Adam knew that already and was hoping Keller wouldn’t realize it until after he calmed down. Now Adam was panicking because Keller was panicking.
The rescuers that they were counting on wouldn’t make it here in time. They couldn’t make it here in time. Their doom was becoming certain. Adam’s brain went into overdrive. He started making fists to crack his knuckles; it helped his brain work when stressed.
“Think, think, think,” he said out loud.
He looked at Keller and asked, “How much air do you have now?”
Keller looked down at his gauge.
“About seven minutes.”
Adam stopped pacing.
“Okay, look, we’re desperate. We’ve got one chance here. We do have something that might move that door, but one of us will have to hold our breath.”
“What the heck are you talking about?” blurted Keller loudly.
Adam explained with authority, “These oxygen bottles we have on our backs. If we knock the nozzle off, it’ll act like a rocket and push on the door. At least for a few seconds.”
“And then we both die from suffocation. Nice plan,” said Keller sarcastically.
Adam shook his head, “No, we’ll only use one. We have an auxiliary Y-hose so we can share the remaining tank.”
Keller said, “Okay, use my tank. It’s almost empty.”
Adam looked at him with distress and said, “No. We have to use the one with the most air. It’ll pack the biggest punch.”
“That means…” said Keller without finishing his own thought.
Adam ran back to the anti-gravity cube room and grabbed the floodlight. He brought it back to the door and placed it on the ground. Then he reached down and pulled out the hammer that was in a pocket on his pressure suit. He looked at Keller and said, “Are you ready? We’ll have to run like crazy when this door falls down.”
“Or die if it doesn’t,” replied Keller.
Adam reached back to disconnect his hose, but hesitated. Instead, he talked into his headset microphone, “Yeva? Molly? Can you hear me? Hey look, we’re trapped in the pyramid. The door rolled back over the opening. We’re going to try to knock the door over with one of our oxygen tanks, but it probably won’t work. If you get this message, please bring oxygen tanks. I’m not sure how, but please try.”
Adam looked at Keller and said, “Let me explain what I’m going to do. I’ll remove my oxygen tank and you hold it up against the door, um, up near the top. Wedge it against the door jamb if you have to. Do not let go of the tank! When I knock the nozzle off, that rocket power should push on the top of the door. That may be enough force to make it tumble outward. Got it?”
Keller nodded in nervous agreement.
Adam was looking for courage. He squeezed his eyes shut and thought of dancing in the sunbeams with his daughter again. He smiled at the memory as he gulped in some air and held his breath. With the hammer in his right hand, he reached back with his left and disconnected the tank from his backpack.
The tank fell off onto the ground. He grabbed it and jammed it against the top of the door. Keller held it in place with both gloves. Adam got a good grip on the hammer. He swung at the nozzle and hit it with authority. It bent sideways, but didn’t break. He reached back and swung again. He missed and smashed Keller’s thumb. Keller let out a guttural scream, but he didn’t let go of the tank. Now panicked, Adam swung back hard and the hammer flew out of his hands off into the darkness.
Adam’s eyes bulged in sheer panic. His heart was pounding now. He took another breath of the remaining oxygen in his suit and quickly looked around the nearby floor. No sign of a hammer. He fell to the floor to run his hands through the dirt to find it.
Adam stood up and ran off into the darkness, but couldn’t find it among the dusty ground covering. He looked up and noticed Keller was frozen with fear.
Adam ran back toward the door and grabbed one of the digital cameras and smashed it against the bent tank valve. Camera bits went everywhere, but the tank nozzle remained intact. Adam dropped to his knees knowing that he only had another minute of consciousness left. A silence came over him even though his heart was still pounding. Hypoxia was setting in.
Adam felt something tap him on the shoulder. He looked up. Keller was holding the bottle up with one hand and pointing his other toward the darkened room with the anti-gravity cube.
“Get the cube!” commanded Keller over the headset.
Adam jumped up to his feet and ran into the darkness only illuminated by his head-mounted flashlight. He grabbed the cube and ran back toward the door. The cube was a mixture of strangeness. It seemed unusually dense for its size, almost made out of something as heavy as gold. Adam lifted the cube with both hands and smashed it down on the bent tank nozzle.
A roar came out of the tank as it jack-hammered into the big granite door. Keller could barely hold the tank as it jittered around the top of the door jamb, but finally the big stone door slowly leaned away from the pyramid. The oxygen bottle rocketed for only a few more seconds, but at the last moment the door toppled away from them with a ground rattling thud revealing bright sunshine and the golf cart in the distance.
Adam fell down with near suffocation. He was on all fours with no strength to stand. His hand reached into one of his suit utility pockets and pulled out an auxiliary Y-shaped air hose. He feebly held it up to Keller for him to share his remaining air.
“No,” said Keller over the headset.
Adam looked up and asked with a raspy voice, “What? Hook me up here. I’m dying.”
Keller looked at his oxygen gauge again.
“I know. But I’ve only got four minutes left. If I share this, neither of us will make it back to the ship.”
Adam’s eyes were bloodshot and filled with the rage of betrayal.
Keller looked horrified at his own decision and cried out, “I’m sorry, man. Look, I’m really sorry. I’ll. I’ll tell everybody that you died a hero. We’ll bury you here on Mars, okay?”
Adam started gasping for air like a helpless fish out of its tank. Keller saw it and turned away saying, “I’m sorry. I’m so sorry. I know you saved my life. I’m sorry.”
Adam started to really see the sunbeams again. The music was coming back. He was fading. His head dropped. All he could see out of his visor was the floodlight tripod and the smashed camera bits.
Keller stumbled toward the golf cart, but paused to catch his breath near the edge of the fallen stone door. He slumped over with hands on knees just resting for a second trying to calm down from all the stress and grief he was feeling for his doomed friend.
Adam reached out and grabbed the tripod. He pushed through all his pain and light-headedness to stand up, climbing the tripod like a crutch. He stumbled up behind Keller and with his last remaining strength swung the tripod like a baseball bat right into Keller’s helmet, shattering open the glass on his visor.
Keller fell to the ground and did not move. His last breath was now part of the billowing Mars breeze. Adam rolled him onto his side and unlatched Keller’s oxygen tank.
“I’m sorry Keller. I’ve got a family that depends on me. You don’t.”
Chapter 21
A lone astronaut jogged across the surface of Mars under the grayish maroon sky. Each step kicked up a cloud of red. Her footsteps led directly from the Big Turtle; she was clearly following the tire tracks left by the multiple golf cart trips. She said out loud to herself, “Don’t slow down, Molly! This is where years of jogging pays off!”
She was dragging behind her the only extra oxygen tank they had that was full; otherwise Yeva would have been with her. In Molly’s left hand she had a crowbar. She had heard the crackly final message left by Adam and was racing to the pyramid to see if she could save them.
She paused and bent over to catch her breath. A reflection in her visor made her look up. In the distance she saw a fountain of red dust. It was getting taller. Soon she could make out that it was the golf cart racing toward he
r. She squinted and saw that it only had one person sitting in it. She started waving at it to stop. It continued full speed toward her.
As the golf cart came closer, Molly saw that it was swerving erratically trying to follow the old tire tracks like a drunk driver was handling it. The driver wasn’t slowing down and Molly jumped out of the way to keep from getting hit. She was showered in a cloud of red sand as the golf cart passed her by and kept on going.
“Hey Yeva, this is Molly. I’m halfway there and the golf cart just drove past me toward Big Turtle. Somebody is driving toward you fast.”
“Then you should come back too,” answered Yeva.
“But there was only one person in the cart. Should I continue on to the pyramid just in case?”
Yeva didn’t reply. Her silence acknowledged what they were both thinking. Finally, Yeva stated the obvious.
“If there was only one person driving, I assume the other one is dead. You should just come back home now.”
Molly felt like she’d been punched in the gut and started to hyperventilate.
She whispered quietly in her helmet, “Please, dear God, let it be Keller in the golf cart.”
The golf cart continued screaming along through the Martian dust and grit. Adam could no longer see in color; only brief images in black and white as he dazed in and out of consciousness. He saw the Big Turtle and knew that he had to get near the door. He misjudged the distance and crashed it into the side of the ramp. He was thrown out and landed near one of the Big Turtle’s support legs.
Adam crawled up the ramp and into the airlock. He had to forcefully grab each of his legs and pull them into the little room. He yanked the outside door shut. Adam could hear the air flooding in as Yeva spun the valves to help pressurize it faster than usual. He ripped off his helmet and gasped the deepest breath of his life. The tunnel vision subsided, but he still couldn’t see colors. Then the door to the ship interior flew open.
Yeva screamed, “Where is Keller! Why isn’t he with you! What happened!”
Adam reached up toward her with his hand, but it fell down again. He was gasping heavily now and eked out a pathetic, “Keller..., he… we…”
He gulped another huge breath of air.
“We got trapped and...”
Adam was hyperventilating. His vision went blurry.
“He didn’t. He, uh. Keller… he…”
Adam passed out and his head slumped to the floor.
Chapter 22
Adam’s eyes popped open. It was dark. No sunshine came through the windows. It must be the middle of the night, he thought to himself. How much time had passed? He felt around in the darkness. He must be lying in the medical bed. Sensor cables were hooked up to his temples.
Adam swung his legs carefully out of bed letting his feet quietly touch the cold floor. He stood up trying to clear his foggy brain.
“Was it a dream?” he hoped out loud. Adam looked over at the bed stations. Yeva and Molly were there. Keller’s bed was empty.
“Oh no,” whispered Adam.
His lungs still hurt. He shuffled over to the communication station being careful not to pull the wires from his sensors. There was a light blinking near the microphone which meant they had a message from Mission Control. He looked back to make sure everybody was asleep. Adam put on the headphones and pushed the play button.
“Okay crew, this is Chris Tankovitch. We heard about the terrible news. I am sorry you have to deal with this. Keller’s assistant Lydia has been notified, but we haven’t made any public announcements. We just had an emergency meeting and, well, you’ll have to bury him there. Without refrigeration it wouldn’t be safe to keep him in either the housing unit or the return capsule. And you just can’t strap him to the outside.”
Adam considered the grim task ahead and cringed.
The message from Chris continued, “So, you’ll have to play it by ear, but do the best you can. So far we think you should continue the mission until completion, but that’s up to you. Oh, and Molly, we received the uploaded photos from Adam and Keller’s investigation of that floating cube thing. Unfortunately, the video upload from Adam’s helmet is taking a really long time. Just let it run overnight. We’ll review it when it’s finished.”
Adam was suddenly frozen in fear. His pulse skyrocketed and the health monitoring computer that he was hooked up to started beeping.
“Crap!” he said.
Adam tried to think happy thoughts. Quickly. Sun beams! Sun beams! His pulse calmed down and the beeping stopped. Yeva and Molly didn’t wake up.
He searched the desktop and found the battered helmet that he’d worn on the mission. The upload cable was plugged into the video camera. The light was blinking which meant the upload was still in progress. Adam reached over and yanked out the cable. In the brief moments of lucidity during the wild drive back, he had hoped to discuss the event with his crew and Mission Control before they watched the helmet video. That was unlikely to happen now. Adam had no idea how much Mission Control had already received.
Just then bright light from the sunrise tore through the window edges and lit up the room with a dull grey glow. It was morning on Mars. The automatic blinds slowly rolled up.
Adam went back to the medical bed and sat down to think over the previous days’ events in his head. After ten more minutes, the morning wakeup call came from their ship computer. It was a mechanical voice saying, “Rise and shine!” The voice was way too happy for the mood on Mars. Molly and Yeva slowly stirred from their sleep and woke up. Adam stood up and put together breakfast for everybody.
Yeva was the first to show; Molly was in the bathroom. Yeva looked around to make sure Molly couldn’t hear her and she whispered to Adam, “Molly isn’t doing so well. She’s very upset. Be careful what you say, okay?”
Adam nodded without making eye contact.
They sat down to their bland tubes of raisin bran and coffee. However, nobody could eat. After they could take no more of the quiet, Yeva spoke.
“Adam, please tell us what happened out there.”
Adam took a drink of coffee and stared at the table.
“A Marsquake caused the door to close on us and we were stuck inside. In order to get out, we used one of our oxygen tanks as an air hammer to knock the door down.”
Adam looked up at their intense faces. He added, “We were down to one tank without enough air for both of us. And then I, we, had to make a terrible decision.”
Molly started to cry and bellowed out, “He gave up his life for you?”
“Yes. He saved my life,” said Adam plainly.
She was leaning on the table with her hands covering her face sobbing loudly.
That was all Adam was willing to say. The head-mounted video camera didn’t record sound because there was none on Mars due to the thin atmosphere. Without hearing the actual words exchanged between them in the pyramid, Adam realized that his talk of the hero Keller would eventually be questioned due to his own actions. Hopefully, he thought, someday his own explanation would add context to the unfortunate video that Yeva and Molly hadn’t watched yet. But surely Chris and NASA had watched it by now.
Molly was trying to slow her tears. Her nose was pouring snot.
“Look, I understand this is an awful thing,” said Adam. “He died a hero. I’ll go back to the pyramid today and get him, okay? We’ll give him a proper burial with full honors.”
“You broke the golf cart during your trip back. You will have to go there on foot,” Yeva explained.
Adam sighed and nodded; bad news after bad news.
He got up and hugged Molly saying, “I’m so sorry this happened.” Then he walked over to the medical bed, sat down and turned away from the two women. He was incapable of processing anything else right now. All he could think about was having a video-conference with his family, but that would have to wait a few more hours.
Late morning finally arrived and Adam suited up for his long workday. He had three tasks when he got
outside. First, see if the golf cart was easily repairable. It wasn’t. The second task was to dig a grave. Below the dusty surface, the ground was impacted and very hard to dig. The digging process took him so long that he had to replace his oxygen tank.
Now for his final task. Walk to the pyramid and retrieve not only Keller, but the anti-gravity cube that he’d left. It would most likely be his last trip to the pyramid. Getting home was all he cared about now.
Adam followed the golf cart tracks as well as Molly’s footprints from the day before. It was by far the longest walk of his life. Not in time or distance, mind you, but in the cost to his spirit. He had faced a life or death decision and he chose life. That decision may have cost him his soul.
Before Adam got too far, he heard, “Wait up, I am coming with you” over the headset. The airlock opened and Yeva came out. Each of them had on two oxygen tanks for this long walk. It took nearly twenty minutes to reach the pyramid. Neither one said a word. They walked past the fossil boulders and toward the pyramid. Adam noticed the wheel tracks left by the Curiosity and saw what direction it had taken the day before. He slowed down as he approached the pyramid.
Yeva stopped when she saw Keller’s body in the distance. It was facing down in the red dust.
“You stay here. I’ll go take care of him,” said Adam.
He walked over and laid out the body bag that NASA included on all of their missions, but had never had to use until now. He rolled Keller’s body into it and zipped it up most of the way and then stopped to briefly look at the helmet. He saw a gruesome face through the missing visor glass. Keller’s expression was frozen solid, literally and emotionally. Adam zipped up the body bag the rest of the way.
Yeva looked curiously at the floodlight tripod that was broken open and laying just a few feet away.
Adam stood up and said, “Let’s get the anti-gravity cube. I’ll show you what it does when we get back to the Big Turtle.”
Red Hope Page 15