A Colony on Mars (19 page)

said Carter when there is a good reason that people should not do something we just tell them not to do it and they don't do it. It works the same as when you have something you want them to do we just tell them to do it but we always give them a reason. If we don't have a good reason we don't bug them, it works for us.”

August 13, 2108: Because of having received advance instructions four large ponds had been dug, cemented and cured. The ponds were adjacent to the warm river across from the farm in The Company cavern. They were ready to receive the paint that Grace, the new fish farmer had brought from Earth. The day after they got the paint the crew that had been assigned to help Grace, set up painted the four ponds. The paint was quick drying and sat up in an hour. The workers scrubbed the new paint then painted over that with a nutritional gel resembling bottom and sides of an established pond. By noon they opened the four trap doors allowing river water to pour into the ponds. Fifty thousand young fish were dumped from the tanks they had lived in on the ship into the ponds. Each breed had their own separate pond. Several hundred fish in each pond floated to the surface. They had died en route to Mars. The dead fish were quickly removed. Some of the young fish began to swim a little but others just laid there, their gil s moving as if they were gasping for air. Grace, the fish farmer put a little food into each tank. The catfish food sank to the bottom while the blue gil , trout and crappie food floated on the surface. Thank you folks so much for al your help but there is nothing more you can do at the moment. You may return to your other duties. One young woman stayed behind when the others left. If it is al the same to Mam I would like to relieve you while you go and take care of your housing needs and put your things away. After that you can go and have lunch and come back when you are all squared away. Just tel me what to do while you are away and I wil see to it. “ What is your name hon,” Grace asked. “I am Helen, Mam.” “I just think I may take you up on that offer Helen.” Grace said, “At this point there is really nothing to do, just keep an eye on the fish and scoop away any that die and float to the top. I wil be back in a couple hours.”

Because the bureaucracy was in such a turmoil because of all the new arrivals it took Grace closer to four hours before she found her house, found her luggage and had lunch. When she returned Helen was stil there, the net in her hand and she was carefully scooping away the young fish that had expired. The worms that Abner had received at the farm were introduced into the crops and the orchards and to his compost piles. A mil ion or so Earth worms were given to Grace because she could use them in her own compost operation that was part of her making fish food out of garbage.

As the days passed Grace had little difficulty in caring for her fish and still had time to go to her meals and take care of her personal matters and check on the fish as often as they needed checking on. Every afternoon Helen would drop by after work and just look at the fish. Sometimes Grace would return to check on the fish and Helen would be there. Sometimes Helen would drop by while Grace was working with the fish. Would you tell me about these catfish, Grace?” Helen ask one evening. “Sure Helen, these fish grow fast, they were barely hatched when the ship had left Earth but already some of these guys are six Inches long. A catfish in ideal warm water conditions can grow to over two pounds in one year. For the cost of production catfish easily out perform al other fish. Crappie (pronounced Croppy) are prolific and grow to about two pounds in 18 months or so. They are good eating with lots of meat but you have a lot of bones to contend with. A lot of pet food manufacturers use crappy in their products but they grind them up so the bones won't harm the pets. Trout and blue gil are fun fish, they are fun to catch and they are fun to watch, but catfish that is where the meat is. Of course blue gil are a favorite of people who like to fil et small fish and fry them crispy in a pan. Trout really isn't one fish but a family of fish, we have several varieties in this pond and they are also good pan fish and the larger varieties are good baked. There is a lot more but if you are curious why don't you look them up on the Internet and learn all about them. The fish that we chose to try first on Mars were chosen because they are hearty fish that we thought might make the journey to Mars and stil be alive and they are fish that we thought might be most likely to adapt best to the environment here. If I can find the right location I am going to try and create a salt water lake and have them send up some salt water fish to try here.” “Within eight or nine months we should be eating fish regularly and fishing should be a popular sport on Mars within a year.” “I am just taken with these fish Grace I would love to work with them if the time ever comes that you need an assistant please consider me for the job. My boyfriend, Darwin got a job on the farm over there caring for the animals. Darwin and I are planning on getting married soon and it would be great if he cared for animals and I cared for fish.”

August 22, 2108: Grace had inspected Big Lake and had inspected the warm river that flowed out of the spa in Paradise and would soon be moving a couple thousand trout to Big Lake and a Thousand or so catfish to the warm river. She told Tim the next time she saw him that she would need a crew for a few hours at sometime in the next week. In the meantime she fil ed a couple tanks with water from the two places and put a couple fish in each tank. The Trout did well in the water from Big Lake and the catfish did just fine in the water from Warm River. The next week she moved one thousand trout to Big Lake and one thousand Catfish to Warm River. They both thrived on a minimum amount of food made from kitchen garbage. The catfish in warm river were soon larger than the catfish in the pond. The trout in the lake out performed the fish in the pond also. On the second week in the pond Grace was finding no more dead fish a day than she would have expected to find on Earth. Grace opened each trap door long enough to let a few fish out into the river from each species. Then she started feeding them the food that she made from table scraps, they also thrived. Grace had also sewn thousands of Earth worms along the banks of the lakes and rivers and made sure there was enough for them to eat. Within a month Grace had transplanted more fish to Big lake, crappie, blue gill and some more trout. Then she opened the gate to the ponds and left them open. Some of the fish stil preferred the pond but most chose the river and the warm lake. The catfish seemed very fond of the warm lake. The water in Big Lake stayed a little warmer than most native Mars water because of all the heat being generated in the Utility cavern.

September 13, 2108: For two weeks Tim had three crews assembling, charging and testing golf carts. Tim himself got the first one off the assembly line. He could now scurry from place to place quickly. When the carts were all assembled they were put in a motor pool. Anyone who needed a cart for work just took one. When they were done with it they drove it back and parked it in the motor pool. If the yellow light was on they took it to the charging station and plugged it in. The lithium ion gel batteries that they used were good for about two hundred fifty miles or ten days which ever came first, before the yellow light would come on. There were never more than ten of the carts on the charger overnight. The surface carts could be used in the caverns but the cavern carts could not be used on the surface. The difference being that the surface carts had big balloon tires that would not sink into the dust that was on much of the surface. People working on the surface would just ride a cart over to the pedestrian elevator, go up to the surface and use the cart while they were working then return it in the evening. After five PM people would take a cart anytime they were going out of the original complex of the Government cavern and The Company cavern a lot of them could be found at the spa on any given evening. People could be found lining the banks of Big Lake, near the feeding area and lining the banks of Warm River and the river and Lake in The Company cavern every evening spotting fish.

September 20, 2108: The gold mine had proved to be very productive. They were extracting not only pure gold from the vein but the ore on each side of the vein for several feet proved to be very rich in gold. They did not even attempt to smelt the ore on Mars. They did jury rig a crusher that worked well so they were just crushing everything produced in the mine. They made cement boxes that were fil ed with the gold and ore then sealed with cement, and cured before being loaded on the empty ships and sent back to Earth. The only way to get at the contents was to destroy the cement box. The boxes were not so heavy that two strong men on Mars could handle one box which weighed about one hundred lbs on Mars but weighed almost three hundred lbs on the ships and on Earth. These boxes had to be unloaded back on Earth with fork lifts. As far as anyone ever knew no gold had ever been pilfered. September 23, 2108: The tunnel crew had a hard time digging the tunnel leading out of Big Lake and the Utility cavern. They ran into hard rock so went and consulted the mine foreman. He examined the rock and decided it was all part of the same vein they were pursuing from the Utility cavern. He moved the mine crew to the tunnel and they removed the 40 foot wide vein of gold bearing quartz before the tunnel digging crew could continue. The hard rock had final y been removed and the tunnel crew resumed work on September 27, 2108. New tunneling equipment had arrived on August 12, 2108 and once tunneling had resumed it went much faster.

CHAPTER – The Ocean

October 7, 2108: The tunneling crew broke through to the third cavern on their way to Utopia. As soon as breakthrough occurred the scientists dressed in Mars suits descended on the place and started their measurements . The cavern was almost circular and covered about twelve square miles. Almost the whole cavern floor was covered by one giant lake. A warm spring entered at one side of the cavern and fed the large lake. There was a stream exiting the lake and flowing off into the a crevice in the cavern wal . The water temperature of the lake was a mild 68 degrees. Tim knew instantly that they had found Graces Ocean. He went to fetch Grace immediately and told her to bring her Mars suit and follow him. When they approached the air lock Tim put his Mars suit back on and told Grace to do likewise. While they were putting their suits on Tim asked Grace,“Do you remember asking me to enlarge the fish ponds because you were expecting a shipment of Salt Water fish on the Mars Runner when it docks in December?” “Of course I remember but what does this have to do with..?” “I'l show you Tim interrupted.” With that they went through the double doors of the air lock and Tim presented Grace with her with her Ocean. The natural water temperature here is 68 degrees and I seem to remember that on Earth they used to quote water temperatures in that range on the radio” “Yes 68 would be perfect.” “Great we should have this cavern sealed and pressurized within the week. We can install a reverse osmosis system where that water exits and use the output as household tap water. You can put your salt solution into the lake and when the reverse osmosis system filters it out you can put it back into the lake.

Luckily the floor was almost level with the tunnel so the drillers continued on their way

October 8, 2108: The four fissures in what they were all referring to as the Ocean cavern were sealed and a pressure test was run. One of the seals leaked a little but was quickly repaired. The cavern was pressurized by the end of the week.

October 9, 2108: Tunneling promptly began on the next long tunnel another nine hundred foot span. The digging went fast and easy. The workers never had to wear their Mars suits. Men were now working the tunnel around the clock. They were gaining more than two feet per hour at times. CHAPTER – Mars Supply Two returns

November 15, 2108: Mars Supply Two docked, Mars was closer to Earth now and the travel time was a little less. The three hundred passengers that they carried were mostly construction workers. There was more lumber than the colony had ever had before. There were four hundred pal ets of merchandise for Super Store and six new employees. The Company who had been operating the first class restaurant sent sixteen employees and a manager. There was enough equipment, supplies and frozen food to fully equip a first class restaurant. There were also five hundred cases of liquor. More was due to arrive in December when Mars Runner made its first docking at the Mars orbiter.

November 21,2108: The building for the restaurant had already been built in the square next to the Bank and waiting when the ship arrived The building had been plumbed and wired so it took less than a week to install the equipment. The restaurant opened for business Today. Prices were established at $200.00 for a first class meal with two drinks Included but two more optional at $10.00 each. Alcohol was limited to diners. The new restaurant dominated the talk radio program for several days.

CHAPTER – The Hour Glass

November 30, 2108: the tunneling crew broke through into their 4th cavern. This was another large and beautiful cavern similar to Paradise. It was almost a perfect hour glass in shape and as luck would have it they had broken through right at the thin part of the hour glass. When the powerful portable lights were shined in both directions they saw stalagmites, stalactites, and columns in every direction. It was later established that the hour glass had about 22 square miles of floor space. There were five lakes averaging ten acres each in size and all joined by a river that ranged from fifteen feet to 50 feet in width. The water here moved quite slowly. Soundings disclosed that the lakes were all more than two hundred feet deep and even the river ran over 50 feet deep in places. Best of all the water was warm. There must be magma somewhere here that is not too far below the surface. They didn't really need another park but it looked like they had found one. Once details of the Hour Glass cavern were released they dominated not only the talk radio show but Rusty spent at least half of his local news half hour discussing the new cavern and what it could mean for their community.