by T I WADE
Mars Noble was in a hurry. He really wanted to get back to the tunnels and to show a few others what he had found, but two water missions had to be completed first.
The two shuttles had landed first at the base, where the crew was to have a free day before beginning the water collection.
The Martian Club Retreat was as Mars Noble had left it years earlier. Dave Black’s hair had gone white. Two of the occupants had died of natural deaths. They had joined Jonesy’s mother and father in the outside graveyard, which would one day become nearly as famous as Arlington.
Overall, the Mars crew were thin and very pasty looking compared to the crew he had left back in Nevada. For the first time since Astermine had first achieved space travel, the returning astronauts could see what differences living on both planets did to the human body.
They had seen the slight changes over time on their own return flight to Mars. They had launched, the crew were tanned, fit and muscular. They had then looked as healthy as any Homo sapiens living on Earth.
The tans faded after a week to ten days, the skin color reverted back to normal, and during the third and fourth weeks aboard the shuttles, their skin color became pale and sallow.
Their muscles, even though they trained four to six hours a day slowly decreased in shape and size. The lack of gravity was the cause of this change. Again a month after leaving earth’s orbit, the entire crew had lost any additional muscular shape they had made on Earth, and everybody was thin, scrawny, and most even looked like they had the same build.
On Mars, the crew were even thinner and paler than the returning crewmembers. Dave Black was as tall as Jonesy, over six feet, but weighed in at 145 pounds. Jonesy was checked over when he reached the base, and his weight was 165 pounds. VIN, and even Ryan weighed in at much the same weight, and the difference in weight between the Mars crew and the returning crew was put down to diet, namely luxuries brought from Earth.
And there were luxuries aplenty for Dr. Messer, Dave and the Mars crew. Items were brought out from hideaways from every member of the flight crew.
Naturally Suzi had the most chocolate, even though the cocoa plants at the retreat were healthy and doing well. She and her new helper, Max Von Braun expertly cooked up a dozen of her famous chocolate cakes for everyone, and the reserves of beer and wine produced on the planet were given out in a celebration of Ruler Roo returning to lead his people.
Suzi had begun to consider Max Von Braun very special, once she had realized that her son owed his life to this brave man.
Life was a day of fun and celebrations on the first day, a rest day, for the crew on the planet. Ruler Roo was ceremoniously given the control of The Martian Club Retreat. The two craft had landed under the blue shields, which connected directly to the base, and after Ruler Roo was given the title, Mars Noble proudly showed his father his growing army of robotic troops.
Like they did when young Mars Noble was a little boy, VIN and Mars space-suited up walked with his son around the plateau.
“There is the Rover over there, Dad,” stated Mars to his father pointing to what seemed a small hill of dust about 100 yards away from the edge of the plateau. “Opportunity has moved since I last saw it. I’m sure the strong storms lift up the Rover and move it.”
“I wonder if NASA, or whoever built Opportunity wants it back,” replied VIN thinking.
“Maybe we should take the machine back to Earth, I’m sure somebody wants to look it over. We have enough room in the larger shuttles,” replied Mars.
“Well, we have the last coordinates for Rover Curiosity as well,” added VIN. “I remember I checked out the coordinates and it was on the opposite side of the planet. I’m sure I can get Ryan to give us permission to do a low level planet orbital check before we leave, and we could pick up that Rover as well, if it is still in its last recorded position.”
“Well, we have enough gas,” replied Mars, “as long as we leave a day early, and I think that looking for the storm that mysteriously disappeared has some importance, but first, on Day Four, I want to show you that tunnel I found.
Jonesy landed SB-III first on the ice shield, and SB-IV came in a few minutes later, once the dust had cleared.
Time was the essence on this trip. The first day was the only day of rest before the shuttles left. It was with much gratitude that the base was found without a storm. Somebody had been listening to many prayers on the way over, as the Martian Club Retreat had been easily seen by the cameras on the first orbit.
Throughout the 3 orbits before landing, nobody had seen a storm on the red planet. It seemed that the storm, or storms that had plagued them before had just disappeared. The Martian atmosphere looked still and clear all the way round.
As soon as the thrusters were powered down, the several crewmembers fitted into SB-III’s forward cargo bay in spacesuits were hoisted out by Mars through the cargo bay roof doors. By the time SB-IV landed all seven of the crew had opened a clear area on the water and were using the long-armed buckets to fill the first canister.
Half a dozen more crew members exited the second shuttle the same way and carried canisters to the water’s edge to begin filling them. They had 15 hours before they needed to lift off, and they were all to work three hours on and three hours off to let the suits recharge.
SB-IV had a second shift of six more crewmembers in her rear cargo bay who would continue filling the aluminum canisters while the first crew rested.
Ryan had reckoned that they could fill at least 3,000 gallons of water on each trip to the watering hole, and 5,000 gallons was the minimum he wanted to transfer.
The work wasn’t that hard in the low Martian gravity, but it took teamwork to fill the 60 canisters they had brought. Sixty canisters if filled could hold 6,000 gallons, or one hundred gallons per canister. It took three men about an hour to fill a canister, and the canisters first had to be lifted out of the shuttle’s open cargo roof doors with a crane, each canister carried over to the where the filling was taking placed, stood upright, the hole in the top opened, filled, sealed and then it took four men to carry them back to the ship. This time they were singularly hoisted up by the crane into the cargo holds.
The crew worked hard and rested hard for the time they had between taking the suits off and putting them back on again. The remaining astronauts always ready in the cockpits, one in each, listened to the weather reports from above, any messages, and timed the outside crew. After two shifts, they had their turn outside.
Jonesy worked hard with VIN and Mars Noble. The crew could work fast, but they needed to make sure that no accidents happened. A ripped spacesuit, or collision of crew or ship could mean death if they weren’t carried into a shuttle fast enough. Two of Dr. Nancy’s medical crew worked outside, and were always ready to take over if a crewmember was injured.
On the first flight, they lifted off 24 hours later with approximately 3,900 gallons, or 39 filled canisters.
On the second flight three hours after the water had been unloaded in one of the blue shields, some of the tired crew as well as some fresh crewmembers headed back. This time it would be easier as they only had 25 more canisters to unload, more canisters were waiting for them at the site.
Again Maggie, or Jenny Burgos in SB-II gave the water detail a weather report every hour until since nothing had changed, they downgraded the reports to every orbit.
For Mars, the weather was as perfect as it would ever be. The temperature outside the hard working suits crept up to above freezing on both days. On the second day it actually reached 35 degrees Fahrenheit on VIN’s suit readings. The sun was bright for the red plant, the atmosphere clear and there was no movement of lazy dust around them.
Again they lifted off for the second and last time or that mission with 41 canisters filled, a record for the crew.
As Jonesy flew back to the base with Saturn behind in SB-IV, he surveyed the landscape while the rest of the crew slept. The yellow, brown and red surface never changed. He began to see
the peaks and valleys where water had once flowed millions of years earlier. Even the storms didn’t change the topography that much. VIN Noble was nodding off in the co-pilot’s seat. He had worked hard, and Jonesy let him sleep.
The second load was taken off by the base crew while the men and women who had worked so hard had twelve hours to rest. The next mission, the one Mars Noble was waiting for was in the opposite direction, and twenty minutes closer flying time than the water.
Once Mars Noble was rested, he headed up to the command center where Dave Black was showing Max Von Braun the ropes of base command. From the command center Mars got his robotic guards active, and four of them headed out to the coordinates programed to them. Mars’ could see with their cameras, and the four robots easily picked up the broken remains of Rover Opportunity and carried it back to the plateau. The other Rover wouldn’t be so easy to save as it was on the other side of the planet, nearly 5,000 miles away.
The crew rested while the base’s crew readied the two shuttles for the flight to the tunnels.
Working inside the blue shields was much easier than with spacesuits in the Martian atmosphere. The shields were connected to each other by overlapping, and also connected to the underground base overlapping the “Porch”, the remains of the outer room built with the silicone glass panels when they had first arrived.
With a perfect atmosphere, the crew could work without spacesuits in the shields, whether it was gardening the vegetable patches, or loading or unloading cargo. The temperature was kept constant with heaters inside each shield that kept the growing of greens at optimal temperature, even when the Martian nights got as cold as minus 120 degrees during the planet’s winter solstice.
Over time, and with the idea of the railway tracks found in the Matt tunnel, the same railway type of tracks had been built by the build crew to convey cargo to and from the three blue shields. The train wasn’t very fancy, and they used the same two-carriage train Mars had built for his first foray down the tunnel. This train could carry two full canisters of water at a time. It ran in one side and out the other end’s emergency doors right into the tunnel leading into the base, and into the upper level of the underground section of the base.
The biologists used the train all the time to move produce in and out of the Retreat. The railway was close to where each shuttle parked, and the cargo bays could be filled or emptied pretty quickly. The train was stationed inside the “Porch” when it wasn’t needed.
If the base was attacked, the whole base could be shut down from the outer atmosphere of Mars within minutes, once base command sucked the air from the three shields through pipes into six large tanks inside the base. This process had been refined down to a couple of minutes as the shields were retracted at the same time.
The train was lifted into the forward cargo hold of SB-IV. The larger shuttle’s crane was better at moving larger cargo. On earth, each of the two carriages of the train would have weighed about 500 pounds. On the red planet, they weighed only 65 pounds.
Once the train was in, two of the mining robots were lifted in. These robots would use their lasers to cut up the gold into small pieces a foot cubed, which could be placed into the nets brought from earth, Each of the ten nets laid flat were 15 feet square, and could hold 50 to 60 of these square gold blocks.
Mars Noble was taking three of his robotic soldiers. They also had lasers and had been programed to cut the solid gold river into blocks. The soldiers weren’t as accurate at short range as the miners were, and these blocks would be lifted into the cargo holds individually. The soldiers were lifted into the shuttle’s cargo hold as the astronauts and crew going mining exited the “Porch”.
They were wearing spacesuits in the “off” mode and had their helmets in their hand. Even though the cutting was to be done by the robots, somebody had to get the pieces into the shuttles’ holds. Twenty-eight of the crew plus eight astronauts were going with them and were to squeeze into the two shuttles.
SB-III was going to be loaded with the gold metal first, and then its squashed crew of eight would launch into orbit to relieve the crew in the two shuttles. Then its job was to launch each day and fill up the cargo holds and nets 250 miles above them.
“Feel like we are going for the gold,” joked VIN as he took the co-pilot’s seat next to Jonesy. They both would be heading up with the first load, and taking over to fly the two orbiting shuttles with the Burgos sisters. Maggie and the rest of the astronauts would return in SB-III, first to the base where Lunar Richmond would take the shuttle back to the tunnels for reloading.
The two shuttles slowly lifted out of the blue shields, and in the best sunlight the sun could offer on Mars headed towards the gold location. En route they passed Lookout Peak, and then the wreck that had injured Mars and claimed the life of Johnny Walls. Max Von Braun, over the intercom, detailed the story as both craft hovered a couple of hundred feet over the wreck as not to cause a dust cloud. Mars looked at the wreck of the Matt ship he had flown through the shuttle’s camera and found no foot prints at all. The dust had covered any signs of movement, and the craft was already half filled of the ever present red dust.
“Looks just like we left it,” stated Mars Noble ten minutes later looking out at the three round tunnel exits staring at them half a mile away.
“This enemy camp is not that far from our base, certainly not as far as the water, and I can see the three tunnel exits,” stated Ryan.
“Looks the same” agreed Saturn taking their shuttle into land first. Jonesy had stopped atop Lookout Peak” the plateau they had often used incase SB-IV was attacked.
Saturn landed her shuttle in exactly the same place she had done a few years earlier, and it seemed that they had never left, except the ooze had changed from a dull yellow to more of an orange color.
“No change in the weather since our last orbit,” stated Maggie in orbit.
“Since you are back up there Maggie” replied Jonesy “I’ll head in. Keep your radar peeled for movement, especially at low altitude.”
“Roger that Astronaut Commander,” replied his wife sarcastically.
Saturn smiled as her mother’s sarcasm clearly came through the intercom communications.
“Don’t they ever stop?” asked Ryan.
“I don’t know Commander, you slept with them for 14 years inside DX2017, you should know,” she replied turning down her thrusters to idle.
“It must have been really noisy in their cryogenic bed,” added Mars.
Jonesy landed next to SB-IV 10 minutes later and Mars Noble, commander for this mission ordered the thrusters to close down. Everybody kept their eyes glued to the radar monitors for at least five minutes after the engines had ceased. Nothing moved.
“I think it safe to screw on helmets,” Mars Noble stated into the intercom. “First group to exit both shuttles. Meet up point in front of the middle tunnel exit before we unload cargo, over.”
Thirty minutes later the first 12 astronauts stood together on top of the ooze, and looked back at the two shuttles staring at them. It was certainly a pretty site.
Sometimes the landscape reminded Mars Noble of Nevada, when the weak sun didn’t turn the surface its usual reddish color. Sometimes both deserts looked the same, but there were always tiny bits of green growth on the bare floor and hills of the Nevada desert.
“I suggest you taller guys do not head inside the tunnel further than the entrances, or you will get back ache,” stated Mars. “The real tall people should unload the cargo bays while we shorter people check out the inside of the tunnels for fresh footprints.”
Mars headed into the tunnel with Ryan and Max Von Braun. Carefully he headed down the first tunnel he and Johnny Walls had checked out. The floor where the dust lay was scrutinized carefully. Their old footprints had been filled with fresh dust.
The railway tracks appeared out of the dust about a hundred feet passed the second hole, and so did the old footprints appear. Mars Noble saw that only he and Johnny ha
d walked down this area.
“No new prints,” Mars stated into his suit’s intercom. “I think it’s time to head back and see if the carriages are unloaded. Any suggestions on who is coming with me?”
“I think the boss should see what you have seen, first,” stated Max. “He is shorter than I.”
“I think that is a good idea,” added Ryan. They headed back over to the first exit and scared many of the astronauts working outside. The two carriages had been unloaded, and were being carried to the first hole.
Within 15 minutes they were inside the tunnel, and the crew had them on the tracks.
“I lay flat in the first carriage on my stomach, you lay flat on the second carriage,” instructed Mars Noble to Ryan. They were each helped to lay down flat. “The first part of the trip will take about 15 minutes to the fork where two tunnels head out. From there we walk, and boss, it is only five feet high all the way, so don’t wear your helmet out on the roof. Boss, when I say accelerate, light the thruster to idle only. Anymore and we will hit the speed of sound. When I say brake, increase the pressure on the brake pedal slightly.”
VIN handed his son a laser pistol, and the hammer they had brought from earth. The hammer was affixed to a handle three feet long and the hammer on earth weighed ten pounds. Here on the red planet it weighed a pound and a half.
Very few words were said as the carriages was gently pushed forward to give them momentum. Then the rear thruster was lit, and on idle easily pushed them down into the tunnel.
The train gradually increased speed as it reached the steeper downhill stretch Mars remembered from the first journey. He asked Ryan to turn off the thruster, they wouldn’t need it for this downward stretch to the fork.
He remembered the tunnel vividly. He had often dreamed about his flight down the tunnel. It was so clean. The walls had been blasted and left totally smooth. So smooth that they felt as smooth as metal, and he wondered of the Matts had made them that smooth. It would have taken pretty sophisticated machinery to make the tunnel so perfect.