8
Castle Rock
The sunwing soared over Mars, heading northward. The canyonlands and chaos of Aurorae were replaced by the channels and erosional remnants of Chryse. The eroded mesas and depositional bars of boulders and gravel grew smaller and farther apart as the sunwing headed north, downhill toward one of Mars’ ancient sea beds. Finally, it was flying over the smooth wastes of the ancient marine plain and its abyssal muds.
Will and Ethel looked out their windows and watched the progression of terrain. The sunwing had left the Outpost at dawn and, after a thirteen-hour flight, was closing on the landing area on the edge of Acidalia Planitia. The early spring sun was still in the sky, illuminating the area with its slanted rays.
“I’m ready to drop the food package,” Ethel reported over the radio. She sat in the pilot’s seat up front, where the windows gave stereoscopic views of the terrain below.
“We copy,” replied Roger, who was in the conestoga below.
Ethel looked at the bullseye roughly traced on the ground and glanced at the computer screen, which displayed a schematic of the sunwing’s trajectory and the release point. She was approaching that point. When the screen showed that she was at the right spot she pulled a small lever.
The sunwing lurched upward; it was 100 kilograms lighter. She looked at another screen that displayed the ground from a camera beneath her seat. The package plunged downward, its airbags deploying. It landed in the bullseye, bounced back into the air, then landed again.
“Good shot, Ethel!” exclaimed Roger.
“Piece of cake, with this software. I’m swinging around for landing, now.” Ethel banked the sunwing eastward. They caught a quick glimpse of the 500 meter crater next to the landing area, which had punched through the Noachian muds and into permafrost; its ejecta blanket was dominated by mud flows formed when the wet ejecta had behaved like a slurry.
Will watched over her shoulder, fascinated, as Ethel flew the Sunwing southward a kilometer, dropping them lower to the ground, until she banked again and headed northward one last time, approaching the landing area and slowing the sunwing, ailerons extended. There was nearly no wind. The landing area was flat and smooth. The jets came on to cancel out their last hundred fifty kilometers per hour of horizontal velocity. When they touched down there barely a bump.
Ethel cut the power to the props and began to shut down the systems. Four figures in pressure suits were outside watching. She waved and they approached.
The outside crew placed rocks under the wheels to stabilize the sunwing so that a gust of wind wouldn’t move it while Will and Ethel depressurized the interior and removed the pressure seal over the zippers in the rear. Finally they were able to remove the clamps and carefully, slowly, unzip the two layers of pressure membrane, then the outer layer as well. Will, then Ethel pushed out and stepped onto the ground.
“Welcome, welcome!” exclaimed Shinji. He reached out to shake their hands; they hugged him instead.
“It’s good to see you, Shinji! You’re a sight for sore eyes!”
“I’m sorry we won’t have time to catch up; we don’t have a lot of time before sunset,” replied Shinji. “I hope it was a good flight?”
“Yes, very comfortable,” replied Will. “She drove and I slept.”
“The view was spectacular; I spent most of my time looking out the window,” added Ethel.
“I wish I could see it, but my return flight will be all night,” replied Shinji.
Roger hurried up, suitcase in hand. He shook their hands as well. “It looks like you’re ready to go!” said Will to Roger.
“I am; it’ll be good to be home, even if it’s only for two weeks. Y’all don’t discover something important in my absence, now!”
“We’ll try not to,” replied Will, jokingly. “I suppose we had better get our luggage and help out.”
He and Ethel reached inside and pulled out their suitcases and hauled them over to the nearest ranger, then returned—walking stiffly, after sitting most of the day—to help with the sunwing. One pair of oxygen and methane tanks had been changed; the other pair was proving difficult, but Paul was hard at work on it. Ethel grabbed her tools attached to her belt and removed the sunwing’s plastic waste tank, which was dangerously close to full. It came off fairly easily and she hauled it to the ranger, where she had seen the replacement. She attached it and checked the fittings. Meanwhile, Will climbed back inside and changed the water tank so the new passengers would have something to drink. Roger and Shinji said goodbye to everyone, then climbed in to zip up the cabin and checked everything out for takeoff. They brought in with them their suitcases and one hundred kilograms of samples.
In fifteen minutes everything had been changed and the Sunwing was ready for launch. They removed the stones blocking the wheels. Sebastian, who was piloting the sunwing remotely from the Outpost, gave a countdown to liftoff; neither Roger nor Shinji were certified to fly it, though they could manage in an emergency. At zero, Sebastian activated the carbon dioxide jets and the sunwing rose vertically three meters, then began to accelerate diagonally as its propellers began to spin at maximum speed. In less than a minute the aircraft was flying.
“Thanks a lot, guys!” exclaimed Roger. “See you again in a few weeks!”
“Enjoy the flight!” replied Ethel. She switched frequencies. “No one cook anything; we’ve got a surprise for you.”
“Great! We’re tired of dehydrated tv dinners!” replied Érico.
The three vehicles approached each other. Ethel lined up her ranger with the conestoga’s rear airlock and backed toward it, and in a few minutes managed a hard dock; then the other ranger approached the conestoga’s north side and docked the portahab against the door there. In the conestoga, Carmen pushed a button that pressurized the rear tunnel, enabling people to walk from vehicle to vehicle without a pressure suit. They had a convenient nightly base.
“The tunnel’s now pressurized,” she finally reported.
“Good.” Ethel turned to Will; he already had the two pressure cooker pots in hand. “This is going to be interesting, an expedition made up of three couples.”
“Yes; at least until Érico and Carmen rotate back to the outpost in two weeks and are replaced by Armando.” Will opened the hatch. He and Ethel stepped into the tunnel to the conestoga, closed the door behind them, then opened the other door and stepped into the conestoga at the same time as Carmen and Érico. They greeted all four of the others at once.
“Welcome to Castle Station!” exclaimed Paul.
Monika was next to him. “It’s so good to see you here!” she added.
“Thank you; we’re glad to be here.” Ethel embraced Monika; they had become good friends. Will and Paul embraced as well, as it had become the thing to do during welcomes. Then Will embraced Carmen and Ethel embraced Érico.
“I’ve never heard this called Castle Station before,” said Will.
“There’s a rock on the rim of the crater that looks a little like the turret of a castle, so we’re calling the crater Castle Crater; hence the name of the station,” replied Érico.
“We’ve been here ten days,” noted Monika. “It deserves a name. This has been a good base of operations. We’ve pushed the route another three hundred fifty kilometers farther south, but the two vehicles pushing farther south have always come back here because the ranger here has been busy with the drills.”
“I hear the drill casings are coming up with fossils?” asked Will.
“Absolutely!” exclaimed Monika, enthusiastically. “The drill has penetrated through three hundred meters of sea bottom sediments, with no end in sight. We can only drill a hundred meters more. It’s been fine-grained clay, mixed with occasional volcanic ash falls, crater ejecta, and boulders rafted in by icebergs. The clay has been two to four percent organic matter, with zillions of partially preserved microfossils.”
“You must be in heaven.”
“You can’t imagine it!” she replied.
“The sediments are wet, too, I hear,” added Ethel.
“Saturated,” replied Paul. “Nothing is dry, like in the equatorial regions. Castle Crater’s floor is pretty fresh; the crater is about five million years old. It’s mostly a block of permafrost. We’ve installed the water harvesting tent and we’re getting up to one hundred kilos of water a day.”
“No wonder we didn’t have to haul the water in our fuel cell exhaust here,” said Ethel. “We were able to fly higher and faster because we were allowed to throw away water as it was produced.”
“No loss; we have plenty here!” replied Paul. “We’ve been using lower power settings on the recycling units and throwing the gray water away. And the farther north we go, the more water there will be lying around.”
“When do we leave, anyway?” asked Will. He looked at Érico, who was commander of the expedition until his departure, at which point Will would take over.
“I was thinking we’d leave tomorrow,” replied Érico. “Ranger 1 and the conestoga will drive straight to the end of the route, then push it farther north, making very short stops for geology. Ranger 2 and the portahab with Paul and Monika will stay here to monitor the drill. In two weeks when Carmen and I are rotated back to the Outpost, both vehicles will drive back here. The expedition will pack up Castle Station and all three vehicles will head north. We’ll do a little more postponed geology, then push the route as far north as we can in the next month or two.”
“You’re moving faster on the flat plain, I bet,” said Will.
Érico nodded. “There are very few rocks. We can push the route northward as much as fifty or sixty kilometers per day under these conditions.”
“Wow.” Will thought a moment. “And from here we’re three hundred or so kilometers from the southern edge of the winter cap, and two thousand kilometers from the edge of the permanent cap.”
“The route is already extended to the area that gets snow in the winter; but of course there’s no snow there now. If we can continue the pace of fifty klicks a day, it’s another forty days to the permanent cap unless the dune fields slow us down significantly,” agreed Érico. “This three-vehicle system for exploring has worked out very well. The machines have been reliable, the solar power has worked out well, the Sunwings can move us around and deliver supplies, and the six of us have had a lot of fun together. It’s really been great!”
“I’m glad to hear it,” said Ethel. “And I’m very happy to be a part of it.”
“So, what do you have for us?” asked Carmen, pointing at the pressure cookers.
“One of Madhu’s rice dishes, complete with chicken and vegetables,” replied Will. “And before we landed, we heated it up! The other pot has more of the same. We’ve got half of Mars’s first rice harvest here.”
“Martian rice?” asked Carmen, surprised.
“The paddy’s beginning to be productive,” said Ethel. “Oh my God, Will; we promised to sent pressure pots back to the Outpost on that sunwing!”
Will chuckled. “They have two left, there; that’ll be difficult! We’ll have to send the pots back on the cargo flight next week.”
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The next morning Érico, Carmen, Will, and Ethel said goodbye to Paul and Monika and headed north on the route. Ethel and Carmen rode in the conestoga and took the lead; Érico and Will followed behind. The route was smooth and clear and they drove along at sixty kilometers per hour, the maximum speed of the vehicles, occasionally slowing down when the computer warned of bumps or curves. At that rate, the end of the route was a five-hour drive.
“It’s incredible how flat it is here,” said Will. “Like parts of the American great plains; not a bump or roll, except for an occasional crater.”
“Actually, it’s flatter than any plains on dry land; it’s more comparable to the abyssal plains at the bottom of the oceans,” said Érico. “Just think, once there was tens or hundreds of meters of water over our heads here, and this was a quiet water depositional environment with mud sifting down through the water, disturbed only by an occasional boulder rafted in by an iceberg. And now look at it, 3.9 billion years later; the water is long gone, the mud is rock, and the soft surface is peppered with rocks tossed here from meteor impacts, and half the area is blanketed with eolian deposits! It looks totally different.”
“It is amazing. I think I much prefer the canyonlands and the rolling highlands, though. There’s practically no geology to do here, except stop at a crater and see what it punched through.”
“That’s true,” agreed Érico. “The poor state of preservation of the fossils is disappointing, too; we were hoping to find frozen intact organisms. Even so, this work grows on you, doesn’t it?”
“Yes, very much so. Mars grows on you, I think. Not a tiny or simple place; a geological jigsaw puzzle almost as complex as Earth, and that’s saying a lot. Much more complex than the moon.”
“Yes, definitely. Even Roger’s beginning to realize what that means. I mean emotionally; he’s always understood that intellectually, of course. I’m beginning to wonder whether he’s thinking about staying an extra cycle.”
“What did he say?” Will was curious.
“He was always saying that his two years on Mars would allow him to return to the moon and even the Earth and look at them in total different ways. That hasn’t changed, but now maybe he’s thinking that four years will give him even better perspective than two.”
“Good! The more who stay, the better, as far as I’m concerned. Are you thinking about staying?”
“Yes, definitely. As I said at the Outpost, this place is growing on me. Are you leaving with Columbus 2?”
“I don’t think so; Ethel and I are leaning toward two more years. What about Carmen?”
“She’s thinking about staying. Which raises interesting questions about whether we should get married, since if we return to Earth, it will be very hard for both of us to stay in our respective astronaut corps, and hard for either of us to transfer to another astronaut corps.”
“That was our concern, too. You might be able to work together at ISS-2 or the moon, though. A married couple just served together at ISS-2; it was a first.”
“Yes, a ‘scandal.’” Érico shook his head. “You Americans have strange notions about romance and sex, I think. If Brazil had been able to send two astronauts to ISS-2 at the same time, we might have sent up a couple years ago. But Brazil only has one six-month slot per year at ISS-2, and the same at Shackleton. There’s pressure to eliminate the position at ISS-2, too. I doubt Carmen and I could coordinate things to be there at the same time.”
“A good reason to stay here, then.”
“Yes, exactly. In two years, and certainly in four years, we’d have enough money in the bank to return to Earth and retire if we want to. Of course, we still don’t know whether we want to get married.”
“That can be a difficult decision to make. Ethel and I are very happy together, and very happy here. It has worked out very well.”
“I’m glad to hear that! The two of you are role models of sorts for us. We’re both young enough to stay here a while, then go back to Earth and start a family. We get along very well, too. It’s just not clear what the point of actually getting married would be.”
“I think the two of you make a good couple; you are very comfortable together. I suppose the answer to the question why get married, in my mind, is that it is simply a promise of commitment. It means you will try to make the relationship work even when it might be difficult. That’s particularly important if you ever have children; it is much better to raise them in a stable emotional environment, with both mom and dad around. So to me, marriage is not imposing an unreasonably set of expectations; it is simply a public way of saying you are partners throughout life’s challenges.”
“Yes, I understand that; but it’s still not clear to me that it’s necessary if you aren’t planning to have children.”
“Knowing the other person is committed to you is pretty comforting.”
“Yes, I suppose.” Érico seemed unwilling to argue with Will. “All the research shows the pendulum is swinging back toward marriage, at least in Brazil. After bashing tradition, people are now embracing it.”
“The same in the States,” agreed Will. “You know, the Outpost could be a pretty pleasant place to live for quite a long time—say, a decade—in a few more years. What it needs is more people; say, 20 or 30 people. If half the arrivals stayed six years, the Outpost would have sixteen; if twelve came each time, it’d have twenty-four. And the cost of keeping the twenty-four here wouldn’t be much more than it is now, because we’re getting close to raising all the food we need.”
“Think what we could do with twenty-four.”
“And three more vehicles; we could run two expeditions at once.”
“We could set out to clear Route One all the way around the equator, from the eastern and western ends. How long would that take?” Érico calculated. “About a year. Not bad. But someone would have to spend a billion importing more equipment, and no one’s willing right now.”
“I know. The space agencies have been hesitant to commit permanently to Mars, so far. It’s still not clear Columbus 3 will fly eight here.”
“Brazil has said it won’t send someone, though it might on Columbus 4.”
“And the various Mars societies have a bad relationship with the space agencies.”
“Of course. They’re seen as unscientific, and the space agencies are claiming scientific justification for exploring this place. It’s a shame, too; they’re natural allies.”
“I wonder if there’s anything we can do to bridge the gap,” mused Will. “We’re the ideal group to do it, after all.”
“We should talk more to the media about this place. Sebastian has been very tolerant of our interacting with the media. It’s too difficult to control; Sebastian isn’t an employee of NASA, and the Portuguese-speaking media wants to talk to me, not to NASA!”
“There are more restrictions on me, as a NASA employee. But you’re right, the non-Americans have more freedom.”
“Well, I’ll see what I can do. I have several very sympathetic contacts in the Brazilian and Portuguese television networks.”
“Good idea.”
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They postponed lunch to reach the end of the route. After eating they started bulldozing the route forward across the vast, flat, stony plain. They steered by global positioning coordinates because there were no reliable landmarks. About 3 p.m. they reached a two-kilometer crater and went out to explore. They came back inside at sunset, docked the conestoga and the ranger together for the night, and ate a late supper.
“I had a fascinating conversation with Carmen,” said Ethel, as they prepared to go to bed in the front of the conestoga. “She’s really enjoying the exploration and the research she’s doing. She’s definitely leaning toward another two years here.”
“Érico told me the same thing. I think their attraction to each other has reinforced it, too; if they go back to Earth they’ll have to choose between each other or their careers.”
“They live on different continents, but here they live in the same place. Carmen really loves him, too. I think she wants to marry him.”
“He’s hesitant, though. I could see that. But I don’t think we should push the matter.”
“I’m not going to push, but a few hints won’t do any harm.” She smiled puckishly.
“Érico and I were talking about the future here. We both think it’s a good idea to educate the public more about Mars. We need to be more active about selling this place to our various nations.”
“I agree, and that’s something practical Sebastian would support. You should talk to him.”
“I will.”
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The next morning the four of them ate breakfast together. Just as they were finishing, they decided to call Sebastian together. Will set up an attaché—a device that was computer and videophone—and they punched in Sebastian’s number. The communication and navigational satellite in orbit automatically relayed the call to the Outpost, and his attaché began to ring.
“Good sol,” he said, using the greeting that had become standard on Mars. Then he saw the four faces crowded around the screen. “What’s happening? I never get a call from four at once.”
“We have an idea, and we want to share it with you,” replied Will. “Érico and I were talking about it yesterday; he and I talked to Ethel and Carmen last night, and all four of us talked about it this morning. Here it is September 6th; we’re three and half months from conjunction and four months from the final decisions about the composition of Columbus 3. Columbus 2 is going well by everyone’s measure, and there are no ‘scandals’ for the journalists to play with. So it occurred to us that it is time to go on the media offensive and educate the public about Mars. We can strengthen our various space agencies in their efforts to finalize the funding for Columbus 3 and possibly strengthen the commitment to development of a permanent human outpost here. Almost all of us have contacts in the media we like and get along with well.”
Sebastian stroked his chin, thinking. “I see your logic, and it makes sense. Of course, we should run this past NASA and the other agencies. But admittedly, by the time we did and they made a decision, it’d be conjunction already. And we do have some latitude in our access to the media.”
“Some people will get mad at us for doing this,” said Will. “Roger would have a better idea of who than anyone else here. We could also ask Laura and David for the reactions in Houston and Paris; they’ll definitely know.”
“Those are good ideas. You know, my suggestion would be to keep this low key. Érico can get away with more than the Americans and Europeans; so can Paul, as a Canadian, and his comments will be carried in the U.S. as well. Shinji already has pretty wide latitude speaking to the Japanese press.”
“I may have more latitude as well,” noted Ethel. “Because of my seniority here and because I haven’t been commander.”
“That’s true. You could even be interviewed by British press with Will, too.” Sebastian nodded. “I like the idea, I really do. The eleven people of Columbus 2 are doing at least twice as much as the six of Columbus 1. This place needs a decent number of personnel; twenty would be great, fifty would be even better. Otherwise, we’ll never explore this world decently. The new commercial shuttle will reduce launch costs five fold, and that reduces the cost of flying people and cargo here about five fold as well. The agencies need to keep their financial commitment constant rather than their personnel commitment! So let’s start out carefully, gradually, see how the first few go, then point out to our public information agencies how well these coincidental interviews went. How does that sound?”
“Great,” replied Érico. “I’ll arrange something informal with one of Brazil’s big morning news and variety shows. I know the female anchor.”
“Good; do it. I’ll suggest Shinji do the same for early next week. Ethel, you aim for late next week; I’ll ask Paul look for something the week later. I agree that we need to do more to support expansion. Now, how’s the exploring?”
“We cleared sixteen kilometers in half a day and had time to explore a crater,” replied Érico. “Even with a ranger and a conestoga, we should do at least thirty klicks a day.”
“There’s not much to see, and not many rocks to move,” agreed Sebastian. “Good. By the way, when Érico and Carmen rotate back here in two weeks, only Armando will come down. We can run the expedition with five, for a while. I’d really like to have six here at the Outpost; we need to do more with the Prospectors and we have a lot of maintenance, horticultural, and manufacturing work to do.”
“But Sebastian, we can do Prospector stuff here, and six gives us more redundancy,” replied Will, concerned. “You’ve got plenty of medical equipment there and lots of safety in the habitats. We’re the ones on the front line.”
“Will, I know; I was there for eight weeks, remember. And I plan to return in about six weeks. Roger will be back too, but I’m not sure when. The expedition will manage just fine with five.”
“Okay,” replied Will, concerned.
“Look, this whole plan was yours, and it has proved to be brilliant,” said Sebastian. “We’re staying in the northern polar region until just before conjunction; that’ll leave time to explore the layered terrains, the permanent ice, maybe do some drilling, etc. It’s going to be an incredible accomplishment and will go down in history. Then we’ll all be back here at the Outpost for a month or so at conjunction, and we’ll all take a nice vacation. Then we’ll have about seven months left and we’ll explore south and east, as you wish. Five people will be plenty.”