Freshly showered and dressed in a crisply clean open-necked shirt and fashionable dark trousers, Yamagata made his way to the ship’s bridge. He thought about dropping in on his two guests, but he would see them later at dinner, he knew. As soon as he stepped through the open hatch into the bridge the Japanese crew, including the captain, snapped to respectful attention.
Waving a hand to show they should return to their duties, Yamagata asked the captain, “Are we ready to send the landing craft to the planet?”
The captain tried to keep his face expressionless, but it was clear to Yamagata that he did not like the idea.
“It is not necessary for you to go down to the surface, sir,” he said, almost in a whisper. “We have all the necessary facilities here on the ship—”
“I understand that,” said Yamagata, smiling to show that he was not offended by the captain’s reluctance. “Still, I wish to see the surface installation for myself. It’s near the north pole, I understand.”
“Yes, sir. Borealis Planitia.”
“Near the crater Goethe,” said Yamagata.
The captain dipped his chin to acknowledge Yamagata’s understanding of the geography. But he murmured, “It is very rugged down there, sir.”
“So I have been told. But personal comfort is not everything, you know. My son, Nobuhiko, enjoys skiing. I cannot for the life of me understand why he would risk his life and limbs for the joy of sliding clown a snowy mountain in all that cold and wet, but still he loves it.”
The captain bowed his head. But then he added one final warning: “Er… They call it ‘Dante’s Inferno’ down there. Sir.”
DATA BANK
The closest planet to the Sun, Mercury is a small, rocky, barren, dense, airless, heat-scorched world.
For centuries astronomers believed that Mercury’s rotation was “locked,” so that one side of the planet always faced the Sun while the other side always looked away. They reasoned that the sunward side of Mercury must be the hottest planetary surface in the solar system, while the side facing away from the Sun must be frozen down almost to absolute zero.