Martian Republic: The Fateful Secret

Chapter 12: Moral Conflict

Location: Enceladus
Timestamp: 4.30pm, +8GMT

Mike found Aarav crouched on the ground, adjusting his superscanner.

"Whoops, sorry," said Aarav. "I accidentally turned my mic off."

"You nearly gave me a heart attack," said Mike. "Anyway, my scan should be done by now. Yours?"

"Already done. But I'm taking another one just in case because I knocked into the scanner while it was scanning."

"I'm done," announced Zijing, picking up his scanner.

Mike headed over to the front section of the alien spacecraft and pocketed his scanner. According his helmet visor's holographic view, his scan was completed.

"I'm done!" exclaimed Aarav a few seconds later.

"Good. That was quick. Get your scanner and let's head back where we came."

Aarav pocketed his scanner and the three of them retraced their steps through the alien city, eventually getting out at the same place they came in. They swam back to the hole which they had smashed in the ice to find that it had frozen over again.

Mike smashed the ice with the mini impactor and the three men climbed out, heading back towards the Explorer.

"You know, I never thought that sentient extra-terrestrial life even existed," said Zijing. "But after seeing what we all saw, I guess I'm wrong."

Aarav, however was not interested in small talk. He was more concerned about their next course of action.

"Mike, you mentioned earlier about what we should do with the data. You said we'd cross that bridge when we get to it. We're at that bridge now," he said.

"In fact, I have a plan," said Zijing. "We can send a little bit of the data to both the Martian Republic and Earth first and make sure that whatever data sent to Mars gets there properly. If it doesn't we can threaten them by not sending the rest of the data. They can, of course take control of the Explorer remotely and cut off our life support but in that case, they can't secure the data."

"That idea's crazy and there's a chance that we're going to be disposed off but at the same time, it's ingenious," said Aarav.

"But there's the ethics issue," said Mike. "We're practically stealing intellectual property from the aliens. Let's say that with the data we just collected people on Earth and Mars succeed in building starships in the next decade. Whatever benefits we reap from it are just due to a crime called stealing."

"Maybe," said Zijing. "But we're never going to use that technology to fight the aliens or harm them in any way. And if Lauren's theory is correct, they're probably so far ahead of us technologically anyway. This would be like a lesser alien species stealing information about an internal combustion engine from us."

"That makes me feel better," said Mike. "Never thought of the engine analogy. So it's a go then."

The three men walked up the Explorer's open ramp and disappeared into the bowels of the dark metal beast. It failed to impress them the same way it did before after getting a view of the aliens' starships. They began the now familiar ritual of decontaminating, putting away their EVA suits and gear and transmitting data to the Explorer's database.

"What are you doing?" asked Zijing.

"Just transmitting data from my helmet into the database," said Mike nonchalantly as he placed his helmet on a dull gray disc.