Fable Hill

by Christopher Uremovich

  “Then stay. We’ll leave without you,” Mia scorned, which erupted in another verbal altercation. This time Roland kept out of it and let the crew fight, his face visibly worn with deep pockets under his eyelids.

  “When will we leave?” Keiko asked, anxious for a return to her life of excess.

  “A question for another day, but with the lack of communications with Earth and Renee's death, we cannot remain here,” Roland concluded.

  Night descended and dreams of home filled the minds of slumbering crew. As was tradition, Frank lay awake, tossing and turning in his bed. He kept wondering about what mysteries lay beyond Lyot Crater to the east. It bothered him that an old NASA aircraft had landed at Ōme seemingly at random. What were the odds of that happening? he mused in the darkness.

  Determined to find the answer before leaving Mars, Frank discreetly donned his spacesuit. He knew the temperature outside was nearing -170°, and he wouldn’t have more than a few minutes to do anything.

  Luckily, the Dreiton had been put under tarp behind the main dome, essentially forgotten by everyone. Frank gambled that no one would notice it missing, especially now that Renee’s death had pushed priorities elsewhere.

  Frank made his way to the control room and temporarily deactivated Amirah, placing her subsystems into sleep mode. “Don’t need you narcing on me,” he whispered. Loitering near the main airlock, Frank waited for the next ventilation cycle, where the large exhaust vents of the station would create just enough noise to mask activation of the airlock.

  Once outside, Frank stopped dead in his tracks as if someone had punched him square in the gut. He quickly checked his suit’s temperature controls and ran back to the airlock door. The internal thermometer read 0°.

  Frank stopped at the airlock door and fell to the ground. He beat the dirt with his fists, swung his arms around, ran in place, anything to get his body heat up. There must be some mistake, he thought to himself, but there was no mistake. The spacesuit’s temperature control was working correctly and all systems were optimal. “I da-don’t h-have long.” His teeth rattled and mask fogged up from hot breath.

  The Dreiton aircraft had been dormant for almost nine months, its power supply removed for study before being lost forever somewhere inside Alexei's workshop. Frank had planned for this, however, as he brandished a new lithium-ion battery, salvaged from a rover some time ago as his scheme developed legs.

  With ratchet in hand, the cold proved a merciless foe. Frank’s gloves quickly lost their dexterity as ice formed on the outside material.

  “Let me help you,” came a voice over comm, preceded by a gentle hand on the back. It was Mia.

  “You weren’t the only one who couldn’t sleep,” Mia said, pushing Frank aside and installing the battery before her hands froze solid.

  Frank was amazed. “How did you do that?”

  “I watched Alexei remove it. Come.” Mia motioned towards the plane’s master switch, attached to the main electric motor.

  With no exterior lights, the craft took off in a blast of compressed CO2 and disappeared, being swallowed by the deafening dark. Frank had installed a small transponder on the tail of the aircraft. He hoped to use the data gleaned from the tracking device to discern where the plane would land next.

  Frank and Mia returned to the airlock, but not before noticing a curious light flashing before them through a single viewport in Alexei's workshop. They stopped briefly and stared. A human silhouette appeared, traversing around the building before it too stopped and stared back at them.

  “I guess we weren't the only ones who couldn't sleep,” Frank stated, reiterating Mia's previous comment.

  “Alexei is fucking creepy,” Mia replied. The figure backed away and retreated into the workshop.

  The next morning, as the skies returned to normal and the sands settled, Amirah was quick to inform Roland of the previous night’s tomfoolery. With disdain, the two astronauts were summoned and questioned about their unauthorized excursion.

  Frank explained everything to Roland, leaving nothing to chance. “It was my idea,” Frank rebutted.

  Mia started off the sol in a deep emotional state. She was used to the late Renee Emerson waking her up for their morning fitness routine and it had a negative effect on her psyche. Silent tears poured out seemingly at random during the conversation. Roland tried his best to ignore it.

  “That craft wasn't authorized to depart the station and, worse yet, you deactivated an artificial intelligence that is critical to the operation of this facility,” Roland briefed.

  “We should be looking into the Dreiton mission, not ignoring it. Why did it land here? Where did it come from? Why are there large amounts of methane being released to the east of Lyot Crater?” Frank asked rhetorically.

  Roland listened with much intrigue. He was even inclined to agree with Frank somewhat. But to him, rules were rules. He was the team lead, not Frank. If the other members were to respect and follow his authority, rule breakers had to be punished.

  “No more leaving the settlement, either of you, until we depart for Earth. That is a direct order coming from me and the company that employs you,” Roland demanded.

  “When do we leave?” Mia asked, sniffling up mucus and tears. She couldn’t care less about remaining inside the habitat, it was Renee she missed.

  “I haven't decided yet, but we only have about two weeks left of water reserves so . . . you do the math.”

  The door to the conference room swung open and Alexei barged inside, interrupting the three crew members. His eyes were bloodshot and he looked terrible from an apparent lack of sleep.

  “What is it?”

  “I'm ready to conduct my experiment,” Alexei replied. “I'll need your assistance.”

  Roland left the two alone in the conference room and departed the habitat with Alexei. Mia stood and made her way to the living quarters to clean herself up, but Frank grabbed her arm at the last second and guided her towards the control room.

  “Give me ten seconds of your time, please,” he said to her.

  “What is it?”

  “You'll see.”

  Frank logged into the satellite positioning system and opened a new tab with the transponder history displayed. Red contour lines zig-zagged across a digital interface, leading to an area due east of Lyot Crater, aptly named Dioscuria. A barren, flat plain with the occasional inselberg made up the topography of Dioscuria.

  “How do you expect us to get there, hmm?” Mia questioned. “Take a Sakura capsule?” she laughed in Frank's face.

  “Well, yes,” Frank replied, to Mia's astonishment.

  “Look, I have to go finish my research and pack my things,” Mia pleaded before exiting the control room.

  Frank looked longingly outside the viewport of the control room. In the distance he could see Alexei walking past the reactor with his robot posse, hauling random objects. Frank remembered months ago, about a space elevator experiment being conducted. Maybe this was it? he wondered.

  Making his way to the main atrium for a better view, Frank could see vast distances now that atmospheric dust had cleared during the night. Alexei led the large contingent of machines and mats to a solid concrete launch pad. Created a kilometer from the station, a large swath of level plain surrounded the pad in all directions.

  At the wheel of the MEV, Roland towed a two-stage fuselage of a Japanese-sounding rocket to the launch pad. Held in place by the retractable crane, it doubled as a mobile launch vehicle.

  The 9.54 meter long rocket towered above the MEV as it rolled up and over the concrete ledge. Once in position, Alexei uncovered several heaps of coiled rope made up of a thermoset liquid-crystalline, polyoxazole-reinforced cable with carbon nanotubes.

  Alexei attached four different tungsten wires to the base of the rocket booster, attaching each wire to a metal base at the end of the coils. With the countdown initiated, Alexei and Roland ran from the launch pad and behind a small reinforced Jersey barrier.


  “Three . . . two . . . one . . . liftoff,” Amirah counted down over Ōme Station’s main frequency. A fury of fire and smoke shot out from under the main rocket engine. The sounding rocket gently rose from under its own smokescreen, then picked up immense power and speed as more fuel burned.

  The rocket dragged the polymer strands with it into the heavens, unraveling the coils at a furious pace. When one set of coil exhausted, Alexei would connect the ends to another set of coil. This went on for nearly three minutes before Frank could no longer see the rocket plume in the sky.

  Like a withering snake, the polymer rope left the ground at supersonic speed, a dozen five hundred meter long coils were unraveled and jettisoned into the air in seconds. At the end of the coil train, a small CubeSat was anchored with wire at the maximum extent of the rope. It too was lifted and disappeared in an anticlimactic puff of dust. Alexei and Roland remained at the base of the launch pad. They stood idly by with arms crossed, discussing the launch together.

  It had never been the intention of Nagoya Industries to create a functioning space elevator, only to demonstrate proof of concept. The sounding rocket would reach a maximum apogee of 1,500 kilometers before drifting another 4,500 kilometers to Phobos. Once near the dark side of the asteroid moon, the sounding rocket would crash land and deploy stakes on the surface. The information gleaned from the attached CubeSat would provide valuable data for a future space elevator someday.

  “How long was the attached cable?” Frank asked as Alexei and Roland entered the atrium through the airlock.

  “A little over a hundred kilometers,” Alexei said. “Less than one percent the distance, it was only a tech demo.”

  “So, is that it then? All the experiments have been completed?”

  “All but one,” Roland said, alluding to Alexei’s experimental FTL drive. “Unfortunately we’ll be long gone before we are able to test your theory, Alexei.”

  “I know, sir. It’s no problem,” Alexei said with a faint smile. Frank wondered if it was genuine.

  Working into the wee hours of the next sol, Frank’s face shown blue from a computer screen in the control room. The room was dark and Frank donned large over-ear headphones, listening to radio waves given off by the Dreiton plane.

  He became transfixed on the transponder data of the plane and researching old NASA missions on cached internet sites. Mia looked on from the corner of the room.

  “Hey,” she said softly.

  “Hey,” Frank replied, rubbing his tired eyes.

  “What are you looking at?” asked Mia.

  “It’s creepy, really. The Dreiton plane, I mean.” Frank pointed to a red dot trailed by a red line. “It just keeps circling the mountain, that lone inselburg there.” Frank pointed again to the topographical feature.

  “How does it stay airborne for so long?” Mia asked.

  “No, it’s not airborne, just taxiing on the ground. Just keeps circling the inselburg,” Frank said.

  “That is rather unsettling,” Mia replied. “What do you propose we do?”

  “I have a plan . . . but it all depends on Alexei,” Frank said.

  “Alexei’s not going to help us research that area,” Mia replied.

  “He wont knowingly help us. It’s what I suspect he will do next that will help us . . .”

  Chapter 30

  0900 hours, Sol 310

  Ōme Station

  Earth Date: March 10, 2046

  The station rumbled with vibration. Frank watched his coffee cup shudder and inch closer to the edge of the table. Roland ran out of his quarters and down the hall, still struggling to put on his pants. “Have you all gone bat-shit crazy?!” Roland shouted.

  Frank smiled into his coffee cup and strolled leisurely into the main atrium for a better view of the festivities. Always the strategist, Frank’s theory on Alexei’s next move had come true and it invigorated him.

  Like celestial emissaries, five Sakura capsules and a single Osaka began landing all around the exterior of the station. With afterburners engaged, they landed as gently as a space capsule could, sand blasting the habitat in the process.

  Roland was beside himself, running out to confront Alexei, who stood watching the awesome display of rocketry from the comfort of his workshop.

  “Alexei pulled through for us,” Frank told Mia as she joined him in the atrium.

  “How did you know he would call down all the capsules?” she asked.

  Frank produced a nanostructured quartz data drive. It was small, square, and looked like a clear pane of simple glass.

  “A data crystal?”

  “Not just any data crystal. It’s half of Alexei’s FTL formula. Take a look,” Frank said with a wide grin.

  “Where’s the other half?” Mia asked.

  “Still in his workshop. Look, Alexei has no plan to return to Earth before his drive is tested. We need to borrow one of the capsules and take it to Dioscuria,” Frank said triumphantly.

  To his amazement, there was no push back from Mia. She simply nodded her head and asked how she could help. Together they streamed the contents of the 360 terabyte crystal with a holographic projector, tucked away in Frank’s quarters.

  A fraction of Alexei’s plan was revealed to them: They watched as bismuth isotopes were bombarded by an unknown energy source of seventy-five terajoules, creating polonium and ionizing the surrounding air. The computer model continued on, showing diatomic polonium molecules and subsequent Cherenkov radiation emitted, forming a powerful electric field.

  “When I was in Alexei’s workshop, I saw an anti-matter chamber and diamond anvil cell. I believe the other data crystal completes the puzzle.” Frank said.

  “Why would he separate the formula into two drives?” Mia wondered.

  “I’m not sure. Security maybe? Ensuring his stuff survives in case something happens.

  Frank scrolled further down and opened an old scientific journal article written by Alexei years past. “What are polonium radiohalos?” he asked. Mia skimmed the article and thought hard about it.

  “Discoloration of rocks caused by radiation . . . more complex than that, but you get the idea,” she said.

  “It says here that polonium radiohalos exist in Precambrian rock and no one knows why,” Frank said.

  “One of the great mysteries of science. I’m sure there’s a logical explanation though,” Mia replied, wary of what Frank would say next.

  “Maybe they just existed from the beginning,” Frank conjectured. “The rocks just came into existence with the radiohalos already inside.”

  “I’m not arguing religion with you again, Frank. I’m sorry but I won’t do it.” Frank began to speak again but the sound of the airlock decompressing interrupted him.

  Frank and Mia watched from the doorway as Roland stomped towards the kitchen. His face was that of a defeated man and he grabbed for the last third of Canadian whiskey left over in the cabinet. It was the first time either of them had witnessed Roland drink. He threw back a row of shots and proceeded to light a cigarette indoors.

  “I guess it went well,” Frank joked. Mia slugged him in the arm and whispered back.

  “Alexei really is an asshole though. I feel bad for Roland, he's just trying to do the right thing.”

  Roland stared outside the window of the lounge and power-smoked the cigarette right down to the filter before stamping it out and returning to his quarters. Frank and Mia stumbled backwards to avoid being seen. Frank watched with one eye around the doorway as Roland proceeded into his room, bottle in hand. A feeling of fear washed over Frank, as if he would never see Roland again.

  For the next few hours, Frank sat in his special chair, tucked away behind some crops in the atrium. He sat and watched Alexei load scientific instruments and unknown containers into his recently appropriated fleet of capsules.

  Amirah notified over the station's PA system and gave the usual daily announcements, followed by a disturbing order. “Attention all crew. Starting immediately, a c
urfew has been implemented by the team lead. At 2100 hours, all crew will be required to report in and retire to their quarters. At 2130 hours, all interior automatic doors, including both airlocks, will be locked until sunrise. Failure to abide by these orders will result in the immediate detention of the errant crew member by stun gun.”

  “Need anymore justification?” Frank asked as Mia jogged into the atrium.

  “No, I'm with you one hundred percent,” she replied.

  “Then we must move quickly. Gather your things, rations, oxygen, tent, supplies, everything, and meet me outside.”

  In his mind, Frank was certain something lay hidden just across the icy expanse of Lyot Crater. Having read every conspiracy website he could find, the facts began to meld with the fiction. When he would try and slow down and think clearly, Alexei and his madness would stop him from changing his mind. It was now or never. They would leave Mars soon, any day in fact. It was their last chance to make a potentially huge discovery.

  Mia met Frank outside at noon, just like he requested, and just like he requested, she brought a dolly full of supplies. The two astronauts waited until the area was clear of Alexei and his robot minions, and dashed in a mad sprint towards the nearest Sakura capsule.

  Frank climbed inside and checked the flight controls. Fuel levels were at ninety-five percent and everything seemed to check out. Mia frantically threw bags and supplies into the capsule, paranoid at the prospect of getting caught. With great care they worked together, loading up two tanks of oxygen and sealing the door behind them.

  From the viewport, Mia could see in the distance Alexei staring in their direction. He was carrying a large metal sphere.

  “He's staring at us! Launch!” Mia cried.

  “We have nothing to fear now,” Frank said as he finished his checks. “You good?”

  Mia nodded nervously and went back to staring out the viewport at Alexei.

  “Mia, face forward.” Frank initiated the launch sequence.

  With a violent burst of fire, they were airborne. The settlement below disappeared from view as Frank altered their trajectory to a forty-five degree arc. The capsule reached an altitude of seventy kilometers in a single minute before Frank cut off the main engine, causing the capsule to coast on its side, parallel to the ground. Mia had a clear view of the topography below, watching Lyot Crater and its rings give way to ejecta-formed plains, far as the eye could see.