Mars Wars - Abyss of Elysium

by Abyss Of Elysium (Lit)

  "Let's see how well the wind and dust particles in the air carry the sound. Toon, can you whistle through your teeth?"

  "Sure, man. Like this?" Then he cut loose with a shrill, high-pitched, painful whistle that penetrated their ears like a shot.

  "Oh, man!" Ashley complained. "Turn off the transmitter next time, Toon!"

  "That's right," Peter agreed calmly and slowly in a measured voice. "Turn off your transmitter and whistle into the ESS mike. I'll see if I can hear you."

  In windless conditions at near vacuum, this would have been an exercise in futility. But in the artificial pressure created by the rushing flux of wind, some limited sound could carry – or at least this is what Peter hoped.

  With that Peter touched a switch on the sleeve of his suit which activated the outside microphones located on both sides of his helmet. Immediately he could hear the faint Martian wind rustling across them. Like the ESS, this system was normally used only for verbal instructions in the pressure of the domes before entering the airlocks. Even at several hundred kilometers per hour, the wind hardly created an audible sound on the mikes. In the background he could barely hear the nearly inaudible clicks and pops of tiny soil grains. Closing his eyes to focus, and straining to hear through the steady din, Peter picked up the feeble hint of a whistle.

  "I think I heard you, Toon. Wait five seconds, then whistle again, three times, two seconds apart."

  Peter placed his hand over his left mike and turned the right mike in the direction he thought he had heard the whistle. By moving his head a few degrees every time he heard the whistle, he finally focused on the loudest sound.

  "Toon, try to make your whistles the same each time. I’ll aim toward the direction of the loudest. If your lips get tangled up, let me know. Be sure the ESS is cranked all the way up. Now, one more time so I can focus on your direction."

  This one Peter definitely heard. It was faint, near the threshold of his hearing, but audible, nonetheless.

  "Okay, Toon, we're walking in your direction."

  Peter paced off 10 meters, slowly, feeling Ashley's tug on his belt. Then he stopped and said, "Three more times, please, Toon."

  This sequence was still faint, but louder and more distinct than the last set.

  The sky around them had darkened almost completely and Peter also noticed the strip heaters in his suit were on almost continually now. He quickly calculated that at this rate, the power packs wouldn't last another half hour. The swift wind had captured the profound cold of the high atmosphere and it now rushed around and encapsulated them. It was absorbing any heat energy in its dark, onrushing path.

  He paced off another six steps and ran broadside into the forward part of the MAT.

  "We're here, Toon."

  "I heard the bump. Starboard side hatch is unlatched."

  "Thank God," Ashley sighed, obviously relieved. They worked their way around to the starboard hatch by feel.

  "Go ahead, Ashley. You first," Peter offered.

  A few seconds later they were both securely inside the vehicle with the hatch dogged closed. "Pressurize this pig," Peter ordered. Moments later the blue 'PRESS OK' light glowed on the panel as the trio unlatched and removed their dusty helmets.

  "Well now, guys, how about this for an end-of-the-day surprise?" Toon asked with a wide smile.

  "Thanks, Peter," Ashley said from behind. Peter could feel her place a hand on his shoulder.

  He turned to watch her brush a few misplaced hairs out of her youthful, gray eyes. They reflected clearly back to him. Somehow, he mused, she was able to preserve her consummate appearance even in emergency situations. Her face bore the strength of French Scandinavian ancestry, her light brown hair tucked neatly under a cotton cap. There was a spray of light freckles across her slight nose and he knew well there was a set to match across her bare shoulders.

  Peter surveyed the interior of the craft now completely covered with a filmy, thin layer of the fine Martin sand and soil. "I'm afraid we've messed up your MAT, Toon," he commented. "But I'd much rather be in a dirty MAT than outside in a redwind looking for one."

  Toon had become close friends with Peter and Ashley before they had departed Earth. They frequently shared work assignments, even though the tasks themselves may have been outside their fields of expertise.

  Toon’s face was rounded; his Japanese eyes seemed to always be laughing, infecting everyone he encountered with an instant friendship and confidence. Down low on his chin was a fine patch of black fuzz that swept up beside his laughing smile and seemed to accent the perpetual grin that initiated so much natural, intimate familiarity.

  "What do you say we get out of here, like right now?" Ashley suggested, giving way to a touch of anger she betrayed with her voice that she obviously felt toward herself for loosing her cool in the storm. Only Peter noticed, and even though they were intimate companions, even such slight embarrassment, he knew, would hurt her fiercely independent ego.

  "Agreed," Peter replied. "Plug in the NAV CART and let's go home," he said, referring to the Navigation computer.

  A moment later Peter saw Toon's face disfigure in distress.

  "Toon, you did plug in the nav‑cart didn't you?"

  "Of course. But something's not right."

  "What?" Ashley asked with a heavy accent on the "t,” pulling herself up between the front seats.

  "It won't respond to the interro‑gate," Toon said in a low voice, referring to the console mounted computer key‑board, as he hammered out the code again and again.

  Peter turned back to look at the cargo bay wall where the logic circuits were plugged into the master computer.

  "Oh boy," he mumbled.

  "I don't like the sound of that," Toon commented with a deep sigh, looking straight ahead out the dust coated windshield.

  "Toon, it's crushed. Looks like you crunched it when you tossed your tools into the afterbay."

  "That’s great… just great!" Toon said with acerbic disgust.

  Peter anxiously looked back to assess the full damage, and attempted to piece things back together if possible, but it was too far gone. The little plastic plug-in module lay in several large and not-so-large pieces in his hands.

  Now they were essentially stuck. The nav‑cart's memory could have instructed the auto‑pilot to precisely back-track their previous movements, hands off. The route to the site, which had been carefully stored in its memory was now irretrievably gone.

  Toon was the head "PT" or "professional twidget,” of the colony’s computer engineers. He cultivated his reputation as a certified world-class genius of his craft as well as a die-hard perfectionist, demanding and giving "the standard,” as he was so fond of drilling into those who worked for him.

  Peter could see Toon was sick and had an instinctive feeling that this was a mistake Toon thought he would never live down, provided he lived at all.

  "So we sit this one out," Ashley commented, unhappily falling back into her seat. She was a biologist, not a geologist and most especially not an engineer, and frequently reminded everyone around her of that fact. She had come along to get away from the claustrophobic domes and to help Peter out in his unending search for water deposits. It was obvious now to Peter’s considerable discomfort and embarrassment that this ride was far more than she had bargained for.

  "Unfortunately, it’ not that simple," Peter said, staring at the dust, flowing and sweeping across the MAT's windshield and windows.

  These monstrous storms swept across the barren plains and highlands as enormous, ugly clouds of reddish-orange sand and dust. The onrushing, deadly clouds, capable of bearing a hundred thousand tons of red dust were called redwinds by the colonists. This unpredictable redwind engulfed everything before it, including sunlight, at hundreds of kilometers per hour and devoured the sky in seconds. A redwind could last for minutes over a few square kilometers or an occasional monster redwind would engulf the entire planet for months.

  The art of forecasting them in these
early days of colonization was virtually nonexistent. After only three months on Mars, the colonists had lost two of their number and a MAT to a redwind. It had tumbled blindly off a cliff in one of the unpredictable storms.

  Peter watched Ashley pinch the bridge of her nose, squinting her eyes closed, as though she wasdeveloping a headache. Then she opened her eyes and returned his gaze, looking into his eyes, sudden and steel gray; not perfect but absolute. Framed in a strong face, those steely eyes were his greatest asset and seemed to compel trust and sincerity. From under his white cotton cap, a lock of blond hair fell across his forehead, damp and dirty red.

  Peter looked away from Ashley and ordered, "Toon, contact Base Camp and report our situation. In the meantime, maybe we can figure something out."

  “You sure that's a good idea, boss-man?" Toon asked suspiciously, in typical form merging his weird sense of humor with a serious question and the perfect accent of a Civil War slave. “Them folks dey ai’t a gonna be happy wid us-ins.” No one in the inner solar system could mimic the incredible multitude of voices and a virtual encyclopedia of accents like Toon.

  "Just do it," Peter replied with mounting exasperation, obviously not amused.

  Toon hesitated, then with a slight glance to Ashley, flipped some switches to start his transmission, announcing, "MAT12 to base, over."

  "Go ahead, guys. We've got you plotted in the middle of some red trouble, over," the BC1, or Base Camp, Command Center watch officer replied. “Is everyone okay there, over?”

  "We're fine, base," Toon replied. "However, our NAV CART is, ah, disabled, and we're trying to figure this one out right now."

  "Roger, gang,” the BC1 Command Center replied, followed by a long pause. “New procedures require you stay put till further orders from Lipton's office."

  Toon looked to Peter with disgust. "That's all we need, you know that? I knew we shouldn't even have turned the transmitter on. Now we have no other choice but to follow Lipton's procedure."

  "Alright, Toon, knock it off," Peter stopped him. "The man's in charge, okay? If he's an idiot, we'll just have to work around that. We're going by the book here, and that's it."

  "Toon’s right, Peter," Ashley added. "Lipton's likely to tell us to sit right here till our life support runs out just to save this MAT and his own butt. He almost got fired over the last redwind incident and he's going to call this one safe even if it means sacrificing us to save the machine."

  "We can't stay here forever, Peter," Toon continued. "This isn't storm season, but you never know how long these things will last. We've got life support here for no more than four hours and it’s at least 20 klicks back to base. If he orders us to stay till it slacks off, we may make it and we may not."

  Peter sat back in his seat. They were probably right. Lassiter Lipton, the Director of the Mars colony project, was running scared with a politician's personality. Enhancing his political future was his leadership style. He had not had to make a life or death decision in the project yet, but a sickening feeling swept over Peter that this may just be his moment.

  "We have to wait and see what the man says." Peter said with finality. He was true to his own worst fault; an inexplicable devotion to doing things by the book. Peter activated two jets and blew a layer of dust away from the forward view shield as if it would somehow blow the storm away. But the sky had darkened, if anything. Visibility was now no more than three or four centimeters. He reached to the panel and shut the navigation beams off and switched the interior to red running lights.

  An unbearable 10 minutes of waiting was broken by the welcome crackle of BC1.

  "MAT 12, BC1, over."

  "Go ahead."

  "Peter, this is Francis," the voice continued. Peter sighed with some belief. Francis Linde, meteorology department head, was also his best friend. But his greeting was followed by an uncomfortable pause.

  "I'm sorry to have to tell you this buddy, but Lipton says to stay put ‘till the redwind abates."

  Toon gave Peter a killing look. Ashley covered her face with her hands.

  "Your last message was garbled," Peter replied calmly, raising his voice artificially. "Do you have data from Orbiter One on the extent of this storm and reasonable projections of when it may abate?"

  There was another extended pause.

  "Er, roger, MAT12. This data is, ah, specific to your analysis unit 42 alpha slash MAT12 bravo. Can you switch to frequency 16 for a download, over?"

  "What?" Toon asked, aggravated.

  "Lipton doesn't have frequency 16 in his office. Switch over," Peter said quickly.

  Toon had already acted.

  "MAT12, you there?"

  "Run it," Toon responded.

  "Peter, Francis," the deep voice began quickly. "The orbiter shows the storm building over you. According to the only analysis program we have, the probability of it breaking up is 70 per cent. But the reliability of that program is so low that it isn't even statistically significant. Lipton knows that, but it doesn't make any difference to him.

  “I'm coming after you," Francis stated with finality.

  "No!" Peter responded instantly. "Stay where you are. Lipton's already going to have all our butts for this. I repeat, don't come after us; we're coming in on our own."

  "Be careful, Peter. Be careful," Francis warned, his voice clearly angry.

  "Roger," Peter replied, switching back to the primary channel. "Our transmitter is failing. We have just suffered a total loss of receiving capability. We believe we interpreted your last orders as not to, repeat, not to stay put until storm abates. We are coming in, as instructed. MAT12, out."

  "Think Lipton will buy that?" Ashley asked.

  "No. We all just bought ourselves one way tickets back to earth on the next shuttle flight outbound, which if I’m not mistaken, is scheduled to depart tomarrow."

  Toon sighed. "Better that than dead, I suppose."

  "Oh, we're not back yet," Ashley replied drolly.

  "Or dead..." Peter reminded them with a fake half grin.

  "We'll fight it, Peter," Ashley added, lacing her fingers over the metal neck ring of his suit. Her warm flesh against his skin caused him to shiver. Taking a deep breath, he grasped her hand over his shoulder, his analytical mind racing.

  "Okay," Peter began, offering both of them their hand held notepad computers, "the object of this game is figuring out how to get back without smashing the MAT or falling off a cliff. Both of you draw the route we took to get here as best you can remember. Be as specific as possible. You have four minutes. After that we’ll average our maps and start back." Almost reflexively, his eyes scanned the pressure and power read-outs.

  "Go..."

  As he drew his map, Peter considered their situation. It was not good from any viewpoint. If they made even a slight error along their route they could easily die. The impact of the MAT falling off of a cliff or even a rupture of the MAT's fragile pressure hull could kill them. Impacts on boulders or sliding into deep craters or depressions could also strand them. But even these risks were better than waiting around. Peter mused grotesquely that a spectacular death tumbling off the face of a Martian cliff would be better than a slow one, asphyxiating while freezing to death in the MAT.

  Yet, Peter felt strongly that it was Lassiter Lipton who really controlled this life and death decision. As the Director of the colony, he had been blamed by the U.S. Administration for the deaths of the two colonists earlier. Lipton did not take this criticism well and instead of defending his position, he turned on the colonists. In a six page statement to them he declared that any other "endangerment of life or property would be worked with vigorous administrative action." To the colonists, this was so much bureaucratic whining. In more practical terms, the survivor's punishment would be a one way ticket back to earth.

  But now that the MAT was stranded, ready to repeat a disaster that had greatly embarrassed him, Lipton’s hand seemed invariably forced into this clumsy trade. It was clear to Peter what Lipton's st
rategy was. If they did die awaiting clear skies or rescue, Lipton could easily escape criticism on the basis that ordering the MAT to return to BC1 was too dangerous. His evidence would be the last fatal accident. He could also justify his decision because of the meteorological program’s determined probability of dissipation, regardless of its reliability. Furthermore, it was not storm season or a year of a severe storm cycle. Unfortunately, even the science team would have a hard time arguing with any of these judgments.

  The decision to defy Lipton was difficult for Peter. He described himself as a strict, by-the-book professional. Yet he had no desire for himself, his wife or his colleague to become Lipton's first fatalities. It was a clear and straightforward decision. The instinct to fight for his life and for his companions’ far overrode any trust or respect he may have had for Lipton or the system.

  Peter knew his theory did have one great flaw. If the storm did abate before they returned, Lipton would have them on clear charges of insubordination. The next flight back to earth was scheduled to leave in just one sol and they would be on it without defense. So the choice was the unacceptable possibility of death by asphyxiation, a not‑much‑better chance of blindly smashing up the MAT in the storm, or a one way ticket back to earth. All of these options were equally repulsive to Peter, but as Toon had correctly surmised, better they risk a return than inaction and slow death.

  "Alright, gang, let's have your sketches," Peter quipped, breaking the silence. He collected the two other computers and lined them in a row across the dirty legs of his suit. Then he displayed a U.S. Geological survey quadrangle map with their last position marked. He looked at the three sets of convoluted lines and attempted to summarize them in his mind and relate them to the map.

  "I think we may almost know where we're going," Peter said, satisfied with all the available information.

  His voice was confident and direct. "Toon, you're the driver. Take it easy. The object of this exercise is to make a liar out of Lipton. Ashley, you can operate the gear up here and I'll supervise. Come on up here and sit on the console between us," Peter said, offering his hand to assist her to the now crowded front of the MAT. He strapped her between the two seats with a spare harness.