Mars Nation: The Complete Trilogy

by Brandon Q Morris

  “Sounds like an offer,” Mike declared. “Do the two of you want to make the trip?”

  “If you’ll take care of the garden while I’m gone,” Sarah said.

  She glanced at Lance, and he nodded. This would make a nice change from the base’s daily routine.

  “Since the enclosed Rover’s on loan to MfE, you’ll have to take the open one,” Mike warned. “You won’t be able to get out of your suits until nighttime.”

  “That’s fine. The open Rover is easier to maneuver, and it has an almost unlimited range,” Sarah said.

  “And we’ll see something of the landscape,” Lance added.

  “I just wanted to mention that so you knew what you were getting into,” Mike explained. “The route I’ve calculated should be relatively safe. The only place you’ll encounter significant changes in elevation is in Hebes Chasma. The erosion should be advanced enough that you should be able to get up and down the hillsides just fine.”

  “That makes me feel a lot better,” Lance said. “When do we start?” He would have preferred to set off right away. He held nothing against the other crew members, but the thought of crossing through the solitude of Mars electrified him. This would probably change to irritation once a few days in his suit had rubbed his backside raw, but at the moment this seemed like a splendid idea.

  “If we all get to work, the Rover should be ready to go by tomorrow,” Mike said.

  Sol 50, MfE base

  “We have a problem, Ewa,” Theo said.

  “Just spit it out,” she snapped back, her eyes closed.

  Ewa’s nerves seemed frayed today. Was she perhaps trying to squelch her guilty conscience? That was just wishful thinking. This unscrupulous woman who was willing to steal a spaceship didn’t coincide with his prior image of her.

  “The two Rovers won’t fit onto the ship,” he said.

  “Not even if we take them apart?”

  “Not a chance.”

  “Hmm. We definitely need the enclosed Rover. Otherwise we can’t move the animals over to our new base.”

  “So we’ll leave the open one here?” Theo suggested.

  “It’s perfect for the exploration we need to do. It would be a real loss.”

  “But we still have the ship. Let’s at least leave the NASA crew the second Rover.”

  “Ah, so that’s where this is coming from. We already discussed that in the group. What we’re doing is in the interest of our mission. The NASA base will be just fine.”

  “You know my feelings on this, Ewa.”

  “Yeah. But on a different topic, Ellen had an idea. An old NASA probe is sitting west of us, and it contains solar panels and other materials. I was thinking we could salvage it from the new base, but the distance would be shorter from here. If we can’t take the Rover anyway, we should go ahead and start on the salvage operation.”

  “I hope you’re not counting on me, Ewa. I’m still recovering from those thousands of kilometers I just spent in the Rover.”

  Ewa gazed at him in evident astonishment. No, he wouldn’t be volunteering for this mission despite how good the trip with Rebecca had been.

  “Fine. Shashwat and Guillermo will do the run. Shashwat’s a good mechanic. He’ll be able to take the probe apart in no time flat. It would be best if they set off today.”

  “I’m sure they’ll be thrilled.” Theo couldn’t keep the sarcastic edge out of his voice. “You’ll do the briefing, right? I need to take care of getting the enclosed Rover on board.”

  “All set?” Ewa asked.

  Ellen had taken over the job of pilot. Her talents really were multifaceted. Ewa had first asked Theo if he wanted to pilot the Endeavour, but he had declined. As it turned out, back on Earth, Ellen had gone through simulator training on a capsule similar to the Endeavour. That would have to suffice, Ewa decided.

  “Looks good,” Ellen said. “Prop, LG, FC, everything at one hundred percent.”

  Deep furrows ran across the young woman’s forehead. Theo was glad he wasn’t in her shoes, because this wasn’t a standard launch but a suborbital flight. This meant that the spaceship wouldn’t reach orbit around Mars. Shortly after they took off, Ellen would have to hit the brakes.

  An automated voice came out of the console and started to slowly count to zero. Theo tightened his fingers around his armrests. He inhaled and exhaled deeply. This was his first launch without a trained pilot at the controls. He wouldn’t have been so scared if Chuck was still here. Chuck wouldn’t have permitted such insanity to take place. After they landed, he needed to warn Ellen about Ewa. Was she being hounded by ambition or by fear of death?

  A deep vibration reverberated through the ship. The ship’s steel panels groaned as the engines strained against Mars’s gravitational pull. Theo watched Ellen as she focused intently on what she was doing. Her face was completely emotionless. The trajectory was pre-programmed, but she had to be ready to intervene at any moment if any deviations from the plan arose. The programming was based on conjectures drawn from the literature—they had been forced to prep for their launch without asking the NASA crew for the latest data or instructions.

  Theo was pressed back into his seat by his own inertia. He now folded his hands over his stomach. With each passing second he felt more and more nervous. Very soon, it would be time for the trick for which the Endeavour had never actually been designed. The primary engine would be turned off. He started to mentally count down the seconds.

  This was it. The pressure on his back vanished. They were weightless. Ellen was leaning far over the control screen. She steadied herself with one hand as she activated the vernier thrusters. The Endeavour had to pivot 180 degrees until the primary engine was pointing along their trajectory. An empty sack floated through Theo’s field of vision, slowly drifting up to the ceiling. That had to be the effect of deceleration in the thin atmosphere.

  “The engine will be reactivated in ten nine eight...,” Ellen said into the microphone.

  Restarting an engine within such a short time wasn’t all that easy. It typically would need a more extended rest period, but they couldn’t give it that if they didn’t want to overshoot their destination.

  “...three two one ignition.”

  At that very second the vibration returned, and the inertia of his own mass once again pushed him back into his seat cushions. Somebody behind him applauded, although it was still too early for that. The Endeavour had performed an impressive solo, but the concert—the flight—was far from over.

  “Congratulations! We’re right on course,” Ewa said.

  Did she really have to say that? Theo wasn’t the superstitious sort, but such predictions could only bring bad luck. He pulled up the flight data on his seat monitor. Within thirty minutes, they would land at the spot where it would have taken them many days to travel to on the surface. If they had enough fuel, they could comfortably travel from start to destination. But after they landed, the Endeavour would have to wait for a long time to be refueled.

  The first priority would be to construct the base.

  The NASA people would be furious, and he could hardly blame them.

  Theo was relieved. Ellen had brought them back down cleanly. They were now at the place that would be their new home. He brought up the images from the external cameras on his screen. There was still a lot of dust in the air, but he instantly recognized the crater he and Rebecca had visited three weeks ago. The great treasure—water in the form of ancient ice—was sitting there in the black shadow. It might have come from a sea that had frozen more than three billion years ago. Considering the environment, it was more likely that the deposit had formed at a later point, whenever the comet fragment had struck and formed this crater. They were lucky that, first, the permanent shadow and, second, the layer of protective sand had spread over it. Otherwise none of the ice would be left today.

  Ellen stood up and walked past him to Ewa, pride in her accomplishment written large across her face. She hugged the older wom
an. Ewa smiled as if she wouldn’t harm even a fly. The only thing that stood out was her nose, which looked as if it had been broken multiple times.

  He heard loud laughter behind him. A woman started to sing a song he didn’t recognize. Ewa’s smile remained strangely stiff. It looked frozen, unresponsive to the jubilation around her.

  It was at that moment that Theo realized with certainty that Ewa had a secret, a dark one at that.

  Sol 49, NASA expedition

  Amazing, Lance thought. They had made the decision yesterday, and by today, they were ready to leave. That was the advantage of being on a small team. Every other hour or so, Sarah and he would swap out as drivers. Sarah was going to drive the Rover for the first forty kilometers. Their vehicle consisted of three segments with a total of four axles. They were sitting up front, while the provisions and fuel were stored in the middle section, and the tent was strapped to the last one. There was also room at the back for whatever they could salvage from the old probe.

  Sarah hit the gas hard. You could tell that she was enjoying this unaccustomed pleasure.

  Lance tightened his fingers around the armrest between them. This grew uncomfortable after the first half-hour. “May I?” he asked without further explanation.

  Sarah seemed to know exactly what he meant. “Sure,” she replied.

  Lance leaned forward against her back and locked his hands around Sarah’s waist. It had been a long time since he had ridden a motorcycle, but he could still recall the feeling clearly. It was surprisingly similar. Instead of feeling Sarah’s body through motorcycle gear, he could feel her through the flexible NASA suits. They weren’t wearing safety helmets, but rather breathing helmets. However, the most significant difference was in the driving experience itself. Instead of an asphalt strip, a track of loose dust and stone stretched out before them, jostling and rattling every part of them.

  They took a short break after three hours. Lance had dozed against Sarah’s back for almost an hour. His mouth was dry, his voice raspy. They hadn’t spoken a word since leaving the base, but he felt neither awkward nor weird.

  Lance looked around. The landscape had already changed. It was now fairly hilly. He could make out several oddly shaped boulders on the horizon. “Do you see them?” he asked.

  “It looks like a giant tossed his dice on the ground,” Sarah said.

  “They must be as large as an apartment complex,” Lance added. He sat down on a smaller stone, but stood right back up again. He would be sitting soon enough as it was. “Where do we go from here?” he asked.

  “Straight ahead for the next while. We won’t reach the Chasma for another five days,” Sarah replied.

  Lance stared up into the sky and discovered a bright dot. “Is that Venus?” he asked, pointing at it.

  “That would be very romantic, but I don’t think we can see it during the day. That must be Deimos.”

  “Mars’s moon? It’s that tiny?”

  “Yeah, even in its lower orbit. It’s supposed to look about three hundred times as bright as Venus does from Earth.”

  “And here I thought you were a doctor and biologist.”

  Sarah chuckled. “Didn’t you do the survival training course in Death Valley? They told us something about that there.”

  “All I remember is the roasted snake they served us.”

  “Ready to keep going, Lance?”

  “Yeah, let’s go.”

  This time Sarah rested against his back. It was a pleasant feeling, pleasant and familiar. About 20 kilometers later, the radio beeped. The call was coming from the base. Lance put the Rover in park. Neither Mike nor Sharon would contact them without good cause. Sarah climbed down and stood next to the steering rod, while Lance remained seated.

  “Something terrible has happened!” Sharon shouted. “Mike is as mad as hell, and I had to send him outside to calm down. Otherwise he would’ve taken the base apart into little pieces.”

  “What happened? Did the Spaceliner I guy call back in and make more arrogant demands?” Lance asked.

  “Worse. The MfE criminals stole the Endeavour, and all we could do was watch.”

  “Whaaat? That’s... but they all made such a decent impression.”

  “And we rescued them,” Sharon said. “That’s what upsets Mike the most. We put our lives at risk, and they turn around and steal our ship. He wants to drive out and take it back by force.”

  “That might be a little challenging. There are fifteen of them and only four of us,” Lance said.

  Sarah turned around and strode a few meters away from the Rover, her shoulders hunched.

  “What’s wrong, Sarah? Do you need help?”

  “It’s just... the shock. I suddenly feel nauseous. I have to make sure I don’t throw up inside my helmet.”

  Lance felt himself growing angry. It didn’t bother him so much that the ship was gone, but those bastards were responsible for making Sarah feel sick. His hands clenched involuntarily into fists. He was probably wrong to think of them all as bastards. The only one who would have dared to do this was Ewa. But no, he wouldn’t have expected such unequaled treachery from her, either. That’s not how you repaid someone who saved your life! This was unbelievable.

  “Now what? Can you keep Mike there, Sharon?”

  “We’re lucky you’re out with the Rover. We don’t have any others here. Mike also isn’t crazy enough to actually chase after them. But it’s possible that he will contact you soon and ask you to break off your trip. Please tell him ‘no,’ or he’ll just put himself in harm’s way.”

  “Should we just leave everything as it is, then?” Lance asked.

  “What would you want to do? We’re at a disadvantage. We could ask them to return the Endeavour, but even if they agreed, they wouldn’t have enough fuel for the return flight.”

  “You’re right, Sharon. But when I think about this deception, it makes me want to break something.”

  “Be careful out there. Don’t break anything you might still need. Without the Endeavour, we’ll have to be even more careful with our resources.”

  “Understood.”

  “And whenever Mike calls in, you’ll know the reason why.”

  “Sure, we’ll know,” Lance said.

  The Rover covered the next fifty kilometers in half the time. Lance drove as fast as the motor would let him. This way he didn’t have time to stay upset about the theft. The route was challenging, and the vehicle bounced up and down like crazy on its solid rubber tires. If the Rover had resembled a plump caterpillar before, creeping comfortably toward its destination, the vehicle now reminded him of an eight-legged lesser Egyptian jerboa out hunting.

  Sarah spent the whole time holding on to Lance for dear life. He wasn’t sure if it was her arms or the fact he had to concentrate so hard on their wild ride, but either way he gradually felt calmer. They would be able to get over the material loss. There wasn’t a destination they could have used the Endeavour to reach anyway. The enclosed Rover was more comfortable for its crew, since during the drive you could take off your spacesuit, but it was considerably slower and less maneuverable, and its range was more limited.

  The main problem was that he would have to adjust to a new future again. Only a few weeks ago, he had seen himself as a future father and husband. And then suddenly the human race had shrunk down to a mere 20 people. He could have imagined working cooperatively to build a new life with the MfE crew, but now they were on their own... their number was down to four. After this breach of trust, any potential collaboration with Mars for Everyone was an impossibility. He would spend the next 40 or 50 years living with Sharon and Mike, and with Sarah. One of them would eventually bury all the others and would face death alone. Lance hoped he wasn’t that person.

  Mike didn’t call in as Sharon had expected him to do. She must have managed to convince him to give up his plan for revenge. After they set up their tent and had removed their suits, Sarah and Lance made love for the first time. It felt right and
almost effortless.

  Sol 55, MfE base

  Ewa was standing beside a rectangular ditch that the robotic drill had dug into the Mars surface. It was twelve by eight by five meters deep. A big pile of sand and gravel was sitting only a few meters away. “May I introduce you to our new base?” she said.

  “It’s not very beautiful,” Rebecca remarked, pointing at the pile.

  “Most of that will be used to cover our base. It’s the perfect shield against cosmic radiation,” Ellen explained. She was standing right beside Ewa.

  Theo had already noticed that the two of them were spending a lot of time together. Ellen was an extraordinary planner, and Ewa persuaded the crew to accept their mutually conceived plans. The construction of the base was proceeding more quickly than they had thought it would. They had already started to mine the ice as well. Since their Endeavour landing, something inside their community had changed. Theo wasn’t sure exactly what it was. You could perhaps describe it as a fissure, although there hadn’t been any arguments or discussions. However, groups were forming that spent more time with one another than with the people in the other groups.

  Was this perhaps the evolution that always occurred when an extreme situation slowly transformed into a new normalcy? thought Theo. He and Rebecca spent so much time together that the others probably assumed they were a couple, though they really weren’t. Why not, though? Theo didn’t know why, but he also didn’t feel any urgent need to alter the situation. Could a true, unromantic friendship exist between a man and a woman?

  Ellen walked around the trench, studying the edges as if she needed to check on something.

  “When can we move in?” Rebecca asked.

  “In seven sols, at the latest,” Ellen replied. “I suspect we might be able to speed that up by a day, but I have to discuss that with Ewa first.”