Mars Nation 2 Read online

  The cab that had protected her from the pressure loss was attached to its vehicle from the inside and the outside. It was composed of two parts, floor and ceiling. On Earth, Ewa alone wouldn’t have been able to transport the dome at its weight of one hundred eighty kilograms, but here with the help of her suit’s integrated exoskeleton, it shouldn’t be a problem. She first needed to unfasten the roof’s interior anchors. The clamps were located under the edges of the upper wall tiles, which she had to remove with a screwdriver. She really enjoyed her task since she had never had so much strength in her arms. She should have taken more than the three extra suits from the ship!

  Done! Ewa turned around. She was sorry to have to leave the loader sitting here. All the things they could have done with it! And it had obviously withstood the weight of the drill without a problem. The fact that the drill’s mass was distributed over ten axles probably helped with that. Ewa weighed her options. She really didn’t have the desire or the drive to spend another span of weeks in her spacesuit. Therefore, she needed the loader’s cab since the one on the drill had been destroyed by the robot.

  Suddenly, she realized something. Ewa slapped her forehead, but only struck her helmet. Yesterday she hadn’t driven the loader from its own cab! She could bring the vehicle along using the remote control. Why hadn’t she thought of that before? She could kill two birds with one stone. Was it even worth the effort to trade out the cabs? Yes, because otherwise she would have to haul the supplies already stored on the drill over here. It would be easier to just swap out the cab roofs.

  Ewa returned to the driver’s seat and switched the loader over to remote control status. She then depressurized the cab and opened the hatch. The roof was also attached on the outside. She still had to release eight clamps before she could carry the structure over to the drill. She climbed all over the cab area. Even from up here, the giant scoop was impressive.

  Just imagine all the things the MfE project could achieve with this machine! They had originally planned to build a dome that would have been supported by its own internal air pressure. However, they had given up on the idea already in the planning stage because of the enormous amount of soil they would have needed to move.

  Ewa loosened the clasps and looked around. There was more dust in the air today than there had been yesterday, but it was still bright enough. She reached for the cab roof and jiggled it. The structure moved. Ewa could feel how the artificial arm muscles were helping her. It felt as if a big brother were reaching under her arms from behind. Or Theo. She realized that she missed him. That was the precise reason she had been glad when he had started to grow closer to Rebecca. She would be a threat to everyone as long as that thing was stuck inside her head. If only she had known earlier!

  She carefully placed the cab roof into the scoop. She kept one hand on it to provide balance as she descended from the vehicle to the ground. Picking it back up with both hands, she carried the structure across the ten meters to the drill. Despite the suit’s motor support, she started sweating. How long would the exoskeleton last? She probably should have consulted the spacesuit’s handbook.

  “Where’s the best place to put this thing?”

  She was now starting her monologues again. Since coming to know that Friday was sitting in her brain, she hadn’t felt as truly alone as she had before. But she still longed to see actual humans again. No, she realized, she missed one thing more than anything else. She wanted to be hugged, quite innocently, like a small child. She wanted to be wrapped in the warmth of another person. What was wrong with her? Was she becoming sentimental now, too?

  She set the loader’s roof down on the ground. Before she could mount it, she had to first remove the damaged one from the drill’s cab. She climbed up the ladder onto the drill. It had really been quite smart of the engineers to use a modular building system on these machines. From her elevated position, her gaze fell on the wheel assemblies. They looked as if they were also interchangeable with the ones on the loader.

  Ten minutes later, she shoved the damaged roof off the other side of the vehicle. She waited for the splintering crash, but then recalled that the atmosphere was much too thin for that. She climbed back down and fetched the new roof. It fit perfectly. All she had to do was to fasten it from the inside and the outside.

  And now she was finally ready to go. Ewa closed the hatch behind her and let the life support system fill the cab with breathable air. When her suit signaled that there was enough pressure inside, she opened her helmet. The fresh air smelled as if a downpour had just passed through. Rain—she would never experience that again. But she would never forget the exhilarating air left in the wake of a storm.

  She punched the approximate coordinates of the NASA base into the drill’s computer. She didn’t know the exact position, but when she got close enough, she could locate the station with her radio. The thought of meeting the NASA crew made her anxious. Of course, none of those astronauts were on her conscience, but it had been on her orders that MfE had stolen the NASA spaceship, the Endeavour. Were the MfE and NASA bases collaborating again? Ewa hoped that her sacrifice might have helped that happen.

  The computer delivered its initial prognosis. It would take twenty-one sols to cover the distance. Her last uncertainty vanished as the computer presented the range of all its resources. Friday had claimed that the drill could easily manage the distance, but the computer now provided specifics. She had enough energy for twice that distance and enough breathable air for sixty days. The methane-propelled engine would produce water all on its own. Ewa had heard that the Spaceliner project had relied completely on methane technology because it could be easily obtained from Mars’s atmosphere.

  Ewa looked back one last time. Behind her, Spaceliner 0 still looked elegant with its small back fin, but a dark, rectangular hole now gaped in its lower level, as if a gigantic surgeon had removed a vital organ from there. What would the ship’s owners have to say about that? Ewa shook her head. They weren’t here yet, and nothing was really wholly broken. The hangar could be welded shut again, the robot had only been shorted out, and she was just borrowing the two machines for a few weeks for a good cause. Why should they just sit around in the ship when someone could be making good use of them?

  She activated the loader’s remote-control program. It would follow them at a distance of fifty meters. She then authorized the drill’s navigation system to depart. The huge truck cautiously picked up speed. It drove halfway around Spaceliner 0 before pointing its nose toward the south, where the sun had just reached its zenith. Its sallow light fell softly onto the Mars surface and its scattered rocks. Ewa relaxed into her seat and leaned her head back against her crossed arms.

  6/30/2042, Spaceliner 1

  At exactly noon, the sirens rang out across the ship. Proximity alert! Rick moved unhurriedly into the command center. He was just floating through the hatch as the sirens stopped. All he could do was watch as the three others on the bridge calmed back down. Rick had almost lost his patience. The universe had been taking its own sweet time in bringing his plan into play. But now something had finally happened.

  “What were the sirens for?” he asked innocently.

  Jean Warren answered him. “A proximity alert.”

  “And what was out there?”

  “An asteroid.”

  “Why was it so loud? Shouldn’t we have picked it up earlier?”

  “We’re checking on that. The boulder was large enough that we actually should’ve picked it up from a greater distance than this.”

  “Chad, aren’t you on watch? I expect you to do a thorough investigation of what happened. We can’t allow any errors. We might be our planet’s last survivors.”

  One hour later, there was a knock at his cabin door. It must be Chad, Rick thought as he called, “Come in!”

  Yes, it was the NASA astronaut who had participated in the inflammatory conversation with Jean and Isaac. Rick smiled at him. It felt good to be in the know without anyone b
eing aware that he was. He hoped that Chad was about to lie to him so that he could take both him and Jean out at the same time.

  “The alarm from earlier,” Chad began. “You asked me to look into what happened.”

  “Correct. Something like that shouldn’t just happen. Just imagine what would’ve occurred if the asteroid had hit us.”

  “The odds of that were never more than a fraction per mil.”

  “Nonetheless, Chad, what likelihood would you have placed on us being left high and dry by Earth on our flight to Mars?”

  “You’re totally right. That was a serious incident. I didn’t mean to trivialize it.”

  “Good. And what have you discovered?”

  “The good news is that I didn’t find any technical failures. The asteroid was detected at a greater distance.”

  “But?”

  “Someone had shut off the system’s corresponding alert system.”

  “Why? Do you suspect sabotage?”

  “No, not at all. It’s just that during every shift we pick up several asteroids at a greater distance. The sensors can really get annoying. I simply assume that the signals were deactivated because of that.”

  “So someone put our ship in great danger as a matter of convenience?” Rick grew intentionally louder. He must make his horror crystal clear.

  “That would be one possible motive, but I can’t see inside her brain.”

  “In her brain?”

  “Captain Jean Warren was on duty during the shift in which the signals were turned off. The log indicates that they were deactivated from her account.”

  “Thank you very much for this information, Chad. I am quite grateful,” Rick switched to a more confiding tone. “And I won’t forget you when it’s time for future promotions.”

  What a brilliant move on my part, Rick thought. I will knock Chad out completely when I have the captain arrested based on his statement and reward him for it. The mutinous cell around Isaac and him will be totally shut down.

  “I... That really isn’t necessary. I was just doing my job.”

  “We need more people just like you, Chad.”

  At seventeen hundred hours, Rick called the entire crew together in the common room. He was even able to convince the senator to join them as a member of the assembly, just in case someone challenged his authority to do this.

  After the room fell silent, he asked Jean Warren to come to the front.

  “I apologize, Jean,” he said without making eye contact with her. “You are undoubtedly a deserving colleague, which makes the error you committed all the more tragic. It might have cost the last survivors of the human race their very existence. A collision with an asteroid could have virtually pulverized this ship. This is why I am relieving you of your duties, effective immediately. In addition, I am ordering a fourteen-day arrest period, at the end of which you may attempt to regain the crew’s trust through your new duties in the kitchen.”

  The crew members at the back of the space began to murmur and whisper. He had to be even clearer.

  “It is specifically because of your service and accomplishments that I am choosing to not view your error as an act of sabotage. Under the current, exceptional circumstances, I would have otherwise been forced to sentence you to lifelong imprisonment or even death.”

  The audience grew quiet. Now they get it, Rick thought.

  Sol 86, Mars surface

  Ewa had dreamed a nightmare the night before. In it, she had set fire to the NASA base she was driving toward, like Nero had done to Rome centuries ago. The flames blazed away. She ran off, but in some magical way, the fire could also be seen beyond the horizon. It seemed to have been seared into her retina.

  That wasn’t a realistic scenario, of course. The higher percentage of oxygen at the station increased the fire risk, but a fire couldn’t be sustained in Mars’s atmosphere. It would burn out all the rooms, but would die as soon as it worked its way to the outside. Was her dream trying to tell her something? As the drill bumped across the Mars landscape, Ewa touched her tool bag. It was hanging on the outside of her spacesuit, which she had draped over the armrest of the passenger seat. Moving her hand over the laminated material, she could feel the weapon’s metal.

  Maybe it was time to dispatch that thing inside her head. She touched her forehead with her right hand. It must be sitting a few centimeters behind this spot, that electronic implant housing the uninvited guest who had turned her into a danger to the others. Even if Friday had helped her, could she dismiss the possibility that she might once again become a tool for him to complete his mission? No, she couldn’t. Nonetheless, she felt like it would be a mistake to use the taser today. Mars wasn’t paradise. The planet was unforgiving, demanding every last ounce of strength from its residents. She could use every bit of help she could get.

  Ewa imagined what would happen when she reached the base. In every respect, they would approach her with skepticism. Initially, the NASA people wouldn’t believe the treasure she had brought to them. And they wouldn’t readily accept her transformation, especially not when she declared that she had been controlled by something inside her head.

  Ewa chuckled quietly. She wouldn’t have believed herself either. In a best-case scenario, she would lock anyone who made such a claim in solitary confinement. But that wasn’t what Ewa wanted. She wanted to be active and helpful. So she couldn’t reveal what was inside of her. She had to make up a story that would at least halfway clarify her motive. She didn’t expect them to take her in with open arms, but she did want them to accept her help.

  “Proximity alarm,” the vehicle’s comp suddenly announced.

  Ewa sat up, startled. What could be approaching her out here in the desolate Mars desert? She couldn’t see anything on the screen. She increased the contrast. There really was something moving on the horizon. Ewa experimented with various light wavelength ranges. In the infrared spectrum, it became clear that the object was composed of heated air. It had to be a dust devil. Ewa measured the distance. It was about five kilometers away and was slowly moving toward her. The phenomenon was approximately fifteen meters across. In the visible light, it seemed to be almost a hundred meters tall, dissolving at that height into the ever-present dust layer. However, the infrared image revealed that the tube of heated air reached significantly higher. The little tornado was lifting dust from the surface and carrying it upward. Ewa measured the wind speed as approximately forty to sixty kilometers per hour. It wasn’t really a threat to her. The atmosphere was much too thin. She leaned back again. The dust devil wasn’t anything more than a nice distraction. It would miss her by about two kilometers.

  But Ewa impulsively turned off the autopilot function. She steered the vehicle by hand, directly for the mini-storm. After all, she was a scientist! Nobody had ever measured the precise pressure and temperature readings inside of a Mars dust devil. On the other hand, these phenomena were well-researched back on Earth. She had learned about this work as a student. Of course, there wasn’t anyone back on Earth with whom she could share her findings, but the scientist in her still compelled her to act. Ewa decided to follow the practices of geologists back on Earth. She needed a pole and double-sided tape. Hadn’t she come across a tent in one of the boxes?

  She quickly pulled on her spacesuit. The unexpected activity suddenly made her feel very alive. She authorized the life support system to suck out the air in the cab before stepping out of the hatch. She found the tent in the second crate she checked. She removed its rod system. If she connected all the rods into a single pole, it would reach about three and a half meters. She had tape in her tool bag. She needed to use it sparingly, which was why she wrapped single strips of tape at ten-centimeter intervals along the length of the pole. That should do it.

  Ewa looked at the horizon. The dust devil was still five hundred meters away. It had shifted direction. If she wanted to overtake it, she would have to run. Ewa turned momentarily toward the drill. It wasn’t even noon yet. What woul
d happen if she moved a short distance away from it? She estimated the windstorm’s movement and then set off toward the west, running faster and faster, in order to intersect it. The motorized knee and hip joints worked wonders. Ewa took giant steps. She suspected she was moving at about thirty kilometers per hour.

  These spacesuits really were marvelous. This was probably some form of military technology, otherwise NASA would at least have something similar. She made it! The dust devil was now coming right at her. Ewa came to a stop. It looked quite impressive up close. The dust was thick, cutting off the sunlight. It looked as if the Eiffel Tower’s little brother had set itself in motion and was racing straight for her. The atmosphere was too thin for it to be dangerous, she reminded herself. Years ago, around the turn of the millennium, a Mars rover had even benefited from an encounter with a dust devil, which had instantly cleaned off its solar cells. Nothing would happen to her.

  Then the storm reached her, and it was magical.

  Dust particles danced around her. Her view of her surroundings grew blurred. She froze, standing still. Ewa stretched out her arms. She drew bright, hovering lines in the dust. She had to keep reminding herself that this wasn’t some form of magic—the dust was simply bouncing off her outstretched arms, and behind them, areas with less dust were being formed. The wind wasn’t actually as strong as it had seemed from the outside. The dust particles it was whirling along had to be very small and light.

  Ewa remembered the pole. She stuck it into the ground and held onto it tightly. She looked up. The storm didn’t have an eye, which had to be because it wasn’t reaching straight upward. It was bending in all directions, coiling like a giant worm reaching up on its tail to the sky to beg for something. What might be going on with the dust devil? Ewa laughed loudly. Anyone who could see her would think she was crazy. The dust devil didn’t have any wishes, of course. But it was fascinating to imagine what it might wish for, if it could.