Dinosaur Boy Saves Mars

by Cory Putman Oakes

  She looked up triumphantly, and I could only stare at her.

  “You definitely weren’t getting your beauty rest just now, were you?” I asked.

  “Nope,” she agreed and then gave me a hard look. “Why? Do you think I need some?”

  “Er, no,” I mumbled, not quite sure what she wanted me to say. Was Sylvie asking me if I thought she was pretty? I had never really thought of her as pretty or not pretty or anything like that. She was just…Sylvie.

  “If you’re right, Sylvie,” my grandfather said, still sounding a bit hesitant. “And if the lab is where you say it is, then we’ll have to go up to the surface to get there.”

  “Cool,” Elliot whispered, nudging me in the ribs.

  “Let’s see now,” my grandfather said. “I think I have enough sushi left to bribe the police officers outside the door. The surface though…”

  “Is it hard to get there?” I asked, suddenly a little bit worried. I was just as excited as Elliot to see the surface of Mars up close.

  My grandfather shrugged.

  “That depends on how much Earth candy Sylvie has left in that pocket of hers.”

  • • •

  “Only two kinds of folks go up to the surface,” said the suspicious Martian proprietor of the rental spaceship shop on the outskirts of Mars Central. “Miners and homesteaders. And you lot don’t look like either of those.”

  “We’re the third kind. The kind that doesn’t want any questions asked,” my grandfather said, as Sylvie handed the Martian two boxes of Wild Cherry and Watermelon Nerds.

  The rental Martian’s eyes bulged.

  “Are these real?” he asked, carefully inspecting the boxes.

  “In all of their artificially flavored, illegal glory,” my grandfather assured him, winking at Sylvie. Most Earth candy was illegal in Mars. It hadn’t really occurred to me until then that by arriving here with her usual pocket stash, Sylvie officially qualified as a smuggler.

  The rental Martian opened one of the boxes and brought it up to his nose. He inhaled deeply, smiled, and handed my grandfather a set of keys.

  “No questions here.”

  The Martian was so excited by the Nerds that he threw in our rental space suits for free. They looked a lot like large trash bags with sleeves—until we put them on and they instantly suctioned to our bodies, forming a skin-tight barrier between our skin and the inhospitable Martian atmosphere. They even covered my plates, my tail, and my spikes. The suits all came with helmets that could collapse into the neck of the suit and then shoot up over our heads again with the touch of a button.

  “Are you sure you don’t need one?” I asked Venetio, who had declined his trash bag.

  “Nah,” he said. “Like I said, Plutonians need far less oxygen than Earthlings or Martians. I can breathe just fine on the surface.”

  “But the rest of you can’t,” the rental Martian warned us. “You’ve got about four hours of breathable air in the ship, plus two built into your suits. Don’t lose track of time, or you’ll suffocate and die. Enjoy your trip!”

  • • •

  Our ship, which had the name Sabatier painted boldly on the outside, was made to seat eight people. So the five of us had more than enough space as we flew up and out of the Valles Marineris canyon and started making our way west.

  We used up an hour of breathable air getting to the spot Sylvie had marked on the map. Up close, Mars was the same tomato-soup orange it had been from space. The sky above us was yellowy-pink and surprisingly bright. We passed at least a half-dozen mining camps and a few smaller clumps of circular tents, which Sylvie said were called “habs.”

  I wouldn’t say that the surface was exactly crowded. There were miles of open space between the small pockets of civilization, but there was a lot more up here than I had thought.

  “How did we miss all of this stuff?” I wondered out loud, mostly to myself.

  “Huh?” Sylvie asked. She was sitting across from me in the main part of the ship. Elliot was next to me, facing Venetio. My grandfather was in the front seat, driving.

  “NASA has sent all kinds of things to Mars,” I told her. “Like rovers and orbiters and stuff. But nothing ever recorded anything like the habs.”

  “Sure they did,” Sylvie said, yawning hugely. “There’s a whole division of Martian-Earthling relations whose job is to alter any digital image transmitted from Mars to Earth.”

  “Alter?” Elliot asked.

  “Yeah, you know. Like Photoshop? It’s pretty easy. My dad says the technology you guys send is always pretty low quality.”

  “But they miss stuff sometimes,” Elliot pointed out. “Like the face. And the pyramid! And just before we left, I was reading about this thing that looked like a bone—”

  “Oh yeah, those. My dad also says that some of the Martian-Earthling Affairs guys have a pretty weird sense of humor.”

  Venetio snorted as the spaceship began to slow down. My grandfather turned around from the front seat.

  “Everybody put your helmets up,” he said. “We’re here.”

  • • •

  The coolest part about walking on the surface of Mars was definitely the lower-gravity thing.

  The boots the rental guy gave us did not come with the gravity inserts that we’d all been wearing in our shoes since we got to Mars. So we were all bouncing along like crazy as we followed my grandfather away from the ship.

  “Basketball up here would be a-mazing!” Elliot enthused as he launched himself into the air.

  My grandfather shushed him and motioned for us all to look at the screen of the short-range DNA scanner. I was pretty sure the mask part of my helmet was designed for someone with eye problems; it was really blurry. All I could see on the screen were a lot of crisscrossing lines, some wavy things that looked like interference…and a very tiny, flashing blip in the lower right-hand corner.

  “This way!” my grandfather announced, turning slightly to the right and marching straight over an orangey dune. “The signal will be clearer once we get underground. We need to find an entrance.”

  Just a few dunes away, we found one. I had assumed that the entrance to an ultra-secret research lab would look, I don’t know, at least vaguely high-tech. But the entrance we found was a straight-up cave. Not even a cave, really. More like a hole in the ground.

  A hole that was being guarded by half a dozen human guards, all wearing space suits and helmets and carrying large, complicated-looking guns.

  We all ducked behind the nearest dune before we could be seen.

  “I was right,” Sylvie whispered urgently, punching Elliot in the arm.

  “Ow!” he exclaimed, rubbing his shoulder. “I never said you weren’t!”

  “This does look like the place,” my grandfather said, setting down the DNA scanner and unshouldering a large canvas bag. “Human sentries. Heavy security. And Mr. Juarez’s DNA signature is most definitely somewhere beneath our feet.”

  “So what now?” Venetio asked.

  “Yeah,” I said. “How are we going to get in without anybody noticing us?”

  “We’re not,” my grandfather said simply. He unzipped the bag and looked over at me, a slight smile visible through his helmet’s face shield.

  “Have you seen Star Wars?”

  The Death Star (No, Not Really)

  “This is perfect,” Elliot effused, beaming as my grandfather handed him a white lab coat. “You’re Han Solo, right? And I’m Luke, obviously. And, Sawyer, you’re…well…”

  “Chewbacca,” I finished for him. “You can say it. I’m the Wookiee.”

  “No, you’re not,” my grandfather said, handing Sylvie a lab coat as well. I noticed that he had not brought one for me.

  “You kind of are,” Elliot said with an apologetic grin. “I mean, they got around inside the Death Star by pre
tending Chewie was their prisoner, right?”

  “Sawyer is not a prisoner,” my grandfather said firmly. “He’s an escaped research subject. And only for the duration of this mission.”

  “Swell,” I muttered. At least no one was suggesting I wear handcuffs.

  Elliot turned to Sylvie next.

  “And you’re Leia,” he informed her.

  “I am so not Leia!” Sylvie retorted, giving him an angry look as she tried to roll up the sleeves of her lab coat. It was still far too big. She was practically swimming in white fabric.

  “Sure you are—” Elliot started.

  “Leia was the one they were going to rescue,” Sylvie pointed out. “Nobody is rescuing me, are they? I want to be Luke.”

  “You can’t be Luke. I’m already Luke.”

  “You can’t just call it like that. It’s not shotgun. It’s—”

  “What about me?” Venetio interrupted. “Who am I?”

  Elliot, Sylvie, and I exchanged questioning looks. Venetio was wearing his lab coat and also Sylvie’s sweatshirt, hood up, to hide his blueness. I was pretty sure he had never seen Star Wars and had no idea what we were talking about. But he was looking up at us so eagerly from beneath the folds of the floppy hood that I felt a twinge at how badly he wanted to be a part of things.

  “Venetio can be R2-D2,” my grandfather pronounced, with conversation-ending authority. “Now let’s get moving.”

  • • •

  Getting into the cave—er, hole—was actually easy. All it took was Sylvie’s last six boxes of Nerds, and my grandfather’s shame-faced request that he and his team be allowed to return the escaped research subject (me) to the lab before anybody noticed.

  I just looked down at my feet, trying to look busted. Sylvie and Elliot stood on either side of me wearing their lab coats and keeping a firm grip on both of my arms, trying to look like stern scientists. And Venetio brought up the rear, hiding under Sylvie’s sweatshirt and trying to look less blue.

  The laboratory looked pretty much like how I had pictured Mars before I had seen the steel-and-glass underground city with my own eyes: dark and cramped. It was basically a series of tunnels that no one had bothered to smooth over and make pretty. My grandfather walked confidently down the widest one, DNA scanner in hand, and the rest of us marched after him. Strings of bare lightbulbs followed us, giving us just enough light to see by.

  Other tunnels stretched out to either side of the main one. Two scientists, both wearing white lab coats and helmets, came out of one rather suddenly, and I’m pretty sure my heart skipped a beat.

  But they just continued on their way, sidestepping us and continuing their conversation as though there was nothing unusual about us being here at all.

  We passed a few more scientists, who paid us no more attention. I was just starting to relax and to think that we might be able to pull this off, when we rounded a corner and came face-to-face with a giant, metal door.

  We all froze. My grandfather let out a puzzled “Hmmm” and frowned at the numbered keypad beside the lock.

  “I think we need a code to get in here,” he whispered. “Let’s try to find a way around.”

  “But—” Sylvie began, then stopped abruptly as another scientist came around the corner behind us.

  He was human and just slightly shorter than my grandfather. He stopped behind Venetio and stood patiently, like someone waiting for an elevator on Earth.

  Oh no, I said to myself, and my inner voice started to sound panicky, he’s waiting for us to open the door.

  After a moment or two of awkward silence, he looked up and addressed my grandfather, who was closest to the keypad.

  “Got your hands full?” he asked.

  “Er, yeah,” my grandfather said, holding up the DNA scanner and motioning to me.

  “I got it,” the scientist said, smiling good-naturedly as he stepped forward and punched a code into the pad.

  The door opened with a loud, mechanical squeak. We all followed the scientist inside to a cramped metal room. The door shut behind us. Then there was a loud whirring sound and a sudden blast of air.

  After a moment, a green light flashed above our heads. An oddly soothing voice came over the loudspeaker: Pressurization achieved.

  The scientist removed his helmet without hesitation, and the rest of us hurried to copy him. The air was a little bit thinner than I was used to. It was breathable, but it tasted funny and gave me a little bit of a headache. I took a couple of very deep breaths, relieved that my head was no longer in the confines of the space suit.

  Unfortunately, without our helmets, the scientist could see us all a lot more clearly. And judging from his wide eyes, he was a bit startled to find himself in close quarters with two tall humans, a Martian, a Plutonian, and a dinosaur-Earthling hybrid.

  A second door, on the other side of the tiny room, started to swing open. The scientist dove for it, but my grandfather was too quick for him. In one smooth move, he tossed the DNA scanner to Elliot (who caught it), tucked the scientist into a firm headlock, and got a hand over his mouth.

  “We need to hurry,” he said urgently.

  Sylvie ripped the scanner out of Elliot’s hands and sprinted out of the chamber. Elliot, Venetio, and I followed her. My grandfather came along behind us, dragging the scientist, who was making muffled yelling sounds.

  This area of the lab was nicer than the first part. The floors and walls were made out of metal, and the lights above our heads were normal, rectangular fluorescent fixtures instead of naked lightbulbs. We made a terrible racket as we jogged down a series of hallways, following Sylvie. I picked my tail up in one hand and tried to ignore the uncomfortable bouncing of my plates.

  “Someone’s gonna see us!” Elliot whispered urgently.

  “We’re almost there!” Sylvie yelled over her shoulder, making no attempt to be quiet.

  Two sharp turns later, she stopped abruptly in front of a metal door with the number thirty-nine stamped on it.

  “Here! He’s in here!” Sylvie announced, holding up the beeping scanner.

  Elliot shook his head.

  “I’ve got a bad feeling about this,” he said to no one in particular as Sylvie twisted the doorknob.

  • • •

  The room was pretty big. It had several long, low tables that were covered in chemistry equipment. There were stools to sit on, several sinks, and an emergency eyewash station in the corner. Just like our science lab at school.

  But unlike our science lab, there were also four large hospital beds lined up against one wall.

  Only one other person was in the room. He was wearing a helmet, but it had a clear face shield, so I could see most of him. He was blurry, but I recognized the glasses and the bad comb-over from the Missing picture on the giant screen downtown.

  Mr. Juarez.

  But even as Sylvie gave a small yelp of joy and started running toward him, my tail gave an uncomfortable twitch. I had caught Elliot’s bad feeling. Something was wrong.

  It took me only a moment to figure out what it was: his helmet.

  Why would Mr. Juarez be wearing a helmet in a pressurized area?

  The door behind us opened again. There was a loud hissing sound, and suddenly the room was filled with the scent of fresh lemons. But there was another smell too. Somewhere beneath the lemons, a sickeningly familiar sweet stench entered my nostrils. I covered my nose and mouth with my hand, but it was too late. My head had already started to swim.

  I turned clumsily in the direction of the door. And my hazy mind saw a fleeting image of a bony frill and three distinctive horns…before I lost my balance and the world went dark.

  Busted

  I woke up to a sharp pain in my arm.

  “Ow!” I cried. I tried to wrench my arm away, only to find that it was strapped down to the hospital bed
I was lying on. My other arm, both legs, and my tail were all tied down with cloth restraints as well. There was something like a giant rubber band around my middle, carefully threaded through my plates, that was keeping me pinned down in a weird position, half on my side.

  My space suit had been removed and my shirtsleeve had been rolled up. The scientist from the elevator was looming over me, aiming an alarmingly big hypodermic syringe at my exposed arm.

  “Sorry,” he said. “I missed again. Fifth time’s the charm though, right?”

  I could have sworn he grinned as he stabbed the needle into my arm again.

  This time he didn’t miss; he slipped the needle into my vein and taped it into place, just like the time Dr. Bakker had taken my blood to test me for anemia.

  “Ah. You’re awake.”

  The triceratops head from my hazy, pre-fainting vision appeared over the scientist’s shoulder, just as the bed started moving underneath me. The top part went up and the bottom part tipped toward the floor until I was pretty much straight up and down. The straps holding me in place kept me from sliding onto the floor.

  Now that I was upright, I could see we were in the same laboratory we had ran into, right before we had been knocked out. I couldn’t move my head very much, but I could see that the other three beds were occupied by my grandfather, Elliot, and Venetio. They were still unconscious.

  Where was Sylvie?

  “You see, Asaph? They’re coming around. It shouldn’t be long now.”

  The scientist from the elevator took the needle out of my arm, slapped a Band-Aid over the dot of blood on the inside of my elbow, and left the room. Now that his head was out of the way, I was able to get a good look at the triceratops. Good enough to see that he wasn’t a full triceratops.

  The hands sticking out of the sleeves of his white lab coat were human. His head was human too, except for the two horns above his eyes and the slightly larger horn where his nose should be. There was also a huge, bony frill framing his head. It looked sort of like an oversized Elizabethan collar. Or the plastic thing (which my dad called the “cone of shame”) that Fanny had to wear once so she couldn’t lick her stitches.