“They’re tough to kill, all right.”
“Tell me all about them.”
“Well, for starters, they’re carbon-based—no surprise there. And simple vital staining on frozen sections confirmed that their metabolism is similar to Earth organisms.” She reached for her slate, called up her results. “It appears to be an advanced biofilm, well organized, with several distinct cell types.”
“But prokaryotic?”
“So far it seems so. I did some quick SEMs, didn’t see anything resembling a nucleus or chromosomes. But they cooperate in a manner more typical of advanced life-forms on Earth. Say, on the level of a sophisticated jellyfish. And the structures get quite large…”
“Like stromatolites?”
“Bigger, with more complex shapes.”
He leaned back. “I have often thought that stromatolites were limited by their environment. The ocean-air interface imposes strict physical limitations. What if they’d been set free?”
She nodded. “I think that’s what happened here. Unlimited time, a source of energy, and nutrients from the thermal vent. Anaerobic life went wild.”
“I must see them. My ideas about hydrogen sulfide ecology, do you think they apply?”
“I can’t tell yet, but yes, some of what we talked about at NASA, in the training seminars—that might be the right way to think about it.”
He shifted in his seat, hunched over to press his case. “I must see them.”
“I can’t do that yet.”
“Why not?”
“We’re trying to contain exposure to them.”
“But I would be inside the greenhouse pressure envelope.”
“Look, there are a lot of very squirrely people on Earth who are totally paranoid about this whole subject. You get uplinks, you know all this. Some of them don’t want us to go home, fearing some kind of contamination.” The hell of it was, she had no good reason to deny him access except the real one. She didn’t believe that crap.
“What other tests have you done? Maybe we can find some way to reassure them.”
She looked at him carefully. He seemed entirely guileless, and she was relieved to be able to finally talk about the biology. The constant edginess and fencing wore her down.
“You have been carrying out DNA comparisons?”
“Oh, yes, let me show you. That’s the best of all. First I tried Venter’s essential three hundred genes—not much luck. In fact, I can’t really interpret what I got.”
“I would like to help. Theory’s my game, you know.”
“Well, you’re going to love this.” On her slate she punched up the results of the archaea bacterial gene comparisons. “There. The vent life’s genes have an eighty-six percent concordance with the so-called unique part of the genome of the archaea.”
Chen seemed dazed. “Which means—”
“Common origin. Those unique genes are Martian genes.”
“This is incredible. It’s the biggest story in biology since Darwin. I must see it. We need to reconfirm your results.”
She hesitated, then stepped off the cliff. “When things have settled down a bit, maybe we can do a joint descent in the vent, and you can see for yourself.”
Chen smiled broadly. “That would indeed be interesting. But why wait? You have samples in the greenhouse.”
“I’m sorry, I can’t…”
He recovered himself, his face hardening. “You will not let me see because of your company,” he said sternly.
“They say so, yes.”
“You and I, we are the only biologists. We must work on this together.”
“You’re going back in a few months. If I show you all my work, what’s—”
“To stop me from claiming it?” he smiled warmly. “Only that billions of people already know the truth. You found it. Not I.”
“I don’t want to let out results until I’ve had time to check—”
“I will help you check. There is much to be done.”
“It’s Consortium property. We can’t just—”
“As you assert, I will be gone soon. This is your only chance at collaboration.”
“Look, I really would like to work with you, but—”
“Then I can make that possible. Come back with us.”
