We were absorbing this open, obsolete space of ice rock so far away from our land of all warmth. The terrain was daunting and depressing. Its shapes gave an eerie feeling of dreadfulness.
Sherrard broke our train of thoughts and our silence. He slipped on a piece of ice that crumpled at his feet. We felt the earth shudder as his weight smacked the ground. Out of the crater beside him, crawled a tiny creature. As I peered curiously at it, I thought to myself that our mission had just proved itself.
Pluto and Charon as taken with the ESA/Dornier Fai...
Charon compared with Eris, Pluto, Makemake, Haumea...
Léonide Massine (Ballets russes, Opéra)There were infact other life forms on this distant planet. Eleven minute legs carried this alien's lumpy shell across towards Sherrard. He gave a strangled yelp and scrambled up to his feet. Gartenmeister pulled out the bottle that Lieutenant Jokinker had supplied us with. I bent over and scooped up the alien with my suit hands. Gartenmeister held open the gassed bottle and I lay the creature in it. Instantaneously the gasses inside the jar took effect and our alien fell into a deep, breathless sleep. Gartenmeister replaced the lid and sealed the alien's escape route, should he wake up.
I looked over in the direction of my superior, Leonides, and found him with a friendly expression on his face. It was almost as if he was smiling. 'Lieutenant Jokinker shall be impressed that we have captured a life form', He said...