Shall Not Cease
25 February 2003
Excursion Rover “Clifford” (357 km W of Athena Base)
Athena II
Sol 253
“Harder,” she said.
He slapped her again. She shook her head.
“Harder!” she said, trying to get him to push past his inhibitions.
Again, his hand connected with her cheek. She groaned and rolled her eyes.
“C’mon you fucking truck, slap me like a bitch!”
That did it. Morrison brought his hand down across her face so hard that the sound of the slap echoed off the rover’s thin walls.
Her orgasm hit like the crashing of a wave. She felt her body roil and spasm. The ball of energy exploded through her core and rippled out through her curled toes. Somewhere in the haze, he finished as well. That wasn’t really a concern to her, but it was nice enough, she supposed.
Shoving him off of her hips, she rose and started to dress. Sunrise was in less than an hour and she wanted to get the most out of this day.
He gave her a semi-wounded look as she pushed past him to reach for a washcloth.
“What?” she asked.
“I mean…” he started.
“You did fine. Better than last time. Don’t overthink it,” she said, combing her short hair in the small mirror over the sink.
Brett Morrison put up his hands in surrender. “If you’re happy, I’m happy.”
She bent down to slide out the EVA undergarments and started pulling them up her legs. “You’re the first guy to have sex on Mars, Brett. Trust me, you’re happy.”
“Is that why we’re doing this?” he asked.
“It’s not the
only reason,” she said. There was no reason to bait him now that she’d gotten what she needed. She looked over her shoulder at him sitting on his bunk.
“Look, pressure builds. It’s as dangerous in the human body as it in in a fuel tank. Sometimes you gotta blow off some steam. Decrease fluid levels, you know?” she said.
“Fluid levels?” he asked.
“More yours than mine,” she smirked. “Are you not having fun?” she asked.
“Just.. we could do a little emotional maintenance here,” he said, looking around for his pants.
“Mars ain’t the kind of place for romancin’, sweetie,” she said, trying to get him to join her in mutual nonchalance.
“In fact, it’s cold as hell,” she continued, carrying on the Elton John theme.
That got him to laugh. “Every time I think you’re a cylon,” he said, letting the thought hang.
“Cylon?” she asked.
“It’s a new show on Sci-Fi. They remade Battlestar Galactica. It’s not bad,” he said.
“Is that what you had Houston beam down the other day?” she asked, happy to change the subject.
He nodded, “I watch it after you fall asleep.”
She shrugged, “Cool. Suit up. Big day today.”
This was the most ambitious of the major expeditions that were planned for the Athena II mission. They’d taken Clifford farther out than ever before. The terrain here was still relatively flat, but it was the farthest they’d ever travelled away from Athena Base.
Following the advice of Gide, NASA had determined to lose sight of the shore, as it were. They were now heading into what was thought might be the deeper seabed of Mars’s great, long-dead Northern Ocean. The theory that a vast expanse of water had covered most of the Northern Hemisphere was well-regarded amongst the geologic set. Indeed, the first major aquifer had been found along the trail that led out from Ares Valles.
The plan to set Athena Base in an ancient river delta allowed NASA to plot expeditions into regions that may have once been ocean depths, or wetlands, assuming Mars had ever had that much water to begin with. Before the later Athena expeditions tackled the rocky highlands that might have once held Martian shorelines, Athena II would head in the easier direction and explore the relative flatlands that lay to the north and west.
These days, the six crewmembers of Athena II had split into three odd-couple pairings. Each had its own combination of mission and equipment to concern themselves with.
Charlie Hickory was not the best person to take a long-road trip with. But when her sole companion was quiet, competent, and sexually available, she found the confines of the expedition rover to be more than pleasant.
So far, this month-long jaunt hadn’t disappointed. Clifford carried on-board solar panels that were supplemented with stowable arrays. The trip had been divided into four-day stints. For each day of driving, three would be spent in a single location, soaking up solar power and charging the rover’s onboard batteries. With the water recycling systems operating at a high efficiency, the biggest source of hobbling was in on-board consumables. Limiting the expedition crew to two had given this expedition that much more range.
While Brett and Charlie were road-tripping, Henri and Laura were still occupying Fort Fletcher, determined to search every last drop of the aquifer for any trace of microscopic life that might lie dormant in the permafrost. They’d been searching for months now, but with no success. For Henri, it seemed to be a cruel twist of fate. Laura had found it very satisfying to get such grand access to subsurface samples.
Charlie didn’t envy them their living conditions. Without a second expedition rover, Laura and Henri were forced to sleep in the little runabout each night. The lack of supplies meant that they had to return to Athena Base once every four days. A three-hour trip, one way, all for a bit of water that was as dead as Julius Caesar.
And back home, Jake and Alexei, the two eldest crewmembers, tended to Athena Base and its assorted equipment like a pair of old ranch-hands in the Colorado wilderness of the nineteenth century.
The West Point man and the former Soviet cosmonaut now jointly monitored the MAV, repaired and maintained the HABs, and ran logistics, communications, and control for all of the surface operations. Charlie smiled thinking about the two of them working side-by-side. A model of the new peace that had followed on from the Cold War. Gene Roddenberry would have been proud.
Her boots crunched on the rust-red rocks as she exited the rover. They’d arrived here late yesterday afternoon. They’d done a short EVA to deploy the excess solar panels and scout a bit of the terrain. This spot had a couple of craters a few hundred yards away. Her first order of business was to gather some tools and sample bags, load up the trolley, and head out to do some digging.
While she did that, Brett would set up a weather monitoring station and deploy one of the mini-rovers, the last of the ones they had on-board.
A few hours later, with a sizable hole dug into the crater rim, a three-second tone came over her helmet radio.
“Incoming from Houston,” Brett said, unnecessarily.
Charlie listened to the downlink that had routed from Houston, to
Orion, then down to Clifford. Athena Base was well beyond their horizon now, so their main line of communication was only accessible when
Orion was in their line of sight.
“Lab rover, this is Houston. Lab rover, this is Houston. Giving you your sol 253 report. We have you at approximately two-hundred-and-twenty miles west of Athena Base. Again, we congratulate you on your record-setting expedition. Geology is patiently awaiting your initial report on Site 2-24. At your next convenience, we would like you to do a consumables check, especially CO2 scrubbers, EVA air, and, of course, total food. The flight surgeon is renewing, once again, his request that you
not interrupt your downlink during evening hours. It’s a little disconcerting for you to go full quiet after dark. Mobile engineering still wants to know how Charlie managed to override their downlink controls for the internal cameras. We ask you to please not leave us in the dark again.”
Charlie rolled her eyes at the request. Even if she hadn’t been using her bunk recreationally, she still didn’t like Houston watching her sleep. Overriding the downlink had been child’s play. They just didn’t want to admit she knew more than the backroom guys when it came to Clifford’s onboard systems.
“Also, we’re receiving reports from Meteorology, supplemented by your weather stations, thank you very much. Meteorology is reporting a possible dust storm forming to the south. We’re uplinking new imagery from
Orion down to you with this transmission. The storm seems to be heading your way, so we are directing you to limit the Site 2-24 explorations to this single sol. Charge your batteries as much as possible, and then make for 2-23B and route back east to Athena Base through the B-series of stops. Again, we congratulate you on your journey out, but we are ready for you to RTB starting tomorrow morning. Lab rover, this is Houston, signing off.”
“Oh, you gotta be kidding me,” Charlie said, tossing a shovel full of dirt behind her.
“They’re scrubbing us?” Brett said, in disbelief.
“We’re not even getting dust yet!” Charlie said. “Those little wusses!”
Brett reigned her in, “We got plenty of good stuff to bring back home.”
Charlie looked down at the new subsurface layer she’d just dug into. What she saw below was not the right color at all.
“Brett!” she said, somewhere between a call and a demand.
“What’s up?” he said.
“Come over here. I need you to crazy-check me on this. Right now,” she said.
Ten minutes later, she’d smoothed out a sizable area of rock and soil while he’d been trudging over. She waved him in with a gloved hand and uses the blade of her shovel to point out the anomaly.
“What does that look like to you?” she asked.
He crouched down, no easy task in the stiff suit, and peered into the exposed rock formation.
“That’s… is that opal?” he asked.
“That’s what I’m thinking,” she said, by way of confirmation.
“Oh, man,” Brett said.
“Yeah, we haven’t seen that so far,” Charlie said.
“No way. Nothing from Cale’s crew either. This is a first,” Brett said.
“How sure are you?” Charlie asked.
“I mean… there’s not much else I’d expect with that coloring,” he said, indicating the bright patches in the gravel.
“Correct me if I’m wrong, but you can’t get opal without water, right?” she said, not quite rhetorically.
“Bingo,” he said, picking up traces of the gem with his gloved fingers.
“We gotta see how much is here. They can’t scrub us. This site just got important.”
Brett rose from his crouch, pulled a camera from his tool belt, and took a few photos. Charlie stood back to let him have a good field of view.
When he finished, she began to scoop the opal gems into a large sample bag. As she did, Brett stopped to take a photo of the horizon to the North.
“Let’s get some lunch and make sure we’re talking about what we’re talking about,” he said.
Together they loaded the trolley and walked back to Clifford.
Over peanut butter and powdered mashed potatoes, they checked the samples and more or less confirmed their initial suspicions.
Charlie swung her neck around to take a look at the rover clock. The countdown read 00:42:37, which meant they had the better part of an hour to wait before anyone would know what they found.
“I think we need to stay here at least the full three days,” she said. “We need to know what we’ve found. We need to leave a six-wheel behind to keep searching. This is the best place we’ve seen so far.”
Brett winced. “They’re gonna say let’s bail and leave it for the next shot. That opal’s been sitting there for a million years. It can wait ‘til Athena IV gets here.”
“Or Athena V,” Charlie said. “Or if they like what they see on the other side of the planet, it could be twenty years before someone comes back here,” she said. The ire in her voice rose a bit more. “It’s water, for Pete’s sake. You can’t have opal without water. We can’t just turn our back and run because it’s gonna get cloudy in a few days.”
“It’s gonna get cloudy on top of our solar panels. We lose power and we can’t run the heaters, the motors, the comms antennae...” Brett said.
“All the more reason for us to stay put. We’re low on battery as it is. We’ll only have forty percent in the batt when we leave in the morning. We should stick around and take what we can get tomorrow… and the next day,” she said.
Brett shook his head, “We leave in the morning, get ahead of the weather. Charge, drive, charge, drive. Keep doing that until we’ve got enough clear sky behind us to head home.”
Charlie shook her own head in return, “I’m telling you, they’ll abandon this and we’ll never really know what we’ve got here.”
Brett was starting to feel hemmed in, “I don’t like this any more than you do. But let’s not risk our necks over something that we don’t fully understand. We know where this place is. An hour from now, so will Earth. We did our jobs. Let’s go home.”
Charlie didn’t argue. She just rose and went back to the airlock.
“Tell Houston as much as you can. I’m not sitting here for half an hour when I’ve got something major out there to dig up.”
“Charlie! You can’t go out there alone,” he admonished.
“I’m second in command and Jake Jensen is about two-hundred miles that way,” she said, pointing a long, gloved finger towards the rear of the rover. “You want to file a complaint? Feel free. But this is my little corner of the universe for right now and I’m going to go do my job.”
Brett let her cycle the airlock without further complaint. He knew that the best cure for her anger was a problem to solve. He had no intention of getting between her and her objective unless he was wearing a helmet and pads. Better men than him had tried before. He assumed most of them lay at the bottom of Galveston Bay now.
With a half-hour before he could uplink to
Orion, he resolved to use his time wisely. He connected his camera to his laptop and brought up the photos from the opal crater.
The last one was the first object of his focus. It was the shot of the northern horizon. The red rocks were offset by a pale pink sky. He put the image into an analysis program and then connected to Clifford’s internal software.
Atop the rover, Brett directed one of the object collision cameras to swing to the south. He took an image of the southern horizon and then put it on the screen in a new window.
The southern horizon was noticeably darker.
He tried to use his imaging program to get a sense of the difference in the shade of pink between north and south. After ten minutes, he gave up trying to get a single objective number, but it was obvious that this storm was having an effect on the southern skies.
He lost track of time until the three-second tone blared over the rover’s speakers. Houston was calling again.
“Lab rover, this is Houston. No changes from our last transmission. The dust storm is a little larger and a little faster than we’d previously seen. Updated images are coming to you now. Our revised plan is still on. We’ll have you charge up for the remainder of the day and then start back tomorrow morning. We’re sorry to cut you short, but it is the safest course of action under the circumstances.”
Charlie snorted over the radio, “If we were meant to be safe, we wouldn’t be on another damn planet.”
Brett reeled a bit. With her outside, he’d almost forgotten she was getting the same audio that he was. He decided to put his head in the dragon’s mouth.
“Charlie, we can’t argue with them. I mean literally.
Orion’s orbit won’t cross again until tonight. I’m uploading the opal stuff to them, and I’ll tell them we want to stay, but if they scrub us after hearing that, I don’t think we have much choice.”
Charlie sighed over the radio. On the external cameras, he could see her trudging along with her trolley, heading back towards the crater with the opal.
“How about this? Instead of packing in the solar panels this afternoon, we leave them for morning. Do an EVA first thing. You pick up the panels and I’ll get more samples. We leave at lunch instead of breakfast. That’ll give me four more hours to play with.”
“You think four more hours will make a difference?” Brett asked.
“I know zero more hours won’t,” she said.
“I’ll put that in the recommendations. I’m not gonna go to war with Houston, but I’ll make the suggestion.”
“Copy that,” Charlie said.
As the sun set over Site 2-24, Charlie reflected on how easy it had been to get her own way. Asking permission was laughable with a million miles of void between you and authority. She was fine asking forgiveness from Jensen when they got back. He’d give it easily. After all, she was the only reason that he had six crewmembers alive and walking on Mars. Genius buys a lot.
After another round of dialog, Houston had acceded to her plan. Mostly because they simply
hadn’t gathered the solar panels at the end of the afternoon EVA. Unless Houston wanted them to go get them in the dark, then there wasn’t much else to do.
In the meantime, she was sure this was now the most exciting place on Mars.
After a perfectly adequate round of sex with Brett, she tiptoed over to the drive controls. Plugging in her laptop, she gave a quick thought to whether this was worth her career. She had vague thoughts about being the first woman to return to Mars. She was young enough that she could potentially command Athena VI or VII if the schedules and her health held out.
She wasn’t the type to hold back on the off chance there would be a reward later. Legendary women had to blaze their own paths. And she had already blazed more than two-hundred miles of path. She wasn’t about to abandon it.
Strong women had to be bullshitters or bullfighters. She knew damn well which she intended to be.
The control subroutines could be commented out easily. But it took her about twenty minutes to install the password lock on the software access. Brett couldn’t be blamed. She’d done this alone. Technically her mandate as second-in-command was to take any action necessary for crew safety and mission success. She might not be safe, but she was damn sure going to be successful.
She looked over her shoulder at her slumbering source of sexual satisfaction. If he didn’t want a woman making decisions for him, he shouldn’t have signed on for this little field trip.
26 February 2003
Excursion Rover “Clifford” (357 km W of Athena Base)
Athena II
Sol 254
“Charlie, we gotta go. It’s time,” Brett said.
They’d already spent two hours at the opal crater. More samples and a deeper, richer vein under the surface. This place was a treasure trove.
“Brett… we’re not leaving,” she said.
“What are you talking about? I’m already packing up.” he said.
“Don’t bother. I’m making a command decision here. We’re staying. We’ll take our chances with the storm,” she said.
“Um… like hell,” Brett said. She admired his gumption, “We did the half-EVA jaunt back here. That was the deal. Let’s mount up and head out.”
“I’m not leaving this site until I know what we’ve got. Neither are you,” she said.
“Charlie, I know you think this is your legacy, but it’s not worth dying over,” he said.
“We’re not gonna die,” she said, rolling her eyes at his hyperbole.
“Charlie,” he said.
“Drag up all the solar panels you want, you’re not going anywhere. You might as well stay and help me dig this up,” she said.
“What are you talking about?” he asked.
“I locked the controls last night. Unless you know my password, that rover isn’t moving an inch unless I say so.”
“What?!?” he said. His voice was about three octaves higher than it had any right to be.
She pointed to the sample bags they’d been gathering for the last two hours. “There are
pounds of opal in those bags. You can’t make opal without water. Where do you think all that water is?”
“Subsurface radar isn’t showing anything major,” Brett said.
“It’s not reaching deep enough. I’m telling you. We gotta stay. We gotta do a wider scan and we have to up the power.”
“We don’t have the time,” Brett said, pointing south. “And we’re not gonna have the power to up the power. This thing is gonna be here tonight!”
“Relax. We hunker down, let the storm slide past us. We’ll have enough juice to keep the systems going, but not to drive.”
“And you’re basing that on your ability to predict Martian weather?” he asked, incredulously.
“You wanna bet your next paycheck that I’m wrong?” she asked.
“I don’t wanna bet my life that you’re right!” he said.
“Look, do whatever you want, but you aren’t leaving without my say so. And the best thing you can do right now is to go get the GPR and sweep that area at full power,” she said, waving a hand towards the newly exposed opal veins they’d found this morning.
“You’ve got to be kidding me,” Brett said.
“Come to your senses,” Charlie said, digging in again.
“Now I know you’re kidding me,” he said. He lowered his tone, “Charlie…” trying one last appeal.
“This isn’t an argument. It’s not a debate. I’m in command. Do what I’m telling you,” she said.
“I’m calling Houston,” he said, turning to walk back to the rover.
“Oh, good luck with that. I’m sure they’ll send someone right out to arrest me and reboot the software. Triple-A should get here in about fifty years. You got your membership card ready?”
“Screw you, Charlie,” he said, storming off.
She let him go. By the time he made the walk back to Clifford, he’d know there was nothing to do but what she told him. You drove Brett like you drove a horse. Just block off his options and he’d go where you wanted.
She extended her EVA, using the reserve oxygen tanks to gain another two hours. It’s not like she was that worried about protocol at this point. Brett had joined her. In for a penny…
When they inevitably called it and walked back, she had a chance to look at the southern horizon. She admitted it was darker than she’d expected.
Overhead, the sky darkened a bit more. Charlie checked the solar panel output. Seventy-eight percent… and falling.
Not good.
“Charlie, I’m begging you,” Brett said, looking at the readout as he stood next to her. “We tell Houston we lost track of time. We got so excited by what we found that we didn’t want to waste time reporting in. Let’s eat and then get the panels back in and go. No one has to know you reprogrammed the rover.”
She bit her lip behind her face plate. He couldn’t see her expression, but if he did, he might have changed his tone.
“Charlie?” he said, calling her bet.
“A full EVA this afternoon. We won’t use the reserve tanks again, but we get a few more hours and gather the panels before we come back in. Head back at first light.”
“Damn you,” he said, with an eerie calm. “That was a decent compromise I put out. And this is a crappy way to make a living,” he said.
“Take it or leave it,” she said.
He put out an impotent howl of rage into the electronic frequencies that united them.
“Fine! Goddammit!” he said, exasperated.
“We’re gonna look at the subsurface scans and there’s gonna be an acre of permafrost down there. It’ll make Fort Fletcher look like a dry hole in the ground,” she said.
“And if you’re wrong?” he asked.
“List your options for me at this point,” she said.
“Ugh,” he said. “Even if we head out now, if we can’t clear this storm we’re going to freeze to death. It’s that simple.”
“You’re worried about the heaters?” she asked.
“I’m worried about everything,” he said. “These storms can last a lot longer than our food supply. We screw this up and we’ll drive straight to Hell at five miles per hour.”
“We know how to stay warm,” she said, giving him a playful smirk.
He rolled his eyes, then pointed to the samples, “What the hell is that opal even worth?”
She thought about it for a moment. “Nothing.”
He walked back to the rover. She kept looking at the bags and thought again.
“Everything.”
27 February 2003
Excursion Rover “Clifford” (357 km W of Athena Base)
Athena II
Sol 255
“Through the unknown, remembered gate”
She typed the line into the computer and saw the software password access scan and clear. As soon as she was in, she brought up the drive controls and deleted the comment markers. A few moments later and there was no trace she’d ever been in the central software. She looked out the forward window.
As the sun rose to the east, she searched the skies overhead. Things were a bit dimmer than she’d hoped. The storm had made more progress in the night. That couldn’t be helped. Brett shot her a look that she ignored. She aimed Clifford’s front wheels straight at the sun and pulled out.
The battery power reading ticked down to 52%. For a night on the surface with minimal heaters and communications, they’d need at least 15%. And there were no guarantees how many nights they’d be in the storm, or how much power they’d be able to soak up tomorrow.
There was a mental agony in having a max speed of five miles per hour. Especially knowing that, in an emergency, she could push this bus to four times that speed. But the rover’s programming allowed the controls to be set for maximum efficiency. Charlie had long ago learned the advantages of patience. She set the cruising speed to preserve battery life and then pointedly took her feet off the pedals. She didn’t plan to use the brake today.
Over the course of the morning, the top-mounted solar panels did its best to soak in light and energy, but it was a losing battle. The skies got darker from right to left. Above them, the shade of heaven went from amber to ochre, and then that ochre burnt to a crisp as the dust storm enveloped them. The change was subtle, like watching a clock, but there wasn’t much else to look at.
When Brett went to refill their water bottles, she checked the efficiency of the top-mounted array. It was only getting about one-third of the usual sunlight. As they’d made progress, that number had fallen from two-thirds, but it fluctuated with the variations in the storm’s leading edge. With flat plains in front of her, she took a moment to think.
The urge to improvise was tempting. Driving east was helping a bit, but her instincts told her that it might be better to push north and try to get out of the path of the oncoming weather.
She had Brett pull up the latest photos from
Orion. Skirting north would only delay the inevitable. Unless this storm abated all on its own, Clifford would need some sort of rescue. Every kilometer they could get closer to Athena Base would make that rescue easier. She held course due east.
At midday the battery reading fell below 25%. Charlie didn’t take lunch. She kept one eye on the forward window, the other on the power levels.
She didn’t look at a clock. There was enough on her mind as it was. But when the low-power light cast an angry red glare across her face, she realized that the day’s work might be over.
“Twenty percent,” Brett said.
“I’m not stopping,” Charlie said.
Brett had lost too many of these arguments to try and start a new one. Charlie had gambled with his life on several occasions now. Sometimes it had been voluntary, sometimes without his consent. If he kept quiet, he could at least pretend that he had some agency left in this little tragedy that was unfolding around him. Besides, he knew that this wouldn’t be his last chance to lose a fight with her.
Two miles later, she spoke without looking at him, “Go suit up. When we stop, we need to get those panels out as fast as we can. There’s still time to soak in some sunlight before dusk. Even if we only get a few percent, that’s better than nothing.”
Brett was happy to comply with that order. When he returned to the cockpit, he had everything on but the helmet. The battery reading fell by one more integer.
“Charlie, that’s thirteen. You’ve got to stop,” he said.
With a pained grimace she nodded and disengaged the drive. Clifford coasted to a stop many many miles east of nowhere.
She turned to him, with a look that shot dread into his stomach, “What are you doing? Get out there. Now!”
He scrambled to the airlock, sealing his helmet as he went. Five minutes later the rack of solar panels was sliding out from the storage bay. Half an hour later, the two of them had finished deploying the panels in neat lines on the ground.
It was hard to see his own shadow amidst all the dust. The deployed panels would have their work cut out for them.
“Let’s get back inside. All we’re doing now is blocking sunlight,” she said.
He agreed and joined her in the airlock. Hearing the cycling process start, he leaned back against the wall and asked the biggest question of the day.
“How far did we get?”
“About thirty miles,” Charlie said.
27 February 2003
Athena Base
Athena II
Sol 255
Decades of service had taught Jake Jensen to mask his emotions, but it was a constant battle.
A bit of blame had to fall on Houston. They shouldn’t have let this get so far out of hand. Meteorology would have done well to end Clifford’s mission as soon as they saw the storm swirling into existence, not after it was heading north. He’d never admit it, but there was a non-zero chance that some backroom hotshot secretly wanted to get readings from inside a dust storm. No doubt there was a long line of university professors back on Earth who were salivating at the chance to take direct readings from inside an extraterrestrial weather system, but none of those people would ever walk on Mars. Nor would they freeze to death if this didn’t work out.
Still, Houston could only give orders. There wasn’t much they could do if those orders weren’t followed.
Charlie. This whole fiasco had her name all over it. In his heart of hearts, he’d known that this day would come. There was a blazing trail of confident competence that lit her service record with an iridescent glow. If you could put her on a polygraph, Charlie would tell you that the only mistake she’d ever made had been saying “I do,” on a cold autumn night twelve years ago. After she said something that haughty, Jake felt confident the polygraph needle wouldn’t move.
Charlie believed in her own infallibility like she believed the sun would rise tomorrow. Is it arrogance if you really are that good? Does it count as overconfidence if you win?
There was a cracked lander a few miles away that could be seen as a testament to her recklessness, or her sheer ability to prevail, depending on the way one chose to look at it.
If you took Charlie off that polygraph and put Jake on in her place, he’d admit that much of his anger was at himself.
Asking her to be his second-in-command had been the most important decision of his professional life. He’d have plenty of time to second-guess it in the coming days.
Sending her and Brett over the horizon had been a gamble. He’d known all about their extracurricular activities. Laura thought she had revealed that delicate truth as a matter of full disclosure. Jake didn’t have the heart to tell her that he’d known for weeks.
It didn’t take much to perceive the changes in their patterns. Well, in Brett’s patterns, at least. Jake knew that, to Charlie, this was just a biological convenience. If Brett hadn’t been persuaded, she’d have likely gone after Alexei or Henri. He spared a thought about whether her fourth approach would have been aimed at himself, or Laura. Neither would have surprised him.
Truthfully, he did not care about what Charlie and Brett did when they weren’t working. The bunks were strong enough to hold two people and they were quiet enough not to keep anyone awake. Everything else was biochemistry and politics and he cared for neither.
The source of his internal strife came down to one simple calculation. This excursion was ambitious, bold, and required perfection. There was no one in the astronaut corps that embodied that more than Charlie Hickory.
Jake had already released his anger in private. Certain things you just didn’t do in front of the crew.
A perfectly good green t-shirt had been ripped in half after he listened to the report from Houston. With the shreds in the garbage, he came out to plan the next great Martian adventure.
Laura and Henri had already been on their way back from Fort Fletcher when the Mayday came in. He’d let them get their new water samples stowed and get some food in their bellies. In engineering, a full stomach could be as helpful as a decent calculator. Moreso, if your problem involved consumables.
After dinner, they stayed at the table. He called up the briefing on the main monitor. Houston had kept their statements calm and tempered. But anyone who knew the technical specifications of Athena hardware would know this was more than just a problem.
Taking a portable white board and a black marker in his hands, Jake collected their attentions and started in.
“What we have is this,” he began. “We are here,” he said, drawing a crude house on the right side of the board. “Clifford is here,” he said, drawing a box with two wheels on the left side.
He paused to indicate the line he drew between the two figures, “We have one-hundred and eighty-nine miles of distance to cover. And our runabout can only do one-fifty”.
Laura spoke up, “That’s burning a full tank of methane
and a full battery charge. You can get seventy-five miles on a full tank. A full battery charge will get you another seventy-five miles.”
“So that means we can only send the runabout seventy-five miles before it has to turn back,” Henri said. “They’re more than twice that distance.”
“And that assumes flat ground, no major obstacles, no mechanical issues,” Laura said. She and Henri had been making a lot of trips out to Fort Fletcher. She knew what the runabout could do.
“Okay. Let’s talk about the pieces on the board. Good news first. Athena Base has plenty of everything. Better, we’ve got spare rover batteries, the big ones for Clifford and the smaller ones for the runabout. If we can get one of the big ones to Clifford, they ought to be able to drive out of the storm and clear the dust. At that point, Clifford can get home the old-fashioned way.”
“Assuming the storm doesn’t follow them,” Laura said.
“Assuming,” Jake confirmed. “We’ve also got a bunch of methane that Athena I was kind enough to leave behind. We can make more if we run out.”
“We won’t run out,” Alexei said.
“Obviously we’re going to need to haul some extra fuel for the runabout. Laura, Henri, I’m going to requisition your sample storage tank. The big one that you’re storing the Fletcher water samples in.”
Laura nodded, “I’m fine with that, but where will we put the water?”
“We’re going to use the empty fuel tanks from the old
Aurora. We’ll keep your water in those tanks and pump it out after we’re done with this little operation,” Jake said.
“No problem,” Laura said.
“So, the tank is twenty gallons. The runabout’s internal tank holds ten,” Jake said.
“Is that not it?” Henri asked. “That effectively doubles its range. You could get all the way to the lab rover and most of the way back.”
“Yes, but not all the way back,” Alexei said.
Henri continued, “You carry the fuel tank and a spare battery for Clifford…”
Jake stopped him, “The runabout’s flatbed can’t carry the tank
and a spare battery for Clifford. It’s a matter of cargo space.”
“Could we not augment the flatbed?” Henri asked.
Laura interjected, “There’s also the weight issue. If you augment the flatbed, that will add weight. Plus the weight of the fuel tank. Plus the weight of the rescue battery. The runabout is good, but it’s not
that good. It can tow, it can run, but towing and running together, for more than twice its designed limits…”
She let the thought hang in the air.
A long moment’s silence fell over the quartet as they sat around the table. Laura had begun it, so she felt confident enough to break it.
She emitted a small
hmmm. “It’s enough fuel to reach them without relying on the battery. If you could reach Clifford, could they not simply use the battery on the runabout and tow the runabout back behind them?”
Jake shook his head, “The batteries for the runabout are smaller than the ones for Clifford.”
“Doesn’t the runabout have two?” Alexei asked.
“Not really. The cockpit battery is just to run the internal systems. That won’t do a bit of good with powering the wheels. The drive battery is what gets you the seventy-five miles. But that’s seventy-five miles on the runabout. Clifford is three times its size.”
“Even the smaller drive battery is still power,” Laura said.
“I don’t like the idea of asking Clifford to haul itself out of a storm, towing another rover, without full sunlight, on a smaller battery. It’s risky.”
“You could leave the runabout behind,” Laura said.
Jake winced, “We’d never be able to go beyond walk-back distance again. Not even out to Fort Fletcher.”
“We may not have a choice if they don’t have enough solar to run their internal life support,” Laura said.
“For the moment, they do. Houston is getting their telemetry. They’re still running heaters and fans. If it comes to that, the suits can last them for a day or two as well.”
“The storm will get worse. We don’t know if they’ll have enough daylight to hold out,” Laura said.
“I agree, but I just don’t love the idea of sending out a rescue that will need to be rescued in turn. If something goes wrong, we could end up with three astronauts needing help and three more stuck here without a single working rover.”
“We’re already risking that,” Laura said.
“What about the counter to this?” Henri asked.
“What do you mean?” Jake asked.
“Are we sure they could not ride out the storm on a bare minimum of power? Shut down everything but heat and fans and simply wait?” Henri asked.
“Would you be willing to bet your own life on that?” Alexei asked.
“I’m just asking,” Henri said.
“We’re going to operate under the assumption that this will get worse before it gets better,” Jake said. He turned to Laura, “I’m not opposed to your idea if it comes down to a ticking clock, but I’m convinced we can come up with a plan that will have both rovers come back here under their own power.”
“What’s your plan?” Laura asked.
“I haven’t gotten it all figured out yet. I know we’ll need to convert the water tank into a fuel tank. I’m thinking about…”
He was cut off by three pings that echoed through the HAB module. The main viewing screen displayed a bright red screen with white letters.
***INCOMING TRANSMISSION – EMERGENCY PROTOCOL***
Jake nodded to the communications station behind Laura. “Laura, not to turn you into Uhura, but do you mind?”
She nodded and turned, swiveling to activate the laptop at the station.
“It’s a downlink, from
Orion,” Laura said.
“What is it?” Jake said.
“It’s data. Relayed in from Clifford,” Laura said, scanning the screen.
“Distress signal?” Henri asked.
“No, it’s image files. They’re coming in slowly. I’m sending them to the big screen. You should have them in just a moment,” Laura said.
“They must be sending their geology data. Maybe didn’t want to risk losing it if the computers freeze,” Jake said.
Laura shook her head, “I don’t think so. This data set doesn’t seem large enough for that.”
“Maybe they’re just sending the choicest bits,” Henri said. “They can’t spare power for a long transmission.”
The first file came up on the large screen. It was a photograph of Charlie, sitting at the desk in Clifford’s lab section. She was holding a legal pad. On the pad itself was a simple message.
RESCUE PLAN: IMAGE 1 OF 20
PREDICT 10 SOL TIME LIMIT BASED ON SOLAR
“Charlie,” Jake said. The single word was really all he needed to say.
The next image downloaded, and Laura sent it to the screen.
It was a closeup of another page on the legal pad. There were some sketches, but what stood out the most were the words at the top of the page.
Jake was the first to react, “Of
course she would give a code name to her own rescue mission.”
Laura frowned, “What’s ‘Operation Black Buck’?”
1 March 2003
Athena Base
Athena II
Sol 257
It had taken a day to prep.
Emptying the water sample storage tank. Carefully stowing the water in
Aurora’s old tanks. Charging every battery straight from the solar farm. Alexei and Henri had been assigned to handle the methane from the old Athena I hardware. While that had been going on, Jake and Laura had pored over every inch of the runabout. They had swapped out the driver’s side forward wheel. They’d changed out three of the gears that had shown signs of wear. And they’d set up brackets to hold the twenty-gallon storage tank. The one that would hold the methane.
When the sun had set, everything was in place. The runabout had been hooked up to the charger all night. When dawn came over Athena Base, Jake was ready.
First order of business was a slow pre-flight check for the runabout. He’d been over every inch three times yesterday, but if this little road show proved anything it’s that you could never be too cautious.
The runabout had been dusted off and was as clean as it had ever been while on this planet. Its white cockpit looked like an oversized technological egg. The flatbed made the vehicle seem like a pickup truck for aliens. When you added the cylindrical twenty-gallon storage tank, now laid on its side and braced on two sets of legs, the whole thing seemed like it might be a logistical vehicle for some invading force of aliens.
From the perspective of a Martian, that’s exactly what it was.
Jake gave one last pat to the methane tank. On either side of it were three solar panels, six in total, which would be dropped off at what they were already calling Site B. He tightened the straps on the harness that held the panels. A pair of aluminum rods had been fashioned into makeshift flag poles. One of his own green t-shirts had been dragooned into use for this operation and wrapped around the poles on either end. He’d had it to spare. When all this was over, if he brought them home, the rags might make a very interesting museum piece.
Jake carried an airtight gym bag. Inside were two bottles of water, two turkey sandwiches, a CD player, and every Beatles CD available to the public at large.
He slid into the cockpit, sealed the hatch behind him, doffed his helmet, and connected his suit’s umbilical to the runabout’s armrest.
“Athena Base, this is the Red Runner. How copy, over?”
“Runner, this is Athena Base. Reading you five-by-five, over,” Laura’s perfectly accented English would guide him out, and, hopefully, back. Today might well be the toughest of the trips. If this ridiculous operation had any chance of success, it needed to be.
The center console had a simple toggle that converted the rover between battery power and methane power. He very carefully moved the toggle from BATT to CH4. Then waited for the tell-tale
whirr that indicated the mechanical change in locomotion. The vehicle hadn’t moved an inch. He reported in.
“Runner on gas. Departing. Can I get a clock confirmation, please?”
“Runner, Athena. Clock confirmation is Sunrise plus thirty-four minutes over.”
“Confirmed, Athena. Setting mission clock to zero. Tripometer to zero. Pulling out.”
“Copy that, Runner. Good luck and safe travels. We’ll see you in about fourteen hours.”
Jake hit the buttons on the dashboard to reset the vehicle’s internal timer and individual trip odometer. When they both flashed to zero, he put the rover in gear.
Taking an S-turn around HAB 2 and the solar panel farm and then he was away. He aimed the vehicle due west. To do so relied on navigation data relayed from
Orion and the few probes still in orbit. The rover’s internal navigation systems would have to be very precise for this to work. But the system had gotten Laura and Henri out and back to Fort Fletcher more than half a dozen times. He trusted it as much as could be expected.
When the rover was clear of Athena Base’s footprint, he locked the navigation and set the cruise control to the blistering speed of twenty-five miles per hour. For a man who hadn’t driven a proper car in more than a year, it felt like he was at the controls of a dragster on the salt flats of Bonneville.
“Athena, Runner. Max speed confirmed. Due West. Talk to me ‘til we lose comms, if you please.”
“Copy Jake. Congrats on breaking the Martian land speed record. Another for the history books. Trust the Americans to go to all the way to another planet just to drive fast.”
“Manifest Destiny, Athena,” Jake said.
The radio link would only work while he had line of sight to the base’s antenna. Even with the height of the HAB and the small radio tower, the total range was less than 10 miles. It wasn’t a matter of power, just line of sight. The Martian horizon was the big problem here and no amount of voltage could overcome it.
Relaying a signal off of
Orion or one of the other birds was a matter of timing. They knew when the windows would open, but all the consultation in the world wouldn’t help him fix a broken axle or a short circuit.
For the next one-hundred and fifty miles, Jake Jensen would have only himself, a toolkit, and his trusty rover separating him from a death on the lone prairie.
He gave Athena one final thanks as the radio crackled into static. Then he broke out the CD player and started with Love Me Do.
In a little less than three hours, he’d arrive at Site A.
1 March 2003
Red Runner – Site A (120 km W of Athena Base)
Athena II
Sol 257
Figuring out the exact distance wasn’t really necessary. It would have helped and been psychologically satisfying, but the limitations of the hardware were the bigger factor.
The engine began to fade out as the methane ran dry. He turned off
Twist and Shout to listen to the vehicle. The steady semi-audible
pocketa-pocketa-pocketa began to fade, right on schedule, at about three hours into the drive. When the rover coasted to a stop, it’s primary fuel tank now dry as a bone, he turned off the systems and exited the vehicle.
“Welcome to Site A,” Jake said, to no one in particular.
He began with the methane tank. It was the biggest, bulkiest piece of equipment, and he wanted to deal it first in case his back decided to become an issue today.
Sliding the cumbersome tank off the back of the flatbed was more a matter of finesse than force. The Martian gravity helped quite a bit. He kept a firm grip on the tank’s makeshift legs as he brought it to the ground. From there, he pulled and cut a neat pair of furrows into the red soil under his feet. The
thwump as the other legs fell a single meter to the surface was a bit jarring, but the tank was made of stern stuff and had survived the bump without a problem.
It was chilling to think that you were the only human around for seventy-five miles in any direction. That kind of isolation wasn’t known to many. He had time to think about that as he refilled the runner’s fuel tank from the big tank’s supply. It would take a few minutes to pump, and Jake used the time wisely.
As half of the methane transferred from the big tank to the smaller one, he took one of the aluminum poles from the flatbed and began to jam it into the ground. They’d sharpened one end of the rod into the red planet’s first man-made spear. The rod itself was light, but long. It didn’t have to be strong, just tall. The front half of the hunter green t-shirt at the top was emblazoned with a white A that had been hand-painted on the chest. All told, it towered over the flat ground that stretched for miles. The little flagpole, smaller than a backyard basketball goal, would mark the site for the next few days. The scrap of shirt hung limp from the top. The thin Martian air would never loft it as a proper flag, but, it was hoped, the stark contrast of green cotton against the red soil would stand out from a distance.
After the rover’s tank was full once more, Jake took a moment to survey the area. He took several photographs in every direction and a few of his handiwork with the tank and flagpole. Such records might be the difference between failure and success.
With the runner’s supply of fuel and battery power back to maximum, Jake reentered the little rover. Reverently, he reached for the toggle and flipped the runner to battery power. He could almost sense the electric hum coursing through the internal circuitry. He set off to chase the Western horizon.
It would be another three hours until he reached Site B. He couldn’t help but chuckle when
Drive My Car came through the CD player’s speakers.
1 March 2003
Red Runner – Site B (240 km W of Athena Base)
Athena II
Sol 257
The first thing he did when the runner coasted to a stop was try the radio.
It was wishful thinking, little more than blind hope. Clifford was over the horizon and not very tall. He tried anyway, though his telemetry confirmed that
Orion was on the opposite side of the planet and could be of no help.
“Clifford, this is the runabout. Do you read, over?”
Nothing.
He went to the back of the flatbed and began pulling down the solar panels. Unlike the big gas tank, they were much easier to handle, and it took less than twenty minutes to arrange and wire them.
“Clifford, this is the runabout. Transmitting in the blind. How copy, over?”
Nothing.
He sighed, “That would have made this easier,” he thought.
It was no simple matter to climb under the runabout’s chassis. There was little ground clearance, and it violated all his astronaut instincts to slide along the dirt, on his back, in an EVA suit. Still, there was nothing else for it. He carefully disengaged the runabout’s drive battery, slid it off its latches, and carried it over to his fledgling solar farm.
Looking up, the sky seemed bright enough. Off to the west, he could see dimmer skies and darker haze. Intellectually, he knew that he was already within the dust storm, but he could not bring himself to sense any danger. The panels he’d laid out were not seeing full sunlight, but the plan didn’t require them to. All was well here, if a bit overcast.
He triple-checked the wiring and confirmed that the solar panels were charging his runabout’s dead battery. There was no chance the battery would be able to charge fully before the sun went down. The next sol would, hopefully, supply it with enough juice to get to one hundred percent.
Either way, Jake couldn’t wait around for that to happen.
He planted the 2nd aluminum pole to mark his location as Site B, then boarded the rover once more.
As the systems hummed to life, he put the machine in gear. Nothing happened.
A flash of panic sent a chill down his spine.
It took a moment to remember the issue. He carefully pulled the console toggle from BATT to CH4. The runabout took a moment to switch over, and he confirmed a full tank of gas from his refueling back at Site A.
Then, he made the most interesting maneuver of this entire trip. A single U-turn that pointed him east. The afternoon sun was high and just over his shoulder.
The challenge now was to retrace his path and find Site A once more. There were enough tracks in the dirt that navigation was obvious, but the thin air would have three more hours to work while he drove.
1 March 2003
Red Runner – Site A (120 km W of Athena Base)
Athena II
Sol 257
The flag had been helpful, but not essential. The runner’s gas tank ran dry about fifty yards from where he’d parked it seven hours ago. He put the rover in neutral and pushed. The vehicle was much lighter with no battery and an empty fuel tank.
When he was close enough to reach the twenty-gallon tank, he stopped. The big tank sat, half full, right where he’d left it this morning.
It was an easy matter to transfer the remaining methane from the big storage tank to the rover’s internal fuel tank. After that, it was a little trickier to load up the dry storage tank back onto the flatbed. It wasn’t so much a matter of strength as, ironically, energy. He was tired from nine hours of driving and another two hours of manual labor. The sun was ahead of him now, racing for that horizon. There were three hours between him and home. He needed to move quickly if he wanted to reach Athena Base before dark.
As he settled into the runabout’s cockpit and headed east, he thought about the progress that had been made today.
Site B now was home to a small solar farm, only six panels, but better than nothing. The battery he’d left behind would have a full sol to charge up. And he’d left behind a flagpole to mark the location.
Still, Site B was a swirling maelstrom of activity compared to Site A. Site A’s only trace of his journey today was a few marks in the sand and the other flagpole.
He drove over his own tire tracks as he headed east. The more he could make that path distinctive, the easier this week would be.
Three hours later, Jake Jensen returned to Athena Base, five hundred yards shy of HAB 2. The sun was behind him, sinking under the horizon, as he trudged the last quarter mile on foot. He could feel the cold in his feet. The runabout had travelled three hundred miles on this sol, but it couldn’t get him the last little bit home.
He’d have to give the rover a good going over before he left again tomorrow.
2 March 2003
Athena Base
Athena II
Sol 258
Mercifully, Houston and the rest of the crew had let him sleep in. Today’s road trip wasn’t nearly as intensive.
On their own volition, Alexei and Laura had woken up at daybreak to handle the prep.
They’d pushed the runabout in from the quarter-mile distant parking spot where it had finally given out. With loving care, they filled its internal tank, and the big storage tank in the flatbed. Putting a new drive battery in place had been a bit difficult, but having two people made the work go a bit smoother.
By the time Jake had woken, breakfasted, and suited up, his chariot awaited.
Yesterday had been a long-haul journey, testing his nerve and his vehicle. By comparison, today’s trip was a milk run.
He still packed two sandwiches, but he only planned to eat one. The careful power conservation that yesterday’s trip had depended on was not necessary for this little out-and-back.
Jake sent a polite acknowledgement to Laura and the gang, then sped off west and headed back to Site A. The tracks he made yesterday were fresh enough to give him some reassurance. A pair of dark ruts against the rust-colored sand.
He’d chosen
Ticket To Ride as his outbound send-off. The upbeat tone gave him a bit of a morale boost as Athena Base’s signal faded out.
Three hours to Site A.
Seven hours later, Laura Winters frowned at the console inside HAB 1.
“Runner, this is Base. Repeat, runner this is Base. How copy, over?”
The silence was troubling.
She was about to report to Houston that Jake was overdue when the little speakers blared to life.
“Base, this is Runner. Drop complete. I’m heading in now. Fuel tank is dry as a martini. Might need a push, over.”
Laura smiled wide at the radio set and acknowledged her mission commander.
“Runner, Athena. Good to hear from you. We were starting to get worried. You’re a bit tardy. Was there trouble?”
“Athena, Runner. Negative. I got the tank unloaded at A and then had lunch. Piled up a few rocks to support the flagpole. Just wasn’t in a hurry this time.”
“Copy, Runner. We got your ping from
Orion when you were approaching Site A. That was the last we heard until now. Very glad to have you back.”
“Athena, Runner. Just ran out of gas. I’m about two-hundred yards from the HAB. Would you ask Henri and Alexei to come out here and push this thing back in? I’d like to get to a bathroom while I still have some dignity here.”
“Any trouble with the runner?” Laura asked.
“Not at all. This baby was good to the last drop.”
2 March 2003
GNN NewsNight
“Doctor Musgrave, thank you for joining us tonight. What’s the latest on the rescue?”
“Good evening, Tamara. Things are going well. Commander Jensen has completed the first two runs of the five that will be required. At this point we have a battery for the runabout charging at Site B, and a full storage tank of methane at Site A. We are now in what we call a decision window. The engineering teams in Houston are monitoring all telemetry from Clifford and
Orion tonight. Before tomorrow morning, we will decide whether to proceed with the original plan or if we can go ahead with a full resupply tomorrow.”
“What’s the determining factor, Dr. Musgrave?” O’Neil asked.
“The lab rover, Clifford, has been trying to make progress to get out of the storm. The problem is that the diminished sunlight isn’t providing much battery power. Over the last two days, Clifford has moved about two miles. That’s about eight miles short of where we need it to be to try the resupply without further trips.”
“Was there any progress today, doctor?”
“When I left the operations center, we were still analyzing the data. The last I saw, it looked like Clifford was moving, but we don’t know when or where it will stop.”
“Doctor Musgrave, could you shed some light on how we got to this point? Tell us about how this situation progressed.”
“First Tamara, I think it’s important to understand that the situation is very much under control. The plan to resupply the lab rover is working exactly as we’ve anticipated. At this time, we are able to say that astronauts Hickory and Morrison have everything they need to last for several days.
Tamara decided to cut through the haze a bit.
“Dr. Musgrave… Story, I understand that NASA is loathe to refer to these trips as a rescue mission, but is it fair to say that the situation got out of hand? Even if it was for reasons beyond anyone’s control?”
Story Musgrave conceded the point with a shrug and a nod, “I think we can acknowledge that the situation with the dust storm was unexpected. Martian weather forecasting is a science that is far younger than weather forecasting here on Earth. And I think we all know how reliable that is.”
Tamara allowed herself to be charmed by that response, “I don’t think anyone would say that NASA has intentionally allowed the situation to become untenable. I do think that we can describe this as a rescue operation without succumbing to melodrama. Now, could you tell us how we got here, Story?”
“Yes, ma’am. Hickory and Morrison were out on what we call a D3 excursion.”
“D3?”
“It’s short for drive, dig, and drop. Basically, we send out a team in a rover. They drive to the areas we’re interested in, dig for samples, and take other readings, then we deploy a rover and leave it at the site. The rovers are solar powered, and they stay behind, controlled either from Earth, or from Athena Base. It lets us maximize our science potential at places where we can’t linger for days on end. It’s what we do for places we want to explore at the edge of our driving capabilities.”
“But they’re very far out,” O’Neil said.
“Yes, in this case, we’re stringing together a series of D3 excursions. The idea is to maximize the amount of exploration we can get with limited consumables. The rover is packed with as many supplies as possible and that way we can do one big road trip as opposed to six or seven smaller ones. Stopping at each site for an extended period to recharge the batteries allows the team to go farther out.”
“But the problem is that Morrison and Hickory are beyond the runabout’s overall range. Was that not anticipated?” O’Neil said.
“Clifford is designed to be a long-haul rover. It’s designed to keep astronauts alive during long trips. This resupply is being done because we didn’t plan on a dust storm of this intensity. We haven’t seen one this bad in the last two decades of observation. I’m sure, from now on, such storms will be planned for.”
“Story, can you tell us a bit about the conditions onboard Clifford right now? What life like for Hickory and Morrison aboard the rover?”
“From what we’re getting from their telemetry, we know they have had enough power to run the heaters on minimal settings. They’ve conserved power to communications for the most part. All they are sending is the rover’s automated data. They have plenty of food and their water systems are more than adequate. I’d say the biggest problem they have now is boredom. We know from the data that they’ve been cycling the airlock, which means they are walking around a bit during the daytime, but they probably don’t go too far from the rover. Likely they are trying to do some geology work while they wait.”
“If we could talk to them right now, what do you think their biggest complaint would be?”
“From what we see of their telemetry, the nights have gotten pretty cold.”
2 March 2003
Excursion Rover “Clifford” (300 km W of Athena Base)
Athena II
Sol 258
When the battery hit fifteen percent, he’d shut down the drive motors. After that, there had been a quick EVA to deploy the solar panels yet again. They hadn’t made as much progress as Charlie had hoped. She’d already declared that these herky-jerky jaunts were a waste of power and effort.
As usual, she was right.
Brett stared at the empty bunk that waited for him. He was wrapped in three blankets. Fully dressed and still he shivered. Since the rover couldn’t take him any farther, he tried to travel in his mind.
He remembered home being so far away. Joshua trees and humidity. Those old damp shoes that were always uncomfortable.
Still, he’d have given anything to be back in Louisiana right now. Gators and mosquitos and oxygen. Any shade of green you liked could be found in the bayou.
He’d trade every red rock within three hundred miles for a gator filled swamp and a shitty beer from Castor’s Pub.
“We can either run the heater a little extra tonight and not have comms ‘til morning, or go minimal again and save the juice for the radio in case they call tonight,” he said.
“They know where we are. Run the heater,” Charlie said. She closed her sleeping bag and turned away.
The heater would be his only source of warmth tonight.
3 March 2003
Athena Base
Athena II
Sol 259
Houston had sent the confirmation at about three in the morning. It was the first thing he saw when he walked into the wardroom of the HAB.
Jake called up the message on the main monitor.
“Athena Base, this is Houston. We confirm your read of the situation. Clifford has not made enough progress and cannot be safely reached by the runabout with the current assets. We advise to continue with the original Black Buck plan. We will be in contact. Good luck today. Houston out.”
Jake nodded. Again, this was to be expected. Clifford’s batteries had barely enough juice to run its internal systems. Asking them to drive ten miles was not feasible. Charlie had built in the backup plan as a bonus; just in case things turned out better than they’d hoped.
He’d never bought in to that wishful thinking.
After breakfast, he and Alexei had loaded a fully charged runabout drive battery onto the flatbed. He dreaded another thirteen-hour excursion just to drop off a battery far beyond the horizon, but this was the business he’d chosen.
Ten years ago, if someone had offered him the chance to drive for thirteen hours on Mars, he’d have paid any price they could name.
“More Beatles today, Jake?” Laura asked over the radio as he mounted up.
“I heard it all over the last two days,” Jake said, honestly. It was no exaggeration. He’d spent eighteen hours in the rover over the last forty-eight.
“What are you putting on today? Don’t tell me you’re listening to classical,” Laura said.
“No way. Not that desperate,” he said, curving around the solar farm and heading west.
“What are you putting on then?” Laura asked.
“A bunch of stuff Molly sent up. Figured I’d see what the kids are listening to these days,” Jake said.
Laura listened to him moving things around in the cockpit. The clattering of a plastic case and a latch.
“Who’s first?”
“Somebody named John Mayer,” Jake said.
“I hear he’s good,” Laura said.
“I’ll let you know tonight,” Jake said.
3 March 2003
Red Runner – Site A (120 km W of Athena Base)
Athena II
Sol 259
Pulling into Site A, he was now seriously wondering what good it was to be on Mars.
Why blaze a trail for these younger generations who preferred Matchbox 20 and Blink 182 as opposed to the true classics?
What was the purpose of creating a better world for children that felt like Counting Crows were better than Van Morrison?
In all honesty, he’d have to admit, John Mayer could play a decent guitar.
Humming one of the catchier songs from
Room For Squares, he refueled the runabout, just as he’d done two sols ago. The nice part was he didn’t have to unload the storage tank from the flatbed this time. It was already waiting for him on the ground.
He took a bit of pride that his flagpole was still standing as well.
In less than thirty minutes, he was on the road again.
Just as he had last time, he departed Site A with a full tank of gas. He headed for Site B on battery power. That was critical for the plan.
3 March 2003
Red Runner – Site B (240 km W of Athena Base)
Athena II
Sol 259
Leaving Site A, he’d been resolved to ride in silence rather than bear up against modern music. But an hour into the trip, the humming buzz of the fans had started to annoy him, so he decided to give the Counting Crows another shot.
Two hours later, he could admit that
Mr. Jones was pretty good.
His little solar farm was busily soaking up what sunlight could reach the surface. He couldn’t be completely sure, but he felt like it was dimmer here than it had been two sols ago. Meteorology would confirm that, if he could raise Houston. Alas, the orbital gods had not smiled upon them. He had to do this bit of work in privacy.
Once again, he disengaged the now-drained drive battery from the runner’s chassis. He’d done it once already and it was simpler this time. He connected his dead battery to the little solar farm he’d constructed before, taking back the one he’d left behind on his first trip.
He plugged the newly recovered battery back into the runabout. He saw the little green bar brighten all the way and the digital readout said he had a full charge. It was very reassuring. This plan, for all its mousetrap tenuousness, was working perfectly.
Carefully, he removed the extra battery that had been stowed on the flatbed. It was already at full charge so there was no need to wire it up. He simply left it sitting beside the dead battery.
Now Site B boasted one fully charged runabout drive battery, one that would be fully charged in two sols. He would need both for the rescue trip two sols from now.
He didn’t bother to put in another useless hail to Clifford. He knew, with a calculated certainty, that it was beyond his horizon. This series of road trips would save Charlie and Brett, but not today.
Mounting up once more, he switched the rover to gas power, pulled a U-turn, and headed east.
3 March 2003
Red Runner – Site A (120 km W of Athena Base)
Athena II
Sol 259
The runner, unburdened by any cargo in the flatbed, got all the way to Site A with a few wisps of fuel to spare.
He greeted the big storage tank once again. Over the past few sols he’d had a love-hate relationship with this big twenty-gallon behemoth. When he finally was done with it, he’d be glad to never lug it around again. Give it back the water that had been so ungraciously taken from it and leave it alone forever.
For now, just as he already had two sols ago, he filled the runner with another tank of gas, loaded the empty storage tank into the flatbed, and headed for home, determined to beat the sunset.
He didn’t know which would feel better: the bathroom, the shower, or the bed. When he went to sleep tonight, Site B would have two drive batteries charging. Site A would just have the flagpole. And he would only have two more trips to make.
4 March 2003
Athena Base
Athena II
Sol 260
Compared to the long-haul trips, this was just a milk run. He was getting used to his confinement. The idea of being in solitary for six hours was downright enjoyable over the thirteen that he’d spent in the rover yesterday.
He’d learned from the last milk run. Packing two sandwiches was just wasteful. He set out from Athena Base with just one sandwich this time, but he did pack an extra bottle of water.
Again, the crew had been kind enough to handle the tank for him. When he walked out to the runabout, the storage tank was fully fueled and on its brackets.
After the ear-numbing disaster that was his daughter’s Creed album, he’d decided to let someone else pick his musical accompaniment for this quick out-and-back.
Laura had selected Rite of Spring and some Chopan. He shrugged when the orchestra came up.
By the time he reached Site A, he was a convert.
5 March 2003
Athena Base
Athena II
Sol 261
He was up early the next morning. He’d gone to bed early the previous night. This was the big day. He fought the urge to call it the final day. He was resolved that it would be many sols before he would step foot in a rover again. Either Clifford or the runabout. He’d had enough time in that little alien egg for a lifetime.
“You want to go over the plan before you’re out of range?” Laura said.
“You mean the plan we’ve spent the last week working up to? The one I’ve got written on four different cards here?” Jake asked, as he drove past the solar farm.
“Yes, that one,” Laura said, deadpan.
“Okay. I’m driving to Site A,” Jake said.
“On petrol power,” Laura said.
“Methane, but who’s counting?” Jake said.
“Continue,” Laura said.
“When I reach Site A, I’ll gas up. At that point the rover will have a full battery and a full tank. The storage tank at A will still be half full for when I get back there tonight,” Jake said.
“Good so far,” Laura said.
“I switch over to battery power for the trip to Site B,” Jake said.
“Very critical. Why is that?” Laura said, like an elementary school teacher going through a lesson.
“So that I’ve still got a full tank of gas at Site B,” Jake said.
“And what happens at Site B?” Laura said.
“Swap out my dead drive battery for one of the live ones at B,” Jake said. “Then drive this big honkin’ battery that I’ve got on my back now out to Clifford.”
“Where you’ll unload Clifford’s new ‘big honkin’ battery’ and they’ll pull themselves out of the storm,” Laura said.
“I gotta tell you, Winters. This whole thing was worth it just to hear ‘big honkin’ battery’ in your fancy British accent.”
“Damned colonists,” she said, wryly. “Tell me how your rebellious arse is going to get home again.”
“When I reach Clifford, I’ll give them the big battery. Then one of them will join me for the trip back.”
Henri piped in over the radio, “No way Charlie Hickory abandons that rover,” he said. “Brett will jump at the chance to come home.”
“Ten bucks says they’ll both want to stay,” Jake said.
“You’re on,” Henri said.
“Focus, you bloody Yank,” Laura said. “How are you getting to Clifford?”
“Battery power,” Jake said, “Pick up Brett or Charlie. Drop the big battery off. Switch over to gas power. Then drive back to Site B.”
“You’ll get there more or less on empty,” Laura said.
“Maybe. Depends on how hard it’ll be to find Clifford.”
“There’s a dust storm. It won’t be easy,” Laura said.
“We’ll see.”
“Don’t muck about with your margins. There’ll be no one there to push you in if you come up two miles short,” Laura said.
“I can always call Clifford if it comes to that. Whoever stays behind will be coming that way anyways.”
“What happens at Site B when you return?” Laura asked.
“Dump the dead drive battery. Load up the second spare that I dropped off two sols ago. Then head for Site A.”
“Where you’ll fill up with more petrol for the trip home,” Laura said.
“Fill up
and bring back the empty storage tank,” Jake said. “Leave only footprints. Remember?”
“I do,” Laura said. “Whoever stays behind on Clifford will have to collect your abandoned solar farm at B.”
“If they can find it,” Jake said. “That’ll be a low priority for their return trip home.”
“Time will tell,” Laura paused as Jake neared the edge of radio range. “Do this perfectly.”
“You don’t ask much, do you?” Jake said.
“If all three of you Americans get lost out there, then the flight home will be one Brit in command of a Frenchman and a Russian cosmonaut,” Laura reminded him. “And you’ll be remembered forever as the American who let that happen.”
“A fate worse than death,” Jake said.
“You put me in command, and I’ll rename
Orion after King George,” she said.
“Oh, that’s low,” Jake groaned.
“Rule Brittania,” Laura said.
“See you tonight,” Jake said.
5 March 2003
Excursion Rover “Clifford” (300 km W of Athena Base)
Athena II
Sol 261
Brett had to admire Charlie’s confidence.
They’d nearly frozen again last night. It was to the point where he was ready to sleep in his space suit just for the extra layers. She’d put on every bit of clothing she had, as well as half the blankets they’d carried. Now she looked like a futuristic Eskimo, sitting in the driver’s seat, waiting for their rescue.
She’d sent the plans in and had believed that they’d be carried out right on schedule. This was the first time she’d bothered monitoring the ground-based radio bands. She simply assumed that Athena Base had gotten her rescue plan, that it was approved by Houston, and that it had been carried out to perfection.
Because no one had ever died from hubris, right?
He shook his head. At this point, both their lives depended on this plan. He might as well root for the home team.
Wrapped up in his own blankets, he stood behind her chair and listened in on his headset.
“Clifford to runabout. Clifford to runabout. Do you read over?”
Nothing but silence in the earpiece. She’d been trying for five minutes now.
“Runabout, this is Clifford. Do you copy?”
She hadn’t been the most pleasant roommate since the storm had taken them. He wondered if she’d be harder to live with if her plan didn’t worked out. He wasn’t going to waste a prayer on that, but it gnawed at his mind.
“Runabout, this is Clifford. Do you read me?”
For all of her flaws, he still cared for her. Apparently much more than she cared for him. But that last part didn’t matter. He put a hand on her shoulder.
He wanted to say something that would be comforting.
“Charlie…”
“Clifford, this is the Runner. I have your roadside assistance package. Do you read me?” Jake’s voice filled their headsets.
Charlie lit up, brushing Brett’s hand off her shoulder, “We read you, Runner. Good to hear your voice!” she said. “What’s your status?”
“Green,” Jake said. “Got a drive battery at thirty-eight percent charge. My nav computer says I’m about six miles from your beacon.”
“That’s great to hear,” Charlie said. “What do you have for us?”
“You know damn well what I have for you,” Jake said.
“Tell me anyway,” Charlie said.
“I got a big honkin’ battery for you to haul your AWOL asses out of this storm,” Jake said.
Charlie’s smile lit up the cockpit. “That’s great!”
“I’m giving you a live battery; you’ll dump your dead one. Once we get the new battery in, Houston says one of you rides home with me, the other will drive Clifford back alone. I’d do it myself, but at this point, both of you have more driving experience with that thing than anyone alive,” Jensen said.
“I’ll stay,” both Charlie and Brett said together.
Jensen laughed, “Henri owes me ten bucks. Work it out amongst yourselves.”
“We’ll flip a coin,” Brett said, laughing giddily at this happy turn of fate.
“And I didn’t pack a lunch for whoever is joining me, so I’d eat hardy if I were you,” Jake said. The headset crackled again.
“We’re on it,” Charlie said.
“If you can spare the juice, in about ten minutes, flip on your overhead light. This storm is thick enough as it is and we’re losing the sunlight. I need all the help I can get to find you. I’ve got your beacon guiding me in, but I’m worried I’m gonna lose it if I have to detour around a boulder, or if this dust gets any thicker,” Jake said.
“We can spare the juice,” Brett replied.
“Whatever you dragged me out here for, I hope it was worth it,” Jake said.
Charlie looked over her shoulder at the sample bags piled up in the corner.
“It is.”
5 March 2003
Athena Base
Athena II
Sol 261
Charlie had lost the coin toss and rode back with him. He’d have to have a come-to-Jesus conversation with her at some point, but that could wait. He had relished watching her load up the empty storage tank at Site A. She’d made this mess, of that he was sure. He had no end of pleasure watching her help clean it up.
Brett was on his way home. More than a hundred and fifty miles back, but safe, warm, and moving. He’d be able to clear the storm and make the trek without any further assistance.
“Hey, before we get back, I wanted to ask, what the hell was ‘Black Buck’ anyway?” Jake asked.
Charlie spoke as if the answer was obvious, “Falkland Islands. The British needed to bomb that airstrip. The bombers couldn’t reach, even with the refueling tankers. So they sent up tankers to resupply the tankers. Built it up like a staircase. Tankers refueling tankers refueling tankers refueling bombers. All those supply runs. They were like the tanker sorties. It was the only way to get you out there and make sure you had a way back home.”
Jake looked askance at her, “The Falkland Islands?”
“I’m surprised Laura didn’t get the reference. I knew someone in Houston would if the image got through. I put it on the first card in case that was all that got through. I assumed they’d think of it the same way I did.”
He shook his head. Trust Charlie to pull some obscure bit of trivia out to save the day. Even if it was the day she’d almost ruined in the first place.
At this point, Jake knew when he was in radio range of the base. He’d done this every day for the past four days. There was a little rock, like a rounded pyramid, about half the height of one of the runabout’s wheels. About a hundred yards after he passed it, the little pigtail antenna would have line of sight to the two-meter radio tower on top of HAB 1.
As they came past that particular rock, he’d been regaling Charlie with Laura’s worry that she’d have to come home without the dumb Americans that had been lost on the dusty plains. Charlie was amused at her roommate’s worry.
He and Charlie were still close, despite the years and the miles that had tried their friendship. They chose to announce their return with typical American gusto.
“Base to runner. Base to runner. Do you read?” Laura’s voice came over the radio.
Jake gestured to the rover’s dashboard, inviting her to give the confirmation.
“Oh, bury me not, on the lone prairie…” Charlie sang.
6 March 2003
Athena Base
Athena II
Sol 261
The questions had been prerecorded. They would play one at a time, then Charlie would react to each in turn. It was the closest they could get to a live interview. It also gave the astronaut time to think and rethink each response. The public affairs office was a big fan of the speed of light.
Tamara O’Neil’s face came up when Charlie clicked the first of the recordings. She wore her signature charcoal grey suit. The GNN logo behind her was graced with the image of Mars, rather than the usual shot of Earth. GNN had made a point to be a leader in coverage of the Athena missions.
“Doctor Hickory, thank you so much for joining us tonight. We are eager to hear about your adventure and your exciting discovery,” Tamara said.
Charlie pondered for a moment and then hit the record button, speaking into the camera at the crest of the laptop.
“Thank you, Tamara. It sure feels good to be back home again. He won’t hear this for a while, but I want to send my thanks and good wishes to Brett Morrison, who is still out on the road. We expect he’ll be back next week, and I couldn’t have asked for a better shipmate out there.”
She went on, “We had quite a time on the road. Our stops were very productive. The mini-rovers we left behind are still in place, though they have been left dormant until the storm passes.”
“The last site we visited had our big surprise. We found deposits of opal, which, if you remember your old Earth science classes from middle school, is a gem that you only find when you have water. The fact that we found a seam of it would indicate that that there may be more water in that area. If that’s the case, it’ll be the second time we’ve found a significant source. That could mean we have much more water that can be accessed and used, which will help our long-term plans.”
As she spoke, Charlie held up a sample bag and the shiny opal shard glinted inside the rusty rock it was embedded within. Watching from the other side of the room, Jake wondered if it would show up well on camera.
Charlie fielded a few more questions about the rescue operation. Jake let her finish. The others were downstairs or outside. He hadn’t told them he needed privacy, but everyone just knew.
“Pretty rock,” he said, sitting down next to her, pointing to the bag that lay on the desk.
Charlie turned to face him. She didn’t speak. She didn’t need to.
“Charlie, you’ve got to stop this,” he said. “We’re living in tin cans. That’s no place for a loose cannon.”
She kept her face blank and her mouth shut. Jake was surprised.
“I talked to Darren back in Houston on a private loop. He’s pissed, but he understands. Everyone understands. I just didn’t want you to think that we all don’t know exactly what happened out there.”
Again, Charlie didn’t flinch.
“Communications were spotty. You had to make a call. You found the big science thing. Everyone prefers a hero to a mutineer. You’ll get away with this. You shouldn’t, but you will,” Jake said.
“Genius buys a lot,” Charlie said, impassively.
Jake didn’t take the bait.
“Charlie, I know you think you should have been left-seat for this. I know a lot of people back home think the same thing.”
“And you’re gonna tell me why I’m not?” Charlie asked.
“When I put a life at risk, it’s my own,” Jake said.
“Look, we’re all risking our lives here…” Charlie started.
“Shut up!” he yelled. Jake slammed a palm on the table. She wasn’t hearing him, and he needed her too. Maybe if he was louder.
His patience had been tested by more than five days of road trips and lost time. He’d be damned if she would logic her way out of this.
The outburst wasn’t helping. It was born of frustration. He reeled himself in.
He sighed and looked at her. There was a way to do this and a way not to. He had to find it. His voice became even and measured again.
“I’ve got more respect for drug users than drunk drivers,” he said, quietly.
She blinked, not quite sure what to do with that.
“A guy who shoots up heroin in his living room, he’s got his own problems. Victimless crime, I think they call it.”
Charlie nodded.
“That same guy shoots up and then goes out on the freeway, and now we’ve got a problem. Plenty of victims out there. Just a matter of time before he runs into someone. In his living room, he can only hurt himself. But out on the interstate, he could hit me, or my kid, or a bus full of kids. You get what I’m saying?”
Charlie nodded.
“You want to die for opal, I doubt I can stop you. I think it’s dumb, but I really can’t stop you. But you put Brett in danger and that’s not okay,” Jake said.
Charlie sat with that thought for a beat longer than she needed to.
“You also put the whole program in danger. If Brett doesn’t mean that much to you, maybe the future of spaceflight does.”
Charlie nodded.
“Are you gonna be punitive?” she asked.
“Like what? Put you in Mars jail?” he scoffed.
She shrugged.
He laid down the law, “From now on, we follow orders. We do not take undue risks. We are good little astronauts all the way back to Earth. Got it?”
Charlie nodded.
“Okay,” Jake said. And that was that, “Now, let’s get a plan together for when Brett gets back. I think we need a trip to do maintenance at the southern weather station…”
12 March 2003
Athena Base
Athena II
Sol 268
There had been a nice little celebration when Brett came back in. After the others had gone to bed, Jake broke into his private stash and joined his third-in-command for a quiet drink at the main table. Brett hadn’t told him the truth about what happened out there. That wasn’t as bad as Charlie’s thing, but it still needed to be dealt with.
“So, you came back,” Jake said.
“Yeah, Charlie was on the money. She always is,” Brett said.
“How long you think that’ll last?” Jake said. Brett gave him a look and he elaborated, “One day she’s going to be wrong.”
“Well, it’s not
this day,” Brett said.
Jensen sighed, “She never loses. You really don’t want to lose for the first time on Mars.”
“She knows the risks. We all do,” Brett said.
“Of course
she knows the risks. She’s the one making them. She knows the risks; she just doesn’t care. If she dies, she doesn’t care. If
you die, she doesn’t care. She’d push you into a volcano just to learn how the lava splashes,” Jake said.
“Then why is she your right seat?” Brett asked.
“Because I knew, at some point, my crew would have their asses in the jackpot, and she’d get us out of it. And that’s exactly how that went down. But I trusted her once because I had to. And I wasn’t emotionally compromised about it. I’m telling you,” Jake paused, then rethought, “I’m
advising you. Don’t trust her every single time and expect it’ll always work out. She’s not magic, she just thinks she is. And when she puts your life at risk you
tell me. Got it? You report that. You don’t cover for her out of some misguided sense of loyalty.”
“Is this about her, or me and her?” Brett asked.
“Oh, I could not give one good goddamn that you two are doing whatever you’re doing. It’s not bothering anyone else and you two both seem to be happier for it. I need you to give me twelve hours of work each sol. What you do with the other twelve hours and thirty-eight minutes is up to you. But I will not tolerate one of my crew putting another in danger, nor will I tolerate the other one covering it up after the fact.”
“Why do you assume that’s what happened?” Brett asked.
“Why do you assume that I’m a moron?” Jake said.
Brett sat back, mildly appalled. Jake looked him in the eye.
“Charlie stopped us from leaving, even though Houston told us to get out of there,” Brett said.
“No kidding,” Jake said, flatly.
A beat passed between them. Jake reached out and patted Brett on the arm.
“See, that wasn’t so hard. Now go to bed,” Jake said.
Brett nodded, rose from the seat, and went towards his bunk.
“Brett?” Jake said, stopping him in his tracks.
“Yeah?”
“Good work out there.”
18 March 2003
Athena Base
Athena II
Sol 274
Twain had said there was no better way to know a person than to travel with them. By that token, the entire crew of Athena II ought to be the most closely-knit group in the history of two worlds.
With that being the case, Laura didn’t have to ask to know that Henri was deeply troubled. When he climbed up the ladder into the wardroom, the visage he carried was one of true shock.
If Mars had ghosts, she might have believed he’d seen one.
“Henri?” she said. Her tone got the attention of the others. The stricken French biologist mindlessly took a seat at the head of the table, the commander’s chair. The rest of the crew gathered around him. Laura went to the sink, filled a cup with water, and put it in front of him. Henri looked at it uncomprehendingly for a moment and returned it to the table, unused.
“What’s wrong?” Charlie asked, putting a hand on his shoulder.
“Are you hurt?” Brett asked.
Henri shook his head in silence. Laura pushed the cup of water towards him again.
This time he picked it up and threw it down his gullet, like it was a shot of bad whiskey. That wasn’t enough to settle him. Laura noticed how his hand shook as he returned it to the cold metal table.
Henri turned to Laura. They’d spent quite a bit of time together already and their rapport was a comfort to him now.
“I was looking at the water again. The permafrost samples we brought back. I was checking for contaminants. They’ve been stowed in the old tanks from
Aurora, and I needed to know if the fuel compromised the water purity.”
“Of course,” Laura said. She’d helped put the water in the old fuel tanks and brought it back out again after the rescue was complete. The twenty-gallon storage tank now sat right outside the airlock, for quick access. Houston was considering ways to add the in-situ Martian water to Athena Base’s own supply, but that would only happen after all scientific research on it had concluded.
“The storage tank had been filled with methane, drained, filled again, drained again,” Henri said. His hand made lazy circles in the air around his shoulder to indicate the use of the tank during the rescue operations.
Henri’s eyes were unfocused. He was gazing into the middle-distance. “No matter what we did, there was bound to be traces of methane still left over. You can’t clean anything perfectly here. The dust, the water, the fuel. It’s impossible for anything to be totally pure. Life isn’t pure. We should have just sent robots,” he said.
“What’s wrong?” Laura asked, repeating Charlie’s question.
“I couldn’t find it. I couldn’t find any of it,” he said, with the weight of a great guilt in his voice.
“Couldn’t find what?” Laura asked.
“The methane!” Henri cried, “I thought it was a problem with the chemical analyzer. It had to be. There was no way. Simply no way to get every last trace of methane out after everything we’d done.”
“Take it easy, Henri,” Brett said.
“I loaded a few slides into the scope downstairs. I… I…” he struggled to form the next sentence. “There’s a structure. It’s… it’s very small. I don’t think I can really do it justice here. If I had a better setup. I need to be back on Earth,” he said. The thousand-yard stare broke as he grabbed Laura by the shoulders. He was in a state she’d never seen from him before.
“Henri?” Laura said, putting a hand on his shoulder.
“I put more methane into the sample. Not much. Just a test,” he said.
“Henri?” Laura said, trying to bring him back to the present.
“Laura… it was
consumed. The methane. They’re methanogens. They’re alive,” Henri said.
