‘’Hum, nothing that would be hard to digest. Let me guide you to the examination room, then I will get Doctor Gorushkova.’’
‘’Thank you, Nurse Yamashita.’’ said weakly Xiulan before getting up and walking to the adjacent examination room, where Meiko Yamashita made her lie down on her back atop a medical examination bed. As the nurse went to get the ship’s assistant medical officer, Julie smiled to Xiulan while holding gently one of her hands.
‘’You are now in good hands, Xiulan. Everything will be fine.’’
Xiulan didn’t reply to that, too busy thinking about the possible causes of her nausea. Doctor Nadia Gorushkova entered the examination room less than a minute later and gave a critical look at Xiulan before smiling to her.
‘’So, what is the problem here?’’
‘’I was suddenly overcome with nausea as I was working behind the bar, Doctor.’’ answered Xiulan, who then recounted in detail what had happened. Gorushkova listened to her, then took a couple of minutes to examine her, watched on by Julie and the nurse. At the end of it, the Russian doctor helped Xiulan to sit up on the examination bed, swinging her legs over the edge before smiling to the barmaid.
‘’I see a couple of possibilities here. First, when were your last menstruations?’’
Xiulan was struck by that question as she realized something.
‘’Uh, seven weeks ago, Doctor. I am normally very regular but I put my missing menstruation on account of my trip in space.’’
‘’Well, I can tell you from past experience and knowledge that being in zero gravity may affect female menstruations. However, most of this ship has been under artificial gravity from the start of this mission. I believe that you are married and that your husband is aboard, correct?’’
‘’Yes, that’s correct, Doctor.’’
‘’Then, let me get something quickly. I will be back in a minute.’’
Gorushkova returned in the examination room after less than a minute and handed a small, elongated object wrapped in plastic to Xiulan.
‘’I will need you to go to the washroom adjacent to the reception room and follow the instructions on the package, Misses Sommers.’’
Xiulan had one look at the inscriptions on the packaging and felt emotions wash over her.
‘’A pregnancy test?’’
‘’That’s right! I suppose that you have been active sexually during the last few weeks?’’
‘’Uh, quite active, actually, Doctor.’’
‘’Then, go to the washroom and we will see if your husband hit the jackpot. Nurse Yamashita will help you if need be.’’
With the nurse then escorting out an excited Xiulan to the washroom, Julie Deloncle grinned to Gorushkova.
‘’Xiulan could be the first woman to become pregnant in space?’’
‘’She very well could be, in view of the symptoms I saw. We will know better in a few minutes.’’
Both women had to wait only three minutes before a muffled shout of joy was heard from the center’s visitors washroom, making Nadia Gorushkova smile to Julie.
‘’It looks like I was right. Mister Sommers will be able to claim himself as being the father of the first baby conceived in space.’’
‘’But, our mission still has over 23 months at a minimum to go before we will be back in Earth orbit.’’ nearly stuttered Julie. ‘’That means…’’
‘’That Xiulan’s child will be born in space, on this spaceship? Yes, it does! Furthermore, that baby will have time to celebrate its first birthday while still on this ship.’’
‘’Oh my god! This is one hell of a news.’’
‘’Yes it is!’’ said Gorushkova, becoming quite serious. ‘’Something tells me that Xiulan won’t be the only woman to become pregnant on this trip. It is a good thing indeed that they loaded some baby supplies and equipment aboard before we departed Earth, just in case.’’
As she had predicted, another female crewmember was found to be pregnant three weeks later, with a third woman getting a positive test another week after that. The ship’s chief medical officer, Doctor Alexander Cranston, soon had to put the brakes on the avalanche of questions that came from medical experts on Earth, essentially refusing to turn the three pregnant women on the ship into some kind of medical guinea pigs. In that, he was firmly supported by Janet Larsson, who basically blacklisted the messages coming from the most obnoxious specialists on Earth. Those specialists were going to have to content themselves with the routine medical reports concerning each crewmember, which were regularly transmitted to Earth and were also filed in the ship’s medical archives.
CHAPTER 7 – FINAL DECISION
14:13 (GMT)
Thursday, February 18, 2044
Ship’s conference room, H.S.S. FRIENDSHIP
Low Mars orbit
Janet Larsson, along with the scientists sitting around the conference table, studied for a long moment the detailed color picture displayed on the main viewer screen of the conference room. Roman Denisovich, the ship’s chief planetologists and geophysicist, who was the presenter at the time, waited patiently while Janet looked at the photo mosaic of the Melas Chasma region of the Valles Marineris, the huge, 3,500 kilometer-long, 300 kilometer-wide and up to ten kilometer-deep canyon running East-West close to Mars’ equator. The image on the display screen also included various types of data accumulated to date by the sensors of the ship and of the mapping satellites that had been viewing the surface of Mars for over five weeks now. That data, including spectrometer readings of the surface soil and altitude elevations established via radar mapping, was as important if not more than the terrain picture itself for the purpose of this meeting. The mission was now at a crucial turning point, with a final decision to be taken today on which exact spot on Mars should be the landing point of the ship’s manned lander craft. In that, there was no margin permitted for error, as the H.S.S. FRIENDSHIP carried only one manned lander. Their planetary shuttle, while designed to land and take off repeatedly from Mars, had only a small cargo and passenger carrying capacity and no scientific research facilities aboard. If they sent down the manned Mars lander to a spot that would then turn to be a deception, then they would have wasted the major part of their mission. Denisovich, like Janet Larsson, was not ready to let that happen through undue haste, so he waited silently as the mission commander made her mind. Janet finally stopped gazing at the display screen and looked at the astronomers, planetologists and geologists assembled around the table.
‘’Ladies and gentlemen, I believe that our choice is now clear: the Melas Chasma region of the Valles Marineris is one of the most striking geological features on Mars and promises to reveal to us many secrets about its past. Its ten kilometer-high cliffs, with its stratified layers dating back 3.7 billion years, will provide us with a detailed geological history of the planet. Also, the abundant presence of hydrated soils at the bottom of the canyon, both sulfates and clays, is a clear indication that liquid water flowed through that part of Valles Marineris in the distant past. With luck, we will find in Melas Chasma where all that ancient water has gone. Here, I must emphasize again how important it is for us to find an exploitable source of water on Mars. If we don’t find such an exploitable water source, then the future of any Human colony on Mars will become highly questionable and we will then have to limit ourselves to exploring, with no attempt at colonization.’’
Jason Terlecki, the mining and base construction engineer assigned to the Mars Lander crew, then raised his hand briefly before speaking in turn.
‘’We still could choose to build our base at one of the poles of Mars, where there are permanent ice caps, with plenty of water ice for us to use. I know that, geologically speaking, the poles are far less interesting than the Valles Marineris and other regions around the equator, but we should not dismiss for good the poles as ultimate locations for a permanent base and colony. I thus propose that we reserve our Mars Explorer Drone Craft
Two for possible surveying of the South Pole ice cap, in case that the Melas Chasma region turns out to be a disappointment after the sending of our first drone.’’
There were a few approving comments and whispers around the table as the scientists looked at each other. Seeing that there seemed to be a consensus forming about Terlecki’s proposal, Janet spoke up.
‘’I personally find Mister Terlecki’s proposal to be highly sensible and logical. Do you all agree with it, ladies and gentlemen?’’
The scientists present quickly expressed their unanimous approval to the proposal, to Janet’s satisfaction.
‘’Excellent! Now, to return to the Melas Chasma region, which is by itself a huge piece of estate with a maximum width of close to 300 kilometers and a length of over 1,200 kilometers. Exploring the whole of that region will be well beyond the capabilities of our ground team, so we will have to target only a specific portion of it. What are your opinions on this, ladies and gentlemen?’’
This time, it was Julie Deloncle, the ship’s chief geomatician, who spoke up first.
‘’I believe that we should target the westernmost part of Melas Chasma, southwest of Candor Chaos. That portion of the Melas Chasma is covered with thick depots of hydrated soil, thus holds many promises for us about finding sizeable quantities of water under its surface. Also, by concentrating our search on the southern cliffs of the canyon, which is nearly at its deepest in that region, we maximize the chances to find a cave, grotto or empty lava tube that could provide a safe environment against space radiations for our future base.’’
‘’Uh, while I find Julie’s opinion valuable, I would prefer that we concentrate our attention on the northern cliffs of that part of the Melas Chasma.’’ said Roman Denisovich. ‘’A number of ancient river beds running West to East end up at the edges of those northern cliffs. If anything, those northern cliffs could hold even bigger promises in terms of underground water layers.’’
That counter-proposal triggered a passionate group debate on the merits of each of the proposals, a debate that went on with many forceful arguments for nearly fifteen minutes, until Janet Larsson decided to wade in to settle the argument.
‘’Ladies and gentlemen, I see that both proposals have plenty of merit, along with many supporters. I thus propose that we concentrate on the westernmost section of Melas Chasma, but that we also have our reconnaissance drone explore in detail both the southern and northern cliffs of that region. Once we will have detailed imagery and readings for the whole target area, we will be able to take an informed, final decision about the desired landing point of our manned lander. Do I have objections to that? No? Then, we will launch our drone number one tomorrow, with the western end of the Melas Chasma as its target of interest. Misters Templeton, Denisovich and Walsingham, I will expect from you a detailed proposed flight plan for our drone craft by tomorrow morning, with a planned launch at four o’clock in the afternoon, Greenwich time. I now declare this meeting over.’’
15:58 (GMT)
Friday, February 19, 2044
Drone command compartment, core section of the H.S.S. FRIENDSHIP
Low Mars orbit
Jeremy Brown, an ex-U.S. Air Force drone pilot, smiled to Peter Walsingham as he floated into his seat next to the ex-British R.A.F. fighter pilot.
‘’Ready for your big flight, Peter?’’
‘’You bet I am!’’ replied Walsingham, who was reviewing his instruments panel in front of him and who also already wore his remote viewing helmet and visor. However, Peter’s visor was still switched off, so that he could look normally at his instruments before his drone’s launch. Jeremy buckled his seat harness, then put on his own remote viewing helmet, so that he could assist Peter during the flight of Mars Explorer Drone Craft One. Once both men were satisfied that the drone appeared to be fully online and functional, Peter pushed a button on his instrument panel.
‘’Opening the doors of Drone One’s hangar.’’
The one piece hatch closing one of the craft hangars situated around the outer edge of the main disk section of the ship opened, exposing to the vacuum of space a large conical object.
‘’Launching Drone One now!’’
The push of another button ejected at slow speed the drone from its hangar and into space, where it floated downward towards the surface of Mars. Next, Peter activated the automated flight plan of the drone with a radio command, making the craft’s attitude engines light up to rotate it into the correct flight axis. The main retro-rocket of the craft then came to life, making the drone cut its orbital speed so that it would go down and enter the very thin atmosphere of Mars, whose pressure was only one percent of Earth’s atmosphere. Both pilots closely followed the flight of the craft on their instruments, ready to take over manually if anything went wrong with the programmed descent of the drone. Thankfully, everything went smoothly and the craft’s base heat shield soon started to heat up from the friction with the rarefied Martian atmosphere, friction that helped decelerate the drone further. Both pilots however knew that, contrary to Earth’s atmosphere, which was thick enough to drastically cut by itself the speed of any de-orbiting object, Mars’ atmosphere was too thin to cut more than a small portion of the drone’s speed, so the retro-rocket engine continued burning for a few minutes, lowering gradually the speed of the craft. Then, when the speed went down to a secure level, a first parachute deployed from the nose of the conical craft. While big by Earth’s standards, that parachute was only barely enough to further decelerate the craft by a few more hundreds of kilometers per hour. Once down to low subsonic speed, another, much bigger parachute, deployed out of the nose cone, while the retro-rocket engine shut off. That parachute was however a rectangular one that could be steered, contrary to the round first parachute meant solely to slow the drone down. While positively huge and dwarfing the craft hanging from it, that parachute still left the drone falling down at an appreciable speed but quickly turned its descent into a nearly vertical one. That was when a large, thin balloon attached to the center top of the main parachute started inflating as helium gas at very low pressure was let in. Once loosely filled, the balloon helped the main parachute break further the downward speed of the drone. Back in the H.S.S. FRIENDSHIP remote command compartment, Peter Walsingham smiled when the descent speed of the drone fell to a specific level.
‘’Gliding speed attained! Time for my magic touch.’’
Grabbing his flight control stick, the ex-R.A.F. fighter-reconnaissance pilot switched the drone craft to ‘parachute gliding mode’, then started sending command signals via his stick. Like standard directional parachutes used by free falling parachutists on Earth, the rectangular main parachute of the drone could be steered by pulling onto selected corner wires attaching it to the craft, making it turn left or right and either accelerating forward or braking its forward speed. In this case, remotely-actuated hydraulic pistons did the wire pulling under Peter’s control. Checking on the position and altitude of the drone via a mapping camera and radar, Peter steered slowly the craft towards the Melas Chasma as it started overflying at medium altitude the eastern end of the giant Valles Marineris canyon.
‘’Jeremy, unmask the drone’s in-flight cameras and sensors. Be ready to study the pictures we will be receiving, guys, and tell us if you see something worthy of a second look.’’
The ‘guys’ in question were a group of seven geologists and planetologists sitting at viewing stations set around the two pilots’ stations and waiting anxiously to see what the drone’s cameras would show them of the Valles Marineris. Their viewing screens soon filled will high definition color pictures of the terrain under and on both sides of the drone, now gliding slowly westward above the giant canyon. The scientists kept relatively silent at first as the drone flew over the eastern parts of the Valles Marineris, Capri Chasma and Coprates Chasma. Their excitement shot up when they started getting pictures of the Melas Chasma, the huge central portion of the canyon
that was their main target of interest.
‘’There’s the Ophir Labes, on the right! I see some interesting strata above the level of the landslide slopes. With the old alluvial beds on the surface nearby, they could contain some water frozen within the dirt and rocks.’’
‘’Indeed! But the bottom of the canyon on the left side, opposite the Ophir Labes, seems to be really rich in hydrated soil depots. This whole region saw a lot of water flow through it in the distant past. The big question now is: where has all that water gone? I’m not ready to believe that it all evaporated into the atmosphere.’’
As the planetologists and scientists discussed that point and others while viewing the images sent by the drone, which continued to glide down at a slow rate under its combined parachute and balloon, Peter Walsingham watched carefully the ground relief the drone was overflying, with the elevations mapped and recorded by its mapping radar. After half a hour of gliding over the canyon, he noticed something previously recorded by the mapping radar of the H.S.S. FRIENDSHIP, but now visible in much better detail.
‘’The ground in this part of the canyon is now getting progressively deeper towards the center of the Melas Chasma. The depth of the floor is now 8,640 meters below the top of the cliffs on either sides, with the depth increasing as we fly westward. Could water have gathered at the bottom as the rivers dried out, thus forming a sort of lake in the center of Melas Chasma?’’
‘’That is very possible, Mister Walsingham.’’ said Roman Denisovich. ‘’With the vast expanses of hydrated soil visible to the left, there could very well have been a lake here, millions of years ago. I would love to be able to drill a deep hole there to check for possible underground frozen aquifer strata under all that red dirt.’’
‘’I always could make the drone land there after it will have flown over the portion of canyon of interest to us and performed a ‘U’ turn to come back eastward, Doctor Denisovich. The drone has a belly drill that it can deploy once landed.’’
A Mars Odyssey Page 9