Larsson’s presentation ended up taking less than fifteen minutes, something that Jack appreciated, as he was starting to feel both hungry and tired. Once dismissed by Larsson, the newcomers left the lounge and walked to the crew cafeteria, situated on the same deck and same ring, some eighty meters away from the lounge. Xiulan nearly clapped her hands together in joy on seeing the classical American dinner restaurant looks of the cafeteria, with its partitioned booths lined up along huge wall display screens, which simulated windows giving a view of a Midwest country panorama.
‘’Oooh, I’m loving this place already! They really did their best to make us forget that we are aboard a spaceship.’’
‘’And they were quite successful, I must say. Let’s see what’s on the menu. If I don’t like it, I will go complain to one of my new work comrades at the kitchen.’’
Xiulan giggled at that before following Jack towards the service counters. She was both surprised and happy when she saw the spread available at the salad bar.
‘’Fresh lettuce and sweet peppers? It must have cost a fortune to bring these up from the surface.’’
‘’Don’t forget that this ship has extensive hydroponics gardens, Xiulan. These were probably grown aboard. If they really can provide fresh produces during the whole trip, then it will make wonders for the morale. However, I doubt that they could produce meat or fish on the ship: raising animals requires a lot of feed grain and would not be economical here in space. Beside, modern freeze dried preservation techniques are good enough to keep meat for many years.’’
‘’What about dairy products, milk, butter?’’
‘’Uh, dairy products are a bit more complicated to keep, although ultra-high-heated milk stays good for months. Well, let’s see what is on the hot menu.’’
Going to the service counter of the kitchen, set at one extremity of the open area cafeteria, the couple grabbed sets of utensils and trays and looked at the large containers of food lined up on top of the steam table. Jack nodded his head in approval on seeing that there was both beef and pork on the menu, along with mashed potatoes, rice and stir-fried vegetables. He then smiled to the cook standing behind the steam table and passed his right arm over for a shake.
‘’Hi! I’m Jack Sommers and I will be working with you in the kitchen.’’
The man, a jovial looking one wearing the traditional white apron and hat of a cook, returned his smile while solidly grabbing his hand and shaking it.
‘’Raoul Bonnet, at your service! We won’t mind an extra pair of hands here: there is a lot to do, as we don’t only prepare and serve the food: we also help inspect and store away the vegetables, eggs and poultry meat produced on the ship.’’
‘’We raise chickens on the ship?’’
‘’And turkeys and rabbits as well. We don’t raise enough of them to be able to serve fresh meat every day, but it will help a lot in varying the menu from freeze-dried meat. We however produce enough eggs to provide them to all at breakfast.’’
‘’That’s great! Oh, I nearly forgot to present you my wife, Xiulan. She will be working as a bar attendant.’’
‘’Pleased to meet you, Madam Sommers.’’ said the French cook while shaking hands with Xiulan. He then pointed the various containers on the steam table. ‘’So, what can I serve you? We have roast beef with peppercorn sauce, pork cutlets and chicken fried rice.’’
‘’The chicken fried rice looks really good, Mister Bonnet: I will have some.’’ replied Xiulan.
‘’And I will have the roast beef, Raoul.’’
‘’Good choices!’’ said Bonnet while starting to serve them. ‘’Right now we are still regularly receiving arrivals of fresh meat and dairy products via shuttles, but we will have to switch to freeze-dried rations a couple of weeks after our departure for Mars. But don’t worry about the quality or diversity of these freeze-dried rations. Our chief cook, Alfredo Caldi, who is renown across Europe, has concocted the various menus we will eat and prepared them himself for preservation in communal size freeze-dried bags. We will be eating like kings during our mission.’’
‘’Hell, that will definitely be better than the sad, unappetizing stuff the early astronauts had to eat.’’
‘’You got that right! Alfredo told me to pass the word to you that you won’t need to start working in the kitchen until tomorrow morning, so you will have this evening and night free for yourself.’’
‘’Thank him for that on my part, Raoul. By the way, is he a demanding boss? I heard a few scary things about European chefs and their huge egos.’’
‘’Naah, not with Alfredo! He is an easy man to work with and is actually quite a funny guy, but don’t overcook the pastas.’’
The trio laughed briefly at Raoul’s joke, then Jack and Xiulan left the service counter with their food and went next to the beverage counter and the salad bar before going to sit in one of the booths that was still unoccupied. Jack looked for a moment at the display screen/false window just beside him, contemplating the recorded images of the road traffic passing in front of the ‘dinner’, before attacking his food. His beef proved to be excellent and he smiled to Xiulan, who was eating her fried rice with gusto.
‘’I think that we will have a good time aboard this ship, Xiulan. Also, with the salary bonuses for deep space service that we are getting both, we will be able to save a nice bundle, maybe enough to buy a house on our return.’’
His wife was thoughtful for a moment before replying in a hesitant tone.
‘’What if we continue serving on this ship on its following missions? It cost tens of billions of dollars to build and launch. Surely, it will not be scrapped after only one trip to Mars. We could simply take some vacation on Earth between missions, if we really like working aboard the FRIENDSHIP. To be frank, conditions on Earth are going to continue deteriorating and the prices for houses built on safe grounds keep shooting up sky-high. In a few years, the real estate market will be so expensive that only millionaires will be able to afford detached houses of their own. And I am not even factoring yet the mounting pollution levels and the social troubles that are growing around the planet. Do we really want us to have children and then raise them in some overcrowded, low-level and overpriced apartment building?’’
Jack put down his fork, alarmed at that turn in the conversation.
‘’Don’t tell me that you don’t want us to have children anymore, Xiulan?!’’
‘’That’s not what I am saying, Jack. What I am saying is that we should use to the maximum the opportunities offered by working on a long term basis aboard this spaceship.’’
‘’And when would we have children then?’’
‘’How about now, on this ship? During my selection process and training, I was told that pregnancies would be allowed during the trip, so that the project managers could learn if procreating in a future Mars colony is feasible and risk-free.’’
‘’But, would it be risk-free, Xiulan? There is this business about space radiations that could cause malformations and mutations in fetuses.’’
‘’I asked a doctor in Vandenberg about that and he told me that, with the amount of anti-radiation shielding that the FRIENDSHIP possesses, we won’t be exposed to more radiations than we would normally be exposed to on Earth. Things may be different on Mars, but none of us is due to go down on Mars…at least on this trip.’’
Jack was silent for a moment as he weighed his wife’s arguments.
‘’Okay, I can see the merist in your arguments. So, you really would like us to try to have a child on this trip? When would you like us to make a first try?’’
Xiulan smiled to her husband while covering his right hand with her left hand and caressing it.
‘’How about tonight, Jack?’’
CHAPTER 5 – DEPARTURE
14:08 (GMT)
Wednesday, November 25, 2043
Command center, H.S.S. FRIENDSHIP
Low Ear
th orbit
‘’To all the crew: we are five minutes away from nuclear engines ignition. If you are not already strapped into a seat, do it now and seal your spacesuits. This is the last warning.’’
Switching her microphone off, Janet Larsson looked to her right at her flight engineer, Roberto Calderon.
‘’Systems status, Mister Calderon?’’
‘’Everything is a go, Commander.’’
‘’Mister Ponichnikov?’’
Viktor, who was occupying the nuclear engines control station, answered at once.
‘’All nuclear engines are in pre-boost mode, switched to the primary fuel tanks and are ready to go, Commander.’’
‘’Navigator?’’
‘’Route entered and locked in the computer, Commander.’’ replied Shen Li Yang, sitting to the right of the ship’s pilot, Anton Kubtchev.
‘’Good! Close your visors, people!’’
The eight other men and women inside the fairly small compartment closed their visors and secured them, then made sure that their individual breathing systems were functioning. The command and control section, mounted on an axial pivot inside the center core module, was already pivoted to make its floor point aft, so that the thrust of the nuclear engines would be felt by the astronauts as coming from under them. As for those in the ring carrousels, the engine thrust would add a less than five percent gravity tangential force to the rotational gravity they already felt, enough to make someone feel like in a gently rolling ship but not enough to significantly disturb objects and persons around the spaceship. However, Janet Larsson did not believe in taking unnecessary risks, which was why the crewmembers would have to stay strapped in their seats for the total duration of the nuclear engines burn time of a bit over one hour. Ten seconds before the planned time for engine ignition, Janet spoke again briefly.
‘’Mister Ponichnikov, put the nuclear engines at idle power. Mister Kubtchev, initiate the final countdown.’’
‘’Understood, Commander! Time to ignition: five seconds!...three, two, one, engines ignition at full rated power!’’
A powerful roar and strong vibrations transmitted through the structure of the ship followed as the sixteen PHOENIX 2000 nuclear rocket engines started burning a total of 4,160 kilos of liquid hydrogen per second, producing a total thrust of 4,000 metric tons. The huge spaceship started at once to rise from the low Earth orbit in which it had been parked for more than two years. As they started to follow their flight path to Mars, Janet couldn’t help look at one of the holographic video display screens which gave a view of the space outside the ship. Visible as a tiny dot in a lower orbit was the H.S.S. MIR, which was nearing completion in Earth orbit. The MIR was a twin of the FRIENDSHIP and was meant to add to the transport capacity towards Mars. It was also meant to act as a rescue ship if anything bad happened to the FRIENDSHIP. To see it there, nearly ready to travel into space, did a lot to reassure Janet. Not that she believed that the mission had low chances of success, on the contrary, but extra backups were always welcome in space.
There was little talk inside the command center during the next hour, with only short reports and instrument readings being given around while the nuclear rocket engines roared, pushing the spaceship into a Hohmann transfer orbit5 towards Mars. Then, following a pre-calculated flight plan, Janet Larssen gave an order to Viktor Ponichnikov at a precise time.
‘’Bring the nuclear rocket engines to idle power and cut the flow of liquid hydrogen. Once at idle, switch the nuclear engines cores to power production mode.’’
‘’Throttling down nuclear rocket engines to idle… liquid hydrogen flow cut to zero… Switching to power production mode.’’
From a working temperature of 2,450 degrees Kelvin, or 3,950 degrees Fahrenheit, the uranium cores of the PHOENIX 2000 engines started cooling down as the control bars quenched the nuclear reaction in them. With the flow of liquid hydrogen fuel, which had circulated around the cores to both produce thrust and cool the exhaust nozzles, now cut, distilled water was next injected into a network of pipes closely surrounding the pressure vessels of the nuclear engines. That water quickly flashed to superheated steam as it collected the waste heat from the cores while helping the latter to cool down. That steam then was directed to steam-powered turbo-generators, producing massive amounts of electricity. With the sixteen nuclear rocket engines now functioning pretty much like individual nuclear power plants, the H.S.S. FRIENDSHIP ended up with over 480 megawatts of extra electrical power flowing through its power circuitry. Viktor, who was closely following that switch into power production mode on his instruments, soon spoke up again.
‘’Nuclear cores now stabilized in power production mode. We have 480 megawatts of extra power now available.’’
‘’Excellent!’’ said Janet Larssen. ‘’Mister Calderon, start our magnetoplasma engines, cruise thrust mode.’’
‘’Starting our magnetoplasma engines. Low thrust, high specific impulse mode selected!’’ replied the flight engineer as he switched on the eighteen two gigawatt VASIMR plasma engines of the spaceship. Those plasma engines, which constituted the cruise engines of the spaceship for long, deep space missions, started heating gaseous argon fuel via powerful electromagnets, transforming it into hot plasma before that plasma was compressed, further heated and accelerated by a second set of electromagnets, then ejected through an exhaust nozzle, producing thrust. That plasma left the engines at a temperature of over one million degrees Kelvin, 173 times hotter than the surface of the Sun, at velocities close to 70,000 meters per second and with a specific impulse of 10,000 seconds, over ten times more efficient in fuel than the PHOENIX 2000 rocket engines. While the engine thrust to spaceship mass ratio thus created was a measly 0.001, that thrust could be sustained for months and even years, greatly increasing the final velocity of the ship at little cost in fuel mass. While the PHOENIX 2000 nuclear rocket engines by themselves cut in half the duration time of a trip to Mars compared to the eight to nine months needed with pure chemical rocket engines, that travel time was further cut to forty days with the use of the VASIMR engines. Less travel time needed in space meant in turn less possible radiation exposure to the crewmembers of the ship and smaller quantities of supplies and foodstuff needed aboard, two factors highly beneficial to the mission.
‘’Magnetoplasma engines now at steady cruise power.’’
Viktor Ponichnikov concentrated for a moment, trying to detect any felt push given by the VASIMR engines.
‘’Hell, we are accelerating even more slowly than the first clunker I bought at a Moscow used car dealer when I was a teenage student.’’
Roberto Calderon threw Viktor a faked look of outrage on hearing that.
‘’Are you calling our 23 billion dollar spaceship a clunker?’’
‘’He better not!’’ added Janet Larssen, painting a severe expression on her face. ‘’If so, then he will be practicing his space walking…without a spacesuit.’’
Viktor faked a terrified look in response, making the other occupants of the command center burst out in laughter. Janet Larssen, who had also laughed briefly, then became serious again and switched her microphone to ship wide announcement mode.
‘’Attention all hands! You may now unbuckle your safety harnesses, get out of your spacesuits and resume your activities. Thank you!’’
Undoing her own seat harness, Janet then got up and looked at the others in the small command center.
‘’You may now get out of your spacesuits in rotation. Anton, Roberto, Paul and Ken, you take the first shift until 19:00. I will be touring the ship and talking to the crewmembers in the meantime.’’
Janet then floated out of the command center, which was in near zero G conditions in this stage of the flight.
Inside their cabin, Jack and Xiulan Sommers gladly got out of their spacesuits, then stored them in their alcoves, ending up in internal ship uniforms. Since they were not astronauts by profession,
being instead classified as non-technical support personnel with only basic training on space systems, both still found their spacesuits a bit claustrophobic, on top of being rather heavy and cumbersome. Jack smiled on seeing Xiulan take off her uniform’s vest to change it for a white blouse and a classic blue and black, double-breasted barman’s jacket, ending for a moment with only her bra to cover her small but firm breasts. Gluing himself to her back and kissing her neck, Jack also gently fondled her breasts with both hands, making Xiulan purr with appreciation. She in turn put both hands in her back, rubbing his hardened penis through his trousers. Xiulan however put a stop to it after a few seconds, turning around to face her husband and smile to him.
‘’We can continue that after we complete our first work shift, Jack. You have to prepare supper for all the famished crew members aboard, while I have to get the bar ready to operate.’’
Jack sighed with regret but did stop his rubbing and fondling and kissed her on the lips.
‘’You are right, as always. I hope that you will have a nice first work shift.’’
‘’The same for you, Jack. Shall we walk together to the crew lounge?’’
‘’Of course! Let the other see what kind of nice couple we make.’’
Xiulan giggled at that before finishing to change. Both then walked out of their cabin and headed to the nearest set of stairs leading up to the Promenade Deck.
They found the crew lounge already occupied by a good thirty people, as many crewmembers would have little to do while the ship cruised towards Mars. Xiulan split with Jack once they got near the bar of the crew lounge, kissing him again before she went through the door giving access to the back of the bar and to its alcohol storage room. She found the other barmaid of the ship, Mary McGregor, behind the bar, taking out glasses from their protective boxes and lining them up in shock absorbing trays under the service counter.
A Mars Odyssey Page 7