Glory on Mars (2 page)

I don't understand, Emma thought as she gazed at the
panel. Sure, the first two years were tough when they only had the
three modules from their transport ship as habitat. But the second
transport added three more modules and they constructed the plaza
bay - pressurized it with air harvested from the wisp-thin Martian
atmosphere. Things were looking up.

She reached up to the diagram and touched the airlock
Ingra had used. That airlock was probably still open to the frozen
Martian atmosphere. Dust is drifting in, she thought idly. It will
be hard to clean the airlock seals.

She jumped when her headset beeped with an incoming
message.

"Hi Emma. It's Malcolm. Have you heard about Ingra?
Are you okay?"

His face, projected into Emma's left eye on her
contact link, was pinched with worry.

"Malcolm - you shouldn't contact me in
real-time."

Malcolm and the rest of the Settler Four crew were
nearing the end of an isolation evaluation, sealed inside a mock-up
of a transport ship's habitat module. Anyone who came out early
would lose their place on the mission.

"I'm sorry I can't be there with you."

It was like Malcolm to risk a direct message. But
then, he was a charmer and claimed he could talk his way out of
anything. At a party, he was always in the middle of the crowd,
offering jokes and compliments. They'd spent a long weekend
together once - he'd planned everything and she had fun.

She walked past her own portrait -
Settler Three,
The Explorers
- to the Settler Four panel, stood so his image
in her eye overlaid his portrait, and hugged herself. "But we can't
talk like this. Send a time-lagged message.

"And don't worry about me. I'll be with my mission
crew."

***

Emma walked into the settlers' lounge, past a table
to a circle of sleekly upholstered chairs pulled close together.
Liz Brown jumped up. She had her hair pulled back in a streaked
blond pony-tail, which emphasized her long face. Liz's eyes were
red and, as they hugged, tears formed in Emma's eyes, too.

She'd never lived outside the United States before
joining Colony Mars so Liz, a Canadian, felt like a friend from
home. Emma had cross-trained as Liz's back-up farmer and they made
a good team.

Emma sank into the empty chair next to Liz. On her
other side, James Moore gave her a wan smile. The son of a
diplomatic family, he'd lived all over the world and was generally
irrepressible. It was strange to see a sober expression on his
face.

"Do you think they'll delay our launch?" None of them
were especially close to Ingra - she'd left Earth before they
arrived at Colony Mars' headquarters - so James was probably more
worried for the mission.

"I think that will depend on the other settlers on
Mars." Claude Krueger leaned over to them to speak softly. He was
the oldest member of the S-3 crew - a field lithologist and looked
the part, squarely built with callused hands. Claude was German,
but had been teaching in California when he applied to Colony
Mars.

Emma glanced around the room. The S-4 crew was, of
course, in their isolation evaluation. Candidates for S-5 clustered
together on the opposite side of the room. One of them gave Emma an
uncertain nod. Settlers had a say in selecting subsequent crews,
and they didn't know how to react to Ingra's suicide in front of
the S-3 crew.

"Suicide. Could it be anything else?" Claude
asked.

"I don't know." Liz had talked with Ingra more than
the rest of them. She took medic training and they often messaged
back and forth. "She sounded delusional on the vid. She was
hallucinating."

"She's Kamp's psychologist. I don't see how this
could happen."

"Doctors make lousy patients. Being a psychologist,
she'd be able to fake her own routine psych evals."

"Well, this may be ghoulish, but her death's sure
increased interest in the colony," James said.

Emma's eyes snapped up to the Earth Scan sphere
spinning in the far corner of the room at the ceiling.

The most sophisticated artificial intelligence used
by Colony Mars didn't run life support on Mars or pilot spaceships;
it tracked their public presence on Earth. Earth Scan collected
trillions of inputs worldwide, compiled reports, and projected a
holographic sphere, a snapshot of how billions of people viewed the
colony project.

The sphere was swollen to double its usual size,
reflecting increased views. Color coded like a main sequence star,
the sphere had intensified to blue from the usual yellow. Inside
the translucent sphere, a silver hoop spun to show the rate of
earnings from premium content, donations, and merchandise. It was
twirling.

"MEX cut the live feed when they realized what was
happening," James said. "And I guess the premium subscribers have
been howling. They released the vid a few minutes ago."

"Hell," Emma said. "They released the entire video?
What if her family sees it?"

Emma's link interrupted her with another message from
Malcolm. She answered in a whisper, as if talking out loud would
draw more attention to his breach of protocol.

"I talked to one of the women on my crew. She'll
trade places with you, so you can fly with me."

"That won't work. The robotic rovers and walkabouts
are already packed in the cargo module. And I'm the mission
roboticist. I've got to go."

"I don't want you in danger. Ingra was the colony's
psychologist, for god's sake, and she killed herself. It's not safe
until the experts figure out what's going wrong."

"I'm not going to kill myself."

"Of course not. But what about the others, the
colonists already on Mars? What if another one goes crazy?"

"The colony's Artificial Intelligence can run psych
evals for psychologists on Earth."

"It's just that, I'm worried for you. I love you,
Emma. I don't want anything to happen to you."

His intensity transfixed her. It had drawn her to him
originally and a tingle ran down her spine. But they hadn't spent
enough time together to talk about love.

"I'm signing off, Mal. My crew's waiting for me."

"You can't go." There was a cold edge to his
voice.

Emma's feelings shifted abruptly. His concern had
been touching, but he had no right to tell her what to do.

She'd been talking softly, but now pulled out her
pocket pad to type a private reply.
I'm not volunteering to give
up my spot on S-3.

The words looked harsh on her screen. He was, after
all, worried about her with good reason. Critics predicted
psychological issues would destroy the colony. That's why Colony
Mars decided evals by Kamp's AI weren't enough and included a
psychologist among the settlers. Ingra's evaluations of individuals
were, of course, confidential, but Emma read all her summary
reports. There was insomnia among the settlers, fatigue, loss of
appetite, and trouble focusing. None of that sounded fatal, but
Ingra was dead.

Don't worry about me. I'm with a good crew and I can
take care of myself. You need to take care of yourself. Talk to
your mission counselor.

"Malcolm," she said in response to Liz's raised
eyebrow. "He's flipping out."

"He was a lot of fun at that candidate meet-and-greet
party." Her forehead wrinkled with concern. "I didn't know you were
still seeing him?"

"I'm not, not really. We've each had so much
training, different duty schedules..."

"He should talk to his counselor if he's upset."

"That's what I'm telling him."

She read the pad again and hit send.

When the public information officer walked in, he had
more details, but no more insight. "I've received a few suggestions
to change your mission," he said. "But there's not enough time to
explore what unintended consequences could arise. And no one wants
to miss a launch window. So the
Explorers Mission
is still a
go."

James must have been holding his breath. He heaved
out a sigh in relief, Liz and Claude nodded, and Emma ignored the
tightness in her stomach.

"But if any of you want to drop out... I'll try to
place you on another flight, but I can't make any guarantees."

"I'm ready to go," Claude said and the others nodded
resolutely.

Emma's back straightened and her jaw set. "I'm not
dropping out."

"I knew you'd all feel that way." He smiled
grimly.

Emma sat with her crewmates the rest of the day,
abandoning plans for a final walk along the shore. They followed
reports from Kamp, watched as Ingra's body was carried beyond the
colony's construction zone for burial, and as the airlock was
cleaned and closed. Colony Mars issued a formal statement and began
planning a memorial service. Emma was sorry they'd miss the
ceremony, but not sorry she'd miss the subtle fund-raising that
would, no doubt, be embedded in the eulogies.

The launch window wouldn't wait and she had to pack -
they all did. The crew's flight to Spaceport America would leave
Rotterdam airport the next day.

Then on to Mars.

Chapter Three:
Spaceport

Spaceport America's main terminal squatted like a
huge horseshoe crab shoved into New Mexico's desert floor. Dry
mountains rose in the distance and roads crisscrossed a sandy plain
to launch pads, past low scrubby trees raising gray-green leaves to
the blue sky. It was the end of the rainy season and birds flitted
across the landscape, searching for ripening seeds.

The reception party was canceled after Ingra's death,
but a banner still hung at their arrival gate:
Welcome Colony
Mars Settler 3 Explorers
.

Ground-support teams met them, accompanied by
spaceport officials. They'd spend two nights in the spaceport's
elegant hotel before shuttling out to the launch site.

Emma carried two duffle bags to her room. Settlers
took few personal possessions with them and she dropped that small
bag on the closet floor. The second bag held what she'd need for
her time at the spaceport. She'd leave it behind.

The room was huge. The bed alone was larger than her
room on Mars would be, where she'd have a bunk in one of the
repurposed ship modules. Kamp's dormitory bay wouldn't be built for
years.

She activated her link and made a voice contact.

"Hi Mom. I'm at the spaceport."

Her mother had vacillated between congratulations and
tears throughout Emma's training. Today it was tears.

"I can't believe you're really going," she said with
a sniffle. "Living on Mars! It doesn't seem real. What are you
going to
do
every day?"

"Mom, didn't you read the Colony Mars mission site?"
She'd tried to explain a dozen times. Her mother never paid
attention for long.

"Yes. Well, some of it. What's this about you eating
worms? Sounds dreadful."

"It's practical. The first two missions have been
living on space rations while they build the basic settlement bays.
There's room to plant gardens now and - yes - raise mealworms for
protein. Fish, too, if that sounds better to you. But the exciting
part is the exploration robots - we're taking the rovers and
walkabout suits from Dad's company."

Colony Mars engineers had argued for simple surface
buggies, but her father could be eloquent. He'd convinced
management that rovers fully integrated with the colony's AI would
be more flexible and safer. And if the high-tech interface failed,
Emma explained, she could strip it out and go back to manual
operation.

"You and your Dad are like two peas in a pod on this
robot thing." Her mother laughed through her sniffles." I never
could follow the conversations you had, even when you were a little
girl."

According to her mother, her father's early business
ventures all failed. But he started a robotics company about the
time she was born and it took off. Mom wasn't interested in
robotics or business and Emma couldn't remember a time when her
father wasn't working long hours. It was no surprise that her
parents divorced shortly after she started college.

It was her father who got Emma interested in
engineering, in robotics, and in Mars. After she finished her
engineering degree, he gave her a job on his contracts for the
colony - much more exciting than tweaking designs on domestic bots,
which is what new-hires usually did. All his talk about destiny in
space inspired her to apply. That, and the chance to personally
test the robots on the Martian surface. Emma's enthusiasm bubbled
up as she talked about the walkabouts.

"The adjustable seals on the walkabouts were a real
challenge. I had to..."

"It sounds very interesting, dear. I'm sure your
father's thrilled, though I haven't heard from him lately."

Emma sighed. She should know better - Mom could only
listen to technical talk for so long.

"I've arrived at my maker-space, so I've got to go.
I'm going to miss you so much." Her mother smiled through tears.
"I'm proud of you and so happy you're following your dream."

Emma flopped across the coral and turquoise bedspread
as the link closed. Her mother never shared her zeal for
engineering - Emma was her father's child in that way. He'd
encouraged her, though mostly from a distance, answering her
messages late at night from his lab or while traveling. She'd
treasured every message he sent and saved them all. Sometimes it
was hard to tell where his passion stopped and hers began. Emma
hoped she was following her dream.

***

Emma expected to have the next morning to herself,
but as she dressed her link beeped, summoning her to a meeting,
immediately. She'd already pulled on a tee-shirt and old jeans -
comfortable old jeans she'd leave behind. She decided not to change
and headed for the room noted in the message, trying to ignore her
growling stomach.